Tektites, rare natural glasses formed by ancient asteroid impacts, were found stretching across more than 900 kilometers of the country’s interior.
Space & Planets
Opening a Treasure Trove: A Trip to the Historic Archives of Venus
Before 1989, pre-Magellan orbiter and ground-based exploration of Venus produced significant datasets that will be useful when planning future missions to the planet.
The Planet That Shouldn’t Be There
A newly discovered exoplanet suggests that a different way to build planetary systems could be possible.
New Evidence Points to Venusian Lava Tubes, and They’re Really Big
Researchers bring new life to 30-year-old Magellan data to unearth the first direct evidence of the long-hypothesized structures.
Rare Hot Jupiters Could Reveal How All Giant Planets Form
A new analysis shows that the way massive planets migrate after their formation helps determine whether they have companion planets. The process hints at planetary formation in general.
This Potential Exoplanet Is Earth Sized but May Be Colder Than Mars
A new analysis of old mission data may have revealed a possible Earth-sized planet orbiting the K-dwarf star HD 137010.
Oozing Gas Could Be Making Stripes in Mercury’s Craters
Scientists are using new computational tools to analyze troves of old spacecraft data to better understand one of Mercury’s unsolved mysteries.
A Double-Edged Sword: The Global Oxychlorine Cycle on Mars
Global detections of oxychlorine salts reveal a complex, 4-billion-year chemical cycle on Mars. They can act as de-icing agents, oxidants, a hazard and a vital resource for future human exploration.
A Road Map to Truly Sustainable Water Systems in Space
Future astronauts need efficient, durable, and trustworthy closed-loop systems to provide water for missions lasting months to years.
From Measurements to Solar Wind Model Initial Conditions
A new method shows how solar wind measurements at Earth can be used to define initial conditions for solar wind models to reduce their need for solar magnetic maps and decrease their uncertainty.
