Tag: Solar System

NASA’s Lucy probe will fly by the asteroid Donaldjohanson on Easter Sunday

NeRD

Easter Sunday certainly won’t be a day of rest for the astronomy community. All eyes will be on NASA’s asteroid-studying Lucy spacecraft, which is due to have a close encounter at 1:51 p.m. EDT (1751 GMT) on April 20, 2025. Launched in 2021, Lucy is on a 12-year journey to the orbit of Jupiter, during which the probe will perform flybys of eight Trojan asteroids in a quest to learn about the origins of the solar system, searching for elements that could spark the rise of life. But before Lucy gets…

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Could Mars volcanoes have supported ancient life on the Red Planet? Well, maybe

NeRD

While most people searching for signs of alien life these days might have their eyes on the exoplanet K2-18b, one team of researchers is keeping their sights a little closer to home. Texas A&M researcher Michael Tice and a team of international scientists have revealed new clues about Mars’ potential to have supported life, thanks to data collected by NASA’s Perseverance rover. Since 2021, Perseverance has been exploring Mars’ Jezero Crater, using its mobile laboratory to support the work of scientists around the world. Tice and his team, in particular,…

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New photos from European Mars orbiter show dynamic, volcanic Red Planet terrain

NeRD

The European Space Agency (ESA) just released some new snapshots from its Mars Express orbiter that detail the dynamic terrain of the Red Planet’s Acheron Fossae region. One of the photos shows trough-like features called “grabens,” which run about 500 miles (800 kilometers), or roughly the length of Germany. They were shaped from ancient volcanic activity that twisted the surface of Mars almost four billion years ago. Flowing lava from the nearby Alba Mons volcano (not pictured) is likely responsible for the smooth region in the bottom center of the…

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Easter is coming late in 2025, astronomically speaking. Here’s why

NeRD

Saturday night (April 12) brings us the April full moon, which traditionally is known as the “Pink Full Moon.” The Native Americans who once occupied the northern and eastern United States kept track of the seasons by attaching distinctive names to each full moon that occurred at approximate 29-day intervals during the course of the year The “Pink Moon” name is rather deceptive, however, because it might initially give some the idea that on that particular night the full moon will appear to glow with a pinkish or salmon hue.…

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The newest GOES weather satellite in NOAA’s fleet is now fully operational (video)

NeRD

The final satellite in NOAA’s GOES-R weather satellite series has a new place in orbit … and a new name. The GOES-19 weather satellite, which launched into orbit in June 2024, has officially taken the place of its predecessor GOES-16 to watch over the Western Hemisphere from its perch 22,236 miles (35,785 kilometers) above us. To mark the milestone, the satellite has the new name of GOES East to serve as the dominant geostationary satellite in the fleet, NOAA officials said in a statement. “With GOES-19 now in operation, NOAA…

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We now know the shape of notorious asteroid 2024 YR4 that dominated headlines recently — it’s probably ‘suburban,’ too

NeRD

The asteroid 2024 YR4 — the one that caused a stir earlier this year due to its potential collision course with Earth — has a surprising tale to tell. A new study reports that this space rock likely hails from the central region of the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter — a cosmic “suburb” scientists don’t typically associate with asteroids that cross paths with our planet. Shortly after its discovery late last year, astronomers calculated that 2024 YR4 had a 1.3% chance (1-in-83) of impacting Earth in December…

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A day on Uranus is actually longer than we thought, Hubble Telescope reveals

NeRD

Uranus just got a little more time on its hands. A fresh analysis of a decade’s worth of Hubble Space Telescope observations shows Uranus takes 17 hours, 14 minutes and 52 seconds to complete a full rotation — that’s 28 seconds longer than the estimate provided by NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft nearly four decades ago. In January 1986, Voyager 2 became the first — and so far the only — spacecraft to explore Uranus, and with its data, astronomers pegged the ice giant’s rotation period at 17 hours, 14 minutes…

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North America is ‘dripping’ down into Earth’s mantle, scientists discover

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An ancient slab of Earth’s crust buried deep beneath the Midwest is sucking huge swatches of present-day’s North American crust down into the mantle, researchers say. The slab’s pull has created giant “drips” that hang from the underside of the continent down to about 400 miles (640 kilometers) deep inside the mantle, according to a new study. These drips are located beneath an area spanning from Michigan to Nebraska and Alabama, but their presence appears to be impacting the entire continent. The dripping area looks like a large funnel, with…

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Earth’s sea ice hits all-time low, NASA satellites reveal

NeRD

New research from NASA and the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Colorado measured Arctic sea ice cover on March 22, during what should’ve been its annual peak. In conclusion, the agency reported seeing 5.53 million square miles (14.33 million square kilometers) of sea ice — for context, that’s the lowest Arctic winter sea ice levels have ever been. To make matters worse, NASA scientists also discovered that, this year, summer ice in the Antarctic retreated to 764,000 square miles (1.98 million square kilometers) as of March 1,…

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NASA’s daredevil solar spacecraft survives 2nd close flyby of our sun

NeRD

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has successfully completed its second close flyby of the sun, the space agency announced earlier this week. The car-sized spacecraft swooped within 8 million miles (6.1 million kilometers) of the sun‘s surface at a whopping 430,000 miles per hour (692,000 kilometers per hour), matching the historic record it set during its encounter on Christmas Eve last year. During this approach, which occurred on Saturday (March 22), the Parker Solar Probe once again operated autonomously, with its four science instruments programmed to collect science data about solar…

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