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Stories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
#DPS17: Wobbling the Moon and art by James Tuttle Keane
James Tuttle Keane is increasingly famous (among planetary scientists anyway) for his remarkable illustrated notes from conferences. Here's his work from the Division for Planetary Sciences meeting, illustrating both his own and others' research.
Cassini’s Last Dance With Saturn: The Farewell Mosaic
Amateur image processor Ian Regan shares the story of processing Cassini's final images of the ringed planet.
A new year's worth of Mars Orbiter Mission data
India's Mars Orbiter Mission has now completed three years in orbit at Mars, and ISRO celebrated the anniversary by releasing the mission's second-year data to the public. Emily Lakdawalla spent a week downloading and processing data for your enjoyment.
Earth flyby tests OSIRIS-REx's cameras
As expected, OSIRIS-REx's Earth flyby on September 22 was a success. The mission is slowly releasing beautiful images of our home worlds taken by its many cameras following the flyby.
Curiosity update, sols 1726-1813: Surveying Vera Rubin Ridge from below
Curiosity had a productive three months driving along the front of Vera Rubin Ridge, gathering photos and data with its arm instruments, finally driving up on to the ridge on sol 1809.
Voyager 40th anniversary: Revisiting the Voyagers' planetary views
Björn Jónsson argues that even now, 40 years after Voyager 1 and 2 were launched, a lot of the data they returned is still of high interest.
Voyager 40th Anniversary: Watching an Alien World Turn
In 1979, both Voyager missions captured thousands of photos of Jupiter as frames of movies of the giant planet spinning among its moons. In honor of the mission's 40th launch anniversary, Ian Regan has reprocessed the data to produce stunning new movies.
Voyager 40th anniversary: The transformation of the solar system
The Voyager missions transformed most of the large worlds of the solar system from points of light into places to be explored.
Curiosity update, sols 1675-1725: Traverse to Vera Rubin Ridge
Curiosity has had a busy eight weeks, driving south from the Bagnold Dunes toward Vera Rubin Ridge. The path has steepened and the rover is now rapidly climbing upward with every meter traveled. It's been a productive time for arm instruments, but the drill is still not working.
Pretty Pictures of the Cosmos: Waltzing Through the Universe
Award-winning astrophotographer Adam Block brings us more of his stunning images of the universe—this time of cosmic dances through space.
Saturn's small satellites, to scale
Emily shares another of her popular size comparisons of solar system bodies, taking advantage of Cassini's recent views of Saturn's tiniest moons.
Cassini's 'Grand Finale' Portrait of Saturn
Amateur image processor Ian Regan shares a stunning mosaic of Saturn in all its ringed glory.
Jupiter from New Horizons
Using new image processing techniques, Alex Parker brings new life to an old image of Jupiter captured by the New Horizons mission on its way to Pluto over a decade ago.
A journey to Jupiter: Amateur astronomers create 1,000-image video of planet in motion
Peter Rosén shares an amazing animation of Jupiter made from more than 1,000 images taken by 91 amateurs from around the world.
Saturn and Titan in the Milky Way
An unusual photo of Saturn by astrophotographer Damian Peach shows the planet and its largest moon nestled among the star-filled lane of the Milky Way.
Earth's ring system: This mosaic shows 46+ geostationary satellites in one image
Astrophotographer Adam Block captures 46 geostationary satellites, plus some unnamed stragglers, in one 10-frame image mosaic.
Curiosity update, sols 1600-1674: The second Bagnold Dunes campaign
The four-stop dune science campaign offered the engineers some time to continue troubleshooting the drill without any pressure to use it for science. They scooped sand at a site called Ogunquit Beach but couldn't complete the planned sample activity because of new developments in the drill inquiry. The rover has now headed onward toward Vera Rubin Ridge.
New treasures from Juno: Jupiter dazzles during fourth close approach
Image processor Björn Jónsson shares some of his latest stunning images of Jupiter, created using data from NASA's Juno spacecraft.
Cassini, with only a half-year to go at Saturn, just keeps dropping awesome images
Our latest roundup of Cassini goodies from Saturn includes Pan, a ravioli-shaped moon that orbits inside the planet's ring system.
MAVEN dodges Phobos, with (maybe) a little help from Curiosity
This week MAVEN had to execute a short rocket burn in order to prevent a future collision with Phobos. Curiosity (and other rovers) may have played a role in those trajectory predictions.



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