solar system exploration Archives

July 13, 2023July 13, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

Volcanic Hotspot Found on the Moon

Arrow displaying position of the batholith on the farside of the Moon (left) with the heat gradient from the granite within the Compton-Belkovich Thorium Anomaly (center and right). (Credit: Matthew Siegler, PSI)

A recent study published in Nature examines a volcanic hotspot that potentially exists beneath a feature on the Moon’s farside (the side facing away from the Earth) called the Compton-Belkovich Thorium Anomaly. Researchers led by the Planetary Science Institute collected data from the hotspot region using microwave instruments onboard the China National Space Administration’s Chang’e-1 and Chang’e-2 orbiters and holds the potential to help scientists better understand the past volcanic processes on our nearest celestial neighbor, as surface evidence indicates lunar volcanic activity ceased between 3 to 4 billion years ago.

June 30, 2023July 1, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

Psyche Mission Passes Independent Review Board with Flying Colors

Image of NASA engineers preparing the Psyche spacecraft for launch within a clean room at the Astrotech Space Operations Facility located near the NASA Kennedy Space Center. Psyche is scheduled to launch in October 2023 on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from historic Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy. (Credit: NASA/Ben Smegelsky)

An independently appointed review board recently announced that NASA, their Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have exceeded expectations in taking steps to ensure the successful launch of the metal-rich-asteroid-hunting Psyche mission this October. This comes after Psyche’s initial launch date was delayed from August 2022 due to late delivery of the spacecraft’s flight software and testing equipment, which prevented engineers from performing the necessary checkouts prior to launch.

June 28, 2023June 28, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

UK Professor Granted JWST Observation Time to Study Jupiter’s Upper Atmosphere

Professor Tom Stallard (Credit: Simon Veit-Wilson/Northumbria University)

A professor from Northumbria University in the North East region of England has been granted telescope time with NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) later this year to study Jupiter’s upper atmosphere, also known as its ionosphere. Being granted such access to JWST is extremely competitive which makes getting access to use its powerful instruments to study the cosmos a very high honor.

June 25, 2023June 25, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

The Clouds of Venus Could Support Life

Image of Venus taken by NASA’s Pioneer-Venus Orbiter in 1979. (Credit: NASA)

A recent study published in Astrobiology examines the likelihood of the planet Venus being able to support life within the thick cloud layer that envelopes it. This study holds the potential to help us better understand how life could exist under the intense Venusian conditions, as discussions within the scientific community about whether life exists on the second planet from the Sun continue to burn hotter than Venus itself.

June 7, 2023June 8, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

NASA’s Europa Clipper Taking “Message in a Bottle” to Jupiter

NASA’s “Message in a Bottle” campaign allows astronomy fans to send their name stenciled onto a microchip to Jupiter onboard the Europa Clipper mission which will also ferry the U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón’s “In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa.” (Credit: NASA)

NASA believes in getting the public excited about space, and they’re carrying on this tradition by recently announcing that space fans from around the world can travel to Jupiter with the Europa Clipper mission. Though, not literally, but by adding their names to a microchip for the “Message in a Bottle” campaign that will also contain “In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa”, which is an original poem by U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón.

June 3, 2023June 6, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

Jupiter’s “Stripes” Change Color. Now We Might Know Why

Infrared images of Jupiter obtained by a ground-based telescope displaying changes in the stripes of Jupiter's clouds between 2001 and 2011 (dashed blue lines). (Credit: Arrate Antuñano/NASA/IRTF/NSFCam/SpeX)

While Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is one of the most well-known spectacles in the solar system, Jupiter’s clouds and stripes that are responsible for the planet’s weather patterns are highly regarded, as well. Though not nearly as visible in an amateur astronomy telescope, Jupiter’s multicolored, rotating, and swirling cloud stripes are a sight to behold for any astronomy fan when seen in up-close images. And, what makes these stripes unique is they have been observed to change color from time to time, but the question of what causes this color change to occur has remained elusive.

May 31, 2023May 31, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

If You’re Going to Visit Venus, Why Not Include an Asteroid Flyby Too?

Radar image of Venus created by the Solar System Visualization project and the Magellan science team at the JPL Multimission Image Processing Laboratory. This is a single frame from a video released at the October 29, 1991, JPL news conference. (Credit: NASA/JPL)

A recent study submitted to Acta Astronautica examines the prospect of designing a Venus mission flight plan that would involve visiting a nearby asteroid after performing a gravity assist maneuver at Venus but prior to final contact with the planet. The study was conducted by Vladislav Zubko, who is a researcher and PhD Candidate at the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Science (RAS) and has experience studying potential flight plans to various planetary bodies throughout the solar system.

May 19, 2023May 19, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

Mars Has a Thick Crust. Its Internal Heat Mainly Comes from Radioactivity

Elevation data of Mars featuring the lower elevations of the northern lowlands primarily in blue and the much higher elevations of the southern highlands primarily in orange and red. (Credit: MOLA Science Team)

How thick is the crust of Mars? This question is what a recent study published in Geophysical Research Letters attempted to answer as it reported on data from a magnitude 4.7 marsquake recorded in May 2022 by NASA’s InSight lander, which remains the largest quake ever recorded on another planetary body. As it turns out, this data helped provide estimates of Mars’ global crustal thickness, along with a unique discovery regarding the crust in the northern and southern hemispheres, and how the interior of Mars produces its heat.

May 18, 2023May 18, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

Four of Uranus’ Moons Might Have Liquid Oceans, Too

Recent computer models estimate the likelihood of interior oceans in four of Uranus’ major moons: Ariel, Umbriel, Titania, and Oberon, but Miranda is likely too small to sustain enough heat for an interior ocean. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

The study of ocean worlds, planetary bodies with potential interior reservoirs of liquid water, has come to the forefront in terms of astrobiology and the search for life beyond Earth. From Jupiter’s Galilean Moons to Saturn’s Titan and Mimas to Neptune’s Triton and even Pluto, scientists are craving to better understand if these worlds truly possess interior bodies of liquid water. But what about Uranus and its more than two dozen moons? Could they harbor interior oceans, as well?

March 28, 2023April 1, 2023 by Laurence Tognetti

Europa’s Ice Rotates at a Different Speed From its Interior. Now We May Know Why

Image of Europa taken by NASA's Juno spacecraft on Sept 29, 2022. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Southwest Research Institute/Malin Space Science Systems)

Jupiter’s moon, Europa, contains a large ocean of salty water beneath its icy shell, some of which makes it to the surface from time to time, and this vast ocean could host life, as well. Europa was most recently observed by NASA’s Juno spacecraft, but current examinations of the moon’s internal ocean are limited to computer models and simulations produced here on Earth, as no mission is actively exploring this tiny moon orbiting Jupiter. Other than the internal water occasionally breaching the icy shell and making it to the surface, what other effects could the internal ocean have on the icy shell that encloses it?