All
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Stories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
By Jove! (Literally)
Jupiter’s moons have always been exciting to explore, and a new era of Jovian moon research is about to begin.
Where are the ocean worlds in our solar system?
Ocean worlds are among the best candidates to search for life.
Proximity and distance
Looking at planets and moons from near and far, and figuring out how to get all the way out there.
Venusian Probes and UFOs
Venus is an intimidating destination for spacecraft, and we’re pretty sure Earth hasn’t yet been a destination for aliens.
Voyager Wide-Angle Views of Jupiter
Last month marked the 40th anniversary of the historic Voyager 1 encounter with Jupiter in 1979.
Moon Monday: Galileo's Galileans
This week it seems fitting to feature a portrait of the Galilean moons by Galileo.
#LPSC2018: Groovy Galilean satellites
The Jovian system is a busy place. The Groovy Galilean Satellites session at last week's Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) covered analysis of past mission data, testable hypotheses for future missions, and discussion of the use of ground-based data.
Explore spinnable Saturn and Jupiter moons with Google Maps
Google Maps released several new map products that allow you to see the locations of named features on many solar system planets and non-planets, spinning them around in space with your mouse.
Will Juno’s Instruments Observe the Moons of Jupiter?
It is not easy to observe Jupiter’s moons as more than points of light with Juno, because Juno will never get very close to any of the moons, but as its orbit shifts there will be opportunities to collect data on some of the moons.
Juno has arrived!
For a second time, NASA has placed a spacecraft into orbit at Jupiter. The spacecraft operated exactly according to plan, and Juno successfully entered orbit today, July 5, 2016, UTC
A peek at the JunoCam approach movie
We're now just about 12 hours away from Juno's Jupiter orbit insertion. As anticipation ramps up, NASA has released this sneak peek at JunoCam's approach movie, made of views of Jupiter and its largest moons shot during the final approach, up until about five days ago.
New work with 35-year-old data: Voyagers at Ganymede and Saturn
The Voyager data set is a gift to Earth that keeps on giving. This week, I've seen three great new images processed from this old data set.
LPSC 2016: Icy Satellite Science
This year’s Lunar and Planetary Science Conference devoted two oral presentation sessions to questions related to icy satellites in our solar system. Jessica Noviello reports back from the conference.
An internal ocean on Ganymede: Hooray for consistency with previous results!
A newly published paper confirms a subsurface ocean at Ganymede. An ocean there was already suspected from its magnetic field and predicted by geophysics; new Hubble data confirms it, and even says it is in the same place we thought it was before. Such consistency is rare enough in planetary science to be worth celebration.
Flawed Beauties
More examples of imperfect--but tantalizing--images from deep space.
JUICE at Europa
Europe's JUICE spacecraft will provide us with a detailed regional study of this icy moon of Jupiter.
Scale comparisons of the solar system's major moons
A few presentation slides with pretty pictures, sized to scale, of the large moons of the solar system.
One Ocean World Among Many
I'm absolutely floored when I stop to think that our beautiful blue ocean is only one of perhaps a half dozen or more oceans on other worlds in our solar system, and only one of probably millions (or more) oceans on other Earth-like planets in our galaxy. Oceans abound!
Planetary Society Weekly Hangout: Reports from the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference
On Thursday at noon PDT / 1900 UTC I'll report on some of my favorite findings from LPSC, and answer your questions about the latest planetary science.
LPSC 2013: License to Chill (or, the solar system's icy moons)
Reports from the March 19 session at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference covering eight icy moons in the outer solar system: Ganymede, Europa, Dione, Rhea, Mimas, Tethys, Enceladus, and Miranda.