Chemistry

Juno Measures How Much Oxygen is Being Produced by Europa

If the periodic table listed the elements in order of their importance to life, then oxygen might bully its way…

2 weeks ago

Another Explanation for K2-18b? A Gas-Rich Mini-Neptune with No Habitable Surface

Exoplanet K2-18b is garnering a lot of attention. James Webb Space Telescope spectroscopy shows it has carbon and methane in…

2 months ago

There are Mysteries at Venus. It’s Time for an Astrobiology Mission

When scientists detected phosphine in Venus' atmosphere in 2020, it triggered renewed, animated discussions about Venus and its potential habitability.…

2 months ago

Toxic Gas is Leaking out of Enceladus. It’s also a Building Block of Life.

Enceladus' status as a target in the search for life keeps rising. We've known for years that plumes erupting from…

3 months ago

Webb Finds Icy Complex Organic Molecules Around Protostars: Ethanol, Methane, Formaldehyde, Formic Acid and Much More

In the quest to understand how and where life might arise in the galaxy, astronomers search for its building blocks.…

3 months ago

Could Life Exist in Molecular Clouds?

Our search for life beyond Earth is still in its infancy. We're focused on Mars and, to a lesser extent,…

4 months ago

Adolescent Galaxies are Incandescent and Contain Unexpected Elements

If the Universe has adolescent galaxies, they're the ones that formed about 2 to 3 billion years after the Big…

4 months ago

Wow. JWST Just Found Methane in an Exoplanet Atmosphere

If there's one chemical that causes excitement in the search for biosignatures on other worlds, it's methane. It's not a…

4 months ago

A Galaxy Only 350 Million Years Old Had Surprising Amounts of Metal

Astrophysicists working with the JWST have found a surprising amount of metal in a galaxy only 350 million years after…

4 months ago

A Robotic Chemist Could Whip up the Perfect Batch of Oxygen on Mars

Humans on Mars will need oxygen, and Mars' atmosphere is pretty anemic when it comes to the life-sustaining element. NASA's…

4 months ago