Explore Worlds
Find Life
Defend Earth
All
All
Sun
Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Small BodiesStories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
More Evidence for Impact Origin for Colombia’s Vichada Structure
Evidence continues to pile up that the Rio Vichada structure in Colombia is indeed the largest impact structure in South America.
La Sagra Observatory discovers very near-Earth asteroid 2012 DA14
With a new CCD camera configured to shoot rapid, short exposures bought with a Planetary Society Shoemaker NEO Grant we caught near-Earth asteroid 2012 DA14.
Shoemaker NEO Grant Update: Asteroid discoveries from La Sagra
In spite of some bad weather conditions during the first part of this year, the new camera bought with funds from a Planetary Society Shoemaker Near Earth Object grant helped us to discover and confirm ten new near-Earth objects.
The 2010 Gene Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients
In 2010, The Planetary Society awarded $33,285 as part of its Gene Shoemaker Near Earth Object (NEO) Grant Program. The grants were made to a group of international researchers to find, track, and characterize potentially hazardous NEOs.
The Potential to Destroy Civilization? Now on YouTube
Visualization can help the brain comprehend what words and numbers can struggle to covey. There's a YouTube video posted by
Apply for a Shoemaker NEO Grant! Deadline extended to June 24
Amateur astronomers, get your proposals in for this year's round of Shoemaker NEO Grants!
Making a difference through the Shoemaker NEO Grants
Amir Alexander has just posted an update on the activities of the most recent winners of the Shoemaker NEO Grants.
Updates on Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients (18 March 2010)
Our past Shoemaker NEO grant recipients have once again shown themselves to be a hardworking and enterprising group.
Propose for a Shoemaker Near Earth Object Grant
Are you a serious amateur astronomer who enjoys the challenge of following up on the discoveries of faint near-Earth objects?
Planetary Society Researcher Max Rocca Discovers Largest Impact Crater in South America
It was January of 2004 when the elegant curve of the Vichada first caught the attention of geologist Max Rocca of Buenos Aires. Could the course of the river have been shaped by the circular outlines of an impact crater? Rocca decided to find out.
WISE has found its first comet, P/2010 B2 (WISE)
Having discovered its first asteroid on January 12, Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) has now officially discovered its first comet, P/2010 B2 (WISE).
Apophis is less scary than it used to be
Based on analyses of previously unstudied telescopic data, NASA scientists have released new predictions for the path of the 300-meter-diameter asteroid Apophis.
Grant Winners at the 2009 Planetary Defense Conference
A few days ago I had the honor of announcing the latest winners of The Planetary Society's Gene Shoemaker NEO grants here at the Planetary Defense Conference in Granada.
The 2009 Gene Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients
In 2009, The Planetary Society awarded $18,300 as part of its Gene Shoemaker Near Earth Object (NEO) Grant Program. The grants were made to a group of international researchers to find, track, and characterize potentially hazardous NEOs.
More from the Planetary Defense Conference: Shoemaker Grant Winners
More from the Planetary Defense Conference: Shoemaker Grant Winners
Updates on the 2007 Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients (27 April 2009)
Our 2007 Shoemaker NEO Grant winners have been extremely busy over the past two years. Take for example Quanzhi Ye of Guangzhou, China: He was only 18 when he received the award but already the principal investigator of the sky survey at the Lulin Observatory in Taiwan.
Updates on the 2007 Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients (27 June 2008)
Amateur astronomers play a critical role in retiring the risk of impact from near-Earth objects. When the Shoemaker NEO Grant program began in 1997, the focus was on finding previously undiscovered objects one kilometer in diameter and larger. Thanks to professional NEO survey programs like LINEAR (the Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research program run by MIT’s Lincoln Laboratories) and the Catalina Sky Survey (run from the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory), the goal of discovering the vast majority of large NEOs is within reach, and the focus of the Shoemaker NEO Grant Program has shifted to astrometric follow-up and physical studies.
The 2007 Gene Shoemaker NEO Grant Recipients
In 2007, The Planetary Society awarded $34,500 as part of its Gene Shoemaker Near Earth Object (NEO) Grant Program. The grants were made to a group of international researchers to find, track, and characterize potentially hazardous NEOs.
Updates from Past Recipients of the Shoemaker NEO Grants (1 March 2007)
Thanks to The Planetary Society Shoemaker Grant, the 1.06-meter KLENOT telescope optics was completed at the Klet Observatory. Regular observations of the KLENOT project started in March 2002 under the new IAU/MPC code 246, so we can now present results covering 5 years of this work.