by Emily Lakdawalla
Emily Lakdawalla
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All
Follow the thrilling adventures of planetary missions, past and present, and see the stunningly beautiful photos that they return from space!
Emily Lakdawalla • December 31, 2015 • 19
How many planetary exploration missions are there, and where are they? These days, it's hard to keep track, because there are so many. I plan to begin the new year by taking stock of active missions, figuring out what each has set out to do and accomplished so far, but first I want to step back to consider the spread of missions across the solar system as a whole.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 29, 2015 • 1
Two images of Earth taken from different spacecraft at the same time illustrate differences in "true" color imaging among spacecraft.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 28, 2015 • 3
Europe's second mission to Mars has begun its journey from its birthplace in Cannes to its planned arrival at Mars on October 19. Since December 17 we've been able to watch every step of its journey via Twitter.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 22, 2015 • 1
In a remarkable and wholly unexpected gift to Curiosity fans, the rover has just taken the first-ever color Mastcam self-portrait from Mars.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 22, 2015 • 2
It's fun to watch the seasons shift from space, and as of this year we have new ways to do that.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 21, 2015 • 7
Pluto is reluctant to give up its secrets. Last week at the American Geophysical Union meeting I attended sessions featuring results from the New Horizons mission, and most of the presentations could be summed up thusly: the data sets are terrific, but there are still a lot of Pluto features that have scientists scratching their heads.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 18, 2015 • 1
Yesterday at the American Geophysical Union meeting, the Curiosity science team announced the discovery of a mineral never before found on Mars. The finding was the result of a fortuitous series of events, but as long as Curiosity's instruments continue to function well, it's the kind of discovery that Curiosity should now be able to repeat.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 17, 2015 • 4
Finally! It has been a long wait, but so worth it: the Rosetta OSIRIS science camera team has delivered the first pile of data from the rendezvous with comet 67P to ESA's Planetary Science Archive. I have spent a good chunk of the last three days playing with the data, and it's spectacular.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 11, 2015 • 2
ESA announced today a new website at which the OSIRIS team will now be releasing images on a regular basis -- at least one per week -- and they will be recent. Even better news, all OSIRIS data taken through September 16, 2014 has been handed to ESA and its release is expected next week.
Emily Lakdawalla • December 09, 2015 • 9
JAXA had a press briefing today to confirm the successful arrival of Akatsuki into Venus orbit. It's been a long time coming: today's announcement came twelve years to the day after Japan had to abandon efforts to put Nozomi into Mars orbit. They released lovely images and discussed future plans.
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