Space News & Blog Articles

What processes during the formation of Pluto’s largest moon, Charon, potentially led to it having cryovolcanism, and even an internal ocean? This is what a recent study presented at the 56th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference hopes to address as a team of researchers investigated the formation and evolution of Charon to ascertain whether it once possessed an internal ocean during its history and if this could have led to cryovolcanism based on images obtained by NASA’s New Horizons probe.

In the outer reaches of our Solar System, far beyond the orbit of Pluto, lies one of the most mysterious objects ever discovered, Sedna. This reddish dwarf planet follows such an extreme orbit that it takes over 11,000 years to complete a single journey around the Sun. Now, scientists are proposing a new mission to reach this distant world using a revolutionary propulsion technology.

Star formation is a hidden event, at least in its very early stages. Stellar crèches are veiled by clouds of gas and dust. Those same clouds also shield planet formation, particularly in the very beginning. So, astronomers don't always get to see the action until the dust has cleared. Although the newly forming planets are too small to see, their gravity stirs up spiral and ring patterns in the so-called protoplanetary disks around the newborn stars. So, when do those patterns begin to appear in the birth process?

What methods can be used to identify subsurface oceans on the five largest moons of Uranus: Ariel, Umbriel, Titania and Oberon, and Miranda? This is what a recent study presented at the 56th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference hopes to address as a team of scientists from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) investigated potentially using radio science on the Uranus Orbiter and Probe (UOP) concept mission, which was designated as a high priority Flagship-class mission by the 2023–2032 Planetary Science Decadal Survey.

One of the most perplexing discoveries in modern astronomy has been finding supermassive black holes, some weighing billions of times more than our Sun, in galaxies that formed less than 750 million years after the Big Bang. They appear to have grown impossibly fast, challenging our understanding of how black holes form and evolve.

As humanity ventures deeper into space, one critical question looms large: how do we prevent Earth's microbes from contaminating other worlds? A groundbreaking new study by Daniel J. Brener and Charles S. Cockell suggests we may need to fundamentally rethink our approach to planetary protection by borrowing concepts from a surprising source; island biogeography.

Scientists may have found a new way to detect some of the universe's most mysterious objects, primordial black holes (PBHs), using Hawking radiation. This groundbreaking approach relies upon watching for their radiation signatures as they pass through the Solar System. This technique could finally help us to solve one of cosmology's biggest puzzles: what makes up the invisible dark matter that comprises 85% of all matter in the universe.

Calibration is a necessary, if typically invisible, step in the successful operation of any scientific telescope. Without a known value to compare its readings against, data from telescopes could suffer from biases or transients that could completely misdirect scientists analyzing it. However, those same scientists also struggle to find good sources of data to calibrate against. Enter Arcstone - a technology demonstration mission that launched earlier this week that plans to use one particular source as a calibration dataset - moonlight.

We know black hole mergers occur because we can detect the resulting gravitational waves. But when trying to piece together the history of black holes mergers in the Milky Way, astronomers need another tactic. They need to perform some forensic astronomy.

The search for life beyond our planet continues, and one of the most underappreciated tools in an astrobiologists toolkit is statistics. While it might not be as glamorous as directly imaging a planet’s atmosphere or finding a system with seven planets in it, statistics is absolutely critical if we want to be sure that what we’re seeing is real and not just an artifact of the data, or of our observational techniques themselves. A new paper by Caleb Traxler and their co-authors at the Department of Information and Computer Science at UC Irvine takes on that challenge head-on by statistically analyzing a set of about 10% of the total number of exoplanets found and judging their habitability.

For generations, scientists and science fiction writers have contemplated how humans could someday live on Mars. While the idea once seemed like a far-off possibility, the many robotic missions that have travelled to Mars and successfully landed on its surface have given new life to the idea. This presents many challenges, which include the time it takes to reach Mars (6 to 9 months using conventional propulsion) and the dangers of long-term exposure to cosmic radiation and microgravity. But building long-term habitats and facilities on the Martian surface is also challenging.

One of Webb’s strong points is its ability to directly image planets around another solar system. The telescope has been in operation for long enough now that a flood of those images are starting, as more and more systems come under the telescope’s gaze. One of those is described in a recent paper and press release from NASA. According to the paper, the planet in a nearby system is about the size of Saturn, which would make it the smallest planet ever found by direct observation.

Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) have remained a mystery to astronomers even since the first was detected in 2007 (known as the Lorimer Burst). These quick bursts typically last for mere nanoseconds, though some have been found to last up to 3 seconds, and their precise cause remains unknown. In recent years, scientists have traced a few FRBs back to their source and have determined that they came from neutron stars. This has led to the theory that FRBs are caused by compact objects, though this has yet to be proven.

The $10,000 Schweickart Prize is awarded every June to mark Asteroid Day and draw attention to risks from above — and this year's prize is going to a team of students who are proposing a panel to focus on what could happen when we start tinkering with asteroids.

Space exploration enthusiasts tend to overlook the regulatory aspects of their desired goals. They focus on technologies and the science we can do with them rather than mundane things like property rights or environmental considerations. However, in the long run, those enthusiasts will have to grapple with all aspects of exploration programs as they begin to affect more and more of the public. With such foresight, various groups have started putting forward ideas for frameworks of how to holistically think about how to utilize the Moon, as that seems the most likely first stepping stone out to the wider solar system. A new paper from Ekaterina Seltikova and her colleagues at the Space Generation Advisory Council (SGAC) and the University of Toronto puts forth one such framework, with a particular focus on how to develop a lunar economy that is open for everyone.

When astronomers search for potentially habitable planets beyond our Solar System, they typically focus on whether these worlds orbit at the right distance from their stars to maintain liquid water. But new research reveals that violent flares and eruptions from host stars may be equally important in determining whether these distant worlds could support life.

Scientists studying tiny life forms in Antarctica's ice covered ponds have discovered compelling evidence that similar environments could have sheltered complex life during one of Earth's most extreme periods, the so called "Snowball Earth" era.

The coming of asteroid (99942) Apophis in April 2029 has sparked plenty of discussion both inside and outside the astronomical community. Despite original fears that it would pose a threat, Apophis will safely pass around 32,000 km away from Earth - though admittedly that is still closer than some geostationary communications satellites. That close approach offers a unique opportunity for those interested in asteroid science to take an up-close look at one of these relics of the early solar system, and various groups are planning to do just that. A new paper from Victor Hernandez Megia and his colleagues at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) suggests a new mission that could provide even further insight into the interior of Apophis - by returning part of it to Earth.

Detecting exoplanets is one thing, but imaging them is another thing entirely. Astronomers can detect them by the way they block their star's light and by the way they make their stars wobble, and from that they can infer a lot. But that's not the same as seeing them.

Building on the Moon is a challenge we have yet to fully grasp. Plenty of projects have grandiose plans from using blood sweat and tears to create bricks out of regolith to building towers to wirelessly transmit power between isolated locations. However, these projects all but ignore one of the most important types of material we use commonly here on Earth - ceramics. A new paper from Dr. Alex Ellery, an Engineering professor at Carleton University in Ottawa, discusses why ceramics are so critical to the development of the lunar economy, and points to further developments in materials science that must be completed in order to manufacture and utilize them on the surface of the Moon.

On January 15th, 2025, the Japanese commercial space company ispace launched its HAKUTO-R Mission 2 Resilience to the Moon. On June 5th, 2025, the lander crashed down on the lunar surface due to a malfunction with its Laser Range Finder (LRF). Six days later, NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) captured photos of the site where RESILIENCE experienced a hard landing.