half times the size of Earth, which is not what we expected at all." Radius-density diagram of confirmed exoplanets from the NASA Exoplanet Archive with radii below 5​R⊕ and mass and radius measurements significant at better than 4​σ. (CREDIT: Max Kroft...

instead revealed a 200,000-light-year trail of young blue stars stretching toward the galaxy at upper right. (CREDIT: NASA, ESA, Pieter van Dokkum (Yale); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)) Kinetic Recoil from Asymmetric Mergers The team...

the amount of reflected light. By synthesizing historical data from the Kepler Space Telescope with fresh measurements from NASA’s TESS mission taken six years later, researchers detected an unexpected phase shift in this light modulation. A graphic...

is currently under intense scrutiny from both the aerospace industry and government partners, particularly given its role in NASA Artemis missions. As a planned human landing system, the Starship must demonstrate not only survivability but also the...

and those driven by subsurface gas transport. The images were taken by Landsat 9’s OLI-2 instrument on June 27, 2023. © NASA Current research efforts are now focused on establishing the precise mechanisms that connect these surface expressions to the...

and scientifically rich zones on the Moon. This region is of particular interest to global space agencies—including NASA—because its permanently shadowed craters are believed to harbor significant deposits of water ice. Harvesting such resources could...

New data from NASA spacecraft reveals that the stark geological divide between the Martian north and south extends deep into the planet’s interior. New evidence suggests that the interior of Mars is far more complex than previously assumed,...

reveal it is a 200,000-light-year-long chain of young blue stars leading back to the galaxy at upper right. Credit: NASA/ESA/Pieter van Dokkum (Yale)/Joseph DePasquale (STScI) Mapping the Mechanics of a Galactic Kick A research team from the University...

questions about the evolution of the Venusian environment. Although Venus is currently a hostile, pressure-cooked landscape, NASA climate modeling has previously suggested that the planet may have once maintained liquid water and more temperate...

effectively entombing them within sediment that can persist for eons. The research relies on ongoing investigations by NASA’s Perseverance rover, which is currently traversing Jezero Crater. Geologists believe this site served as a lake basin fed by...

ahead, the research team is moving toward optimizing the catalyst’s durability and efficiency, supported by a Mississippi NASA EPSCoR Research Infrastructure Development grant. As international space agencies set their sights on crewed Martian missions...

NASA’s Roman Space Telescope will use advanced coronagraph technology to capture direct images of exoplanets, revolutionizing our search for other worlds. NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope has embarked on a mission to fundamentally alter our...

place.” An artist’s illustration of Saturn’s icy moon Enceladus, showing its frozen outer shell and hidden interior. Credit: NASA The Thermodynamic Hurdle for Small Worlds When an icy moon is shattered by a collision and subsequently reassembles, the...

atmospheric drag naturally pulls defunct objects toward Earth, where they incinerate upon reentry. However, according to NASA, this drag is negligible at the altitudes where the Yaogan-50 fragments are currently drifting—a range extending from roughly...

debris from the solar system and beyond. Earth’s Moon (North Polar Mosaic) Taken by the Galileo spacecraft. (CREDIT: NASA/JPL/USGS) A Deep History of Technological Debris The researchers categorize potential extraterrestrial traces into two distinct...

disrupt global ocean currents that currently redistribute tropical heat toward the poles, according to Michael Way of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Conversely, Aurica paints a portrait of a much warmer planet. Simulations suggest global...

a specialized instrument to facilitate scientific discovery. The importance of these shadowed regions cannot be overstated. NASA researchers view these zones as critical targets, as they potentially contain frozen water and other volatile compounds that...

NASA’s Curiosity rover has uncovered a mysterious, strangely familiar feature on Mount Sharp that is challenging current geological theories. Fourteen years into its remarkable journey across the Martian surface, NASA’s Curiosity rover continues to...

systems that span the necessary scale. The Earth-Moon system could serve as a natural gravitational-wave detector. (CREDIT: NASA) Orbital Resonance as a Sensor When gravitational waves wash over a binary system, they introduce minute perturbations in...

by up to 11.6 kilometers—a total reduction in diameter of approximately 23 kilometers (14.5 miles). Mercury as seen by NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft in 2008. (CREDIT: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of...