Ceres is a Strange Place, Including a Volcanic Peak 4,000 Meters High Made From Bubbling Salt Water, Mud and Rock

Ceres, at almost 1,000 km (620 miles) in diameter, is the largest body in the asteroid belt. Between 2015 and 2018, NASA’s ion-powered Dawn spacecraft visited the dwarf planet, looking for clues to help us understand how our Solar System formed. Ceres is the first dwarf planet ever visited by a spacecraft. Now that scientists …

A Very Rare Planet Discovered. Less Massive than Neptune, Hotter than Mercury. Very Few Should Exist

Astronomers have discovered a very rare, very unusual planet in a distant solar system. The planet, called NGTS-4b, is three times the size of Earth, and about 20% smaller than Neptune. It’s hotter than our very own Mercury. At about 1,000 degrees Celsius, it would be the hottest planet if it were in our Solar …

TESS Just Found its First Earth-Sized World

NASA’s new planet-hunting telescope, TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite), just found its first Earth-sized world. Though the Earth-sized planet, and its hot sub-Neptune companion, were first observed by TESS in January 2019, it’s taken until now to confirm their status with ground-based follow-up observations. The discovery is published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.