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Pioneer

U.S. To Restart Plutonium Production for Deep Space Exploration

March 20, 2013

Want to stay on top of all the space news? Follow @universetoday on Twitter The end of NASA’s plutonium shortage may be in sight. On Monday March 18th,  NASA’s planetary science division head Jim Green announced that production of Plutonium-238 (Pu-238) by the United States Department of Energy (DOE) is currently in the test phases [...]

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Case Closed on the Pioneer Anomaly

July 18, 2012

Caption: An artist’s view of a Pioneer spacecraft heading into interstellar space. Both Pioneer 10 and 11 are on trajectories that will eventually take them out of our solar system. Image credit: NASA The case of the Pioneer Anomaly has intrigued and perplexed scientists, engineers and the space-savvy public since 1980, when analysis of tracking [...]

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A Varying Venusian Vortex

April 14, 2011

Our neighboring planet Venus really is a world of extremes; searing surface temperatures, crushing air pressure, sulfuric acid clouds…Venus pretty much pushes the envelope on every aspect of rocky-planet existence. And now here’s one more thing that made scientists do a double-take: a shape-shifting vortex swirling around Venus’ south pole! The presence of a cyclonic [...]

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