Articles

Emily Lakdawalla

The first astrobiology session at last week's Lunar and Planetary Science Conference featured talks on a huge variety of interesting topics, and was one of my favorite sessions at the meeting.

Casey Dreier

The James Webb Space Telescope will miss its target launch date and cost more money than expected, NASA announced.

Emily Lakdawalla

On this Moon Monday, I'm featuring an animation processed by Gordan Ugarkovic, showing Jupiter's volcanic moon Io with its prominent plumes.

Jake Robins

Mars today is a dynamic place. One visually dramatic sign of change on Mars is

Emily Lakdawalla

Emily's first report from the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference is on the solar system's most atmospheriffic satellite, Saturn's moon Titan.

Raymond Francis

Since 2016, NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has had the ability to choose its own science targets using an onboard intelligent targeting system called AEGIS.

Emily Lakdawalla

To start the week, Voyager 2's best image of Tethys.

Emily Lakdawalla

InSight, NASA's next Mars mission, has arrived at Vandenberg Air Force Base in preparation for a May 5 launch.

A.J.S. Rayl

When Opportunity’s 5000th day dawned in February, it was a meaningful milestone for the team, and it led to a personal first for the veteran robot field geologist that has chalked up so many firsts she’s set the standard for Mars rovers.

Emily Lakdawalla

The Planetary Society has always enjoyed the connections between science and art, so when I saw Leila Qışın's sketches pop up on her Twitter feed during the recent New Horizons team meeting, I knew I had to share them with you.

Emily Lakdawalla

In a milestone for the mission, JAXA's Hayabusa2 sample return spacecraft has sighted its destination, asteroid Ryugu.

Heather Hunter

While we can measure properties of these upper layers using ground-based instruments, satellite-borne remote sensing instruments can give us a more frequent, global, and often higher spatial resolution perspective. And that is precisely what NASA’s Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD) mission will deliver.

Emily Lakdawalla

After a hiatus of nearly 500 sols, Curiosity is ready to attempt drilling into a Mars rock again.

Emily Lakdawalla

Last week the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity celebrated its 5000th sol on Mars, and it celebrated by taking the first complete Mars Exploration Rover self-portrait.

Emily Lakdawalla

Some of the biggest discoveries we make in planetary science rely on the seemingly simple act of picking up and analyzing pieces of other worlds. When things go awry, scientists and engineers can sometimes squeeze amazing science out of a tough situation.

Emily Lakdawalla

NASA has announced changes to how engineers are operating Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in order to prolong its life as long as possible, long enough to support the Mars 2020 rover mission.

A.J.S. Rayl

In January, Opportunity quietly completed 14 years of surface operations on Mars—the longest-lived robot on another planet.

Jim Bell

Just this past week, assembly of the Mastcam-Z EQM was completed, and we saw for the first time what one of our Mars zoom cameras would really look like.

Tom Dahl

Viking enthusiast Tom Dahl has created an animation demonstrating the operation of the Viking lander's Surface Sampler Acquisition Assembly, or

Emily Lakdawalla

Throughout 2018, New Horizons will cruise toward its January 1 encounter with 2014 MU69. Preparations for the flyby are nearly complete.