Astronomers model changes in Earth’s chemical signature over the past 4 billion years to improve the search for Earth-like exoplanets.
Space & Planets
Posted inResearch Spotlights
Two Moons and a Magnetosphere
Decades of research have illuminated how Io and Europa shape—and are shaped by—Jupiter’s giant magnetosphere.
Posted inNews
Dust from Colliding Asteroids Masqueraded as a Planet
New analysis of Hubble Space Telescope images suggests that Fomalhaut b, once believed to be an extrasolar planet, is, in fact, a cloud of dust that likely formed from the collision of enormous asteroids.
Posted inNews
Record-Setting Winds on a Nearby Brown Dwarf
Infrared and radio observations reveal zonal winds moving faster than 2,000 kilometers per hour on a “failed star” in our celestial neighborhood.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
How Accurate Are Our Measurements of the Sun’s Energy?
As instruments collecting solar data degrade, researchers must correct for errors. A new study compares several methods to correct solar spectral irradiance measurements.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Capturing Pluto’s Heartbeat in a Computer
Unprecedented global climate model simulations, incorporating observational data from the New Horizons mission, reveal atmospheric circulations driven by a large ice cap on Pluto.
Posted inNews
Ancient Impact’s Seismic Waves Reveal Pluto’s Ocean, Core
By modeling the waves produced by a massive, ancient impact, scientists have begun to unlock the secrets of Pluto’s interior.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
The Stuff That Psyche Is Made Of
The metallic asteroid Psyche appears to contain more rock than previously thought, shedding new light on possible scenarios for its formation in the early solar system.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
How Mars’s Magnetic Field Let Its Atmosphere Slip Away
A planet’s magnetic field usually protects its atmosphere from being blown away by its star. But new research suggests Mars’s weak magnetic field may have helped its atmosphere escape.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
Mapping Martian Dunes from Orbit
New research shows how fast the sands shift on the Red Planet and how useful imagery from different orbiting cameras can be in studies of Mars’s dunes.