The JWST is enormously powerful. One of the reasons it was launched is to examine exoplanet atmospheres to determine their chemistry, something only a powerful telescope can do. But even the JWST needs time to wield that power effectively, especially when it comes to one of exoplanet science’s most important targets: rocky worlds orbiting red dwarfs.
Continue reading “Finding Atmospheres on Red Dwarf Planets Will Take Hundreds of Hours of Webb Time”One in Twelve Stars Ate a Planet
That stars can eat planets is axiomatic. If a small enough planet gets too close to a large enough star, the planet loses. Its fate is sealed.
New research examines how many stars eat planets. Their conclusion? One in twelve stars has consumed at least one planet.
Continue reading “One in Twelve Stars Ate a Planet”It’s Time to Study Lunar Lava Tubes. Here’s a Mission That Could Help
The Moon is practically begging to be explored, and the momentum to do so is building. The Artemis Program’s effort to return astronauts to the Moon for the first time since the Apollo missions captures a lot of attention. But there are other efforts underway.
Continue reading “It’s Time to Study Lunar Lava Tubes. Here’s a Mission That Could Help”Citizen Scientists Find Fifteen “Active Asteroids”
Nature often defies our simple explanations. Take comets and asteroids, for example. Comets are icy and have tails; asteroids are rocky and don’t have tails. But it might not be quite so simple, according to new research.
Continue reading “Citizen Scientists Find Fifteen “Active Asteroids””Earth’s Long-Term Habitability Relies on Chemical Cycles. How Can We Better Understand Them?
We, and all other complex life, require stability to evolve. Planetary conditions needed to be benign and long-lived for creatures like us and our multicellular brethren to appear and to persist. On Earth, chemical cycling provides much of the needed stability.
Chemical cycling between the land, atmosphere, lifeforms, and oceans is enormously complex and difficult to study. Typically, researchers try to isolate one cycle and study it. However, new research is examining Earth’s chemical cycling more holistically to try to understand how the planet has stayed in the ‘sweet spot’ for so long.
Continue reading “Earth’s Long-Term Habitability Relies on Chemical Cycles. How Can We Better Understand Them?”This New Map of 1.3 Million Quasars Is A Powerful Tool
Quasars are the brightest objects in the Universe. The most powerful ones are thousands of times more luminous than entire galaxies. They’re the visible part of a supermassive black hole (SMBH) at the center of a galaxy. The intense light comes from gas drawn toward the black hole, emitting light across several wavelengths as it heats up.
But quasars are more than just bright ancient objects. They have something important to show us about the dark matter.
Continue reading “This New Map of 1.3 Million Quasars Is A Powerful Tool”Could Earth Life Survive on a Red Dwarf Planet?
Even though exoplanet science has advanced significantly in the last decade or two, we’re still in an unfortunate situation. Scientists can only make educated guesses about which exoplanets may be habitable. Even the closest exoplanet is four light-years away, and though four is a small integer, the distance is enormous.
That doesn’t stop scientists from trying to piece things together, though.
Continue reading “Could Earth Life Survive on a Red Dwarf Planet?”Another Hycean Planet Found? TOI-270 d
Hycean planets may be able to host life even though they’re outside what scientists consider the regular habitable zone. Their thick atmospheres can trap enough heat to keep the oceans warm even though they’re not close to their stars.
Astronomers have found another one of these potential hycean worlds named TOI-270 d.
Continue reading “Another Hycean Planet Found? TOI-270 d”Astronomers Propose a 50-Meter Submillimeter Telescope
Some parts of the Universe only reveal important details when observed in radio waves. That explains why we have ALMA, the Atacama Large Millimetre-submillimetre Array, a collection of 7-meter and 12-meter radio telescopes that work together as an interferometer. But, ALMA-type arrays have their limitations, and astronomers know what they need to overcome those limitations.
They need a radio telescope that’s just one single, massive dish.
Continue reading “Astronomers Propose a 50-Meter Submillimeter Telescope”Perseverance Sees Phobos, Deimos and Mercury Passing in Front of the Sun
NASA’s Perseverance rover is busy exploring the Martian surface and collecting samples for eventual return to Earth. But the rover recently took some time to gaze upward and observe the heavens. Using Mastcam-Z, the rover’s primary science camera, Perseverance captured Phobos, Deimos, and Mercury as they transited in front of the Sun.
Continue reading “Perseverance Sees Phobos, Deimos and Mercury Passing in Front of the Sun”