Exoplanets clue to sun's curious chemistry
"For almost 10 years we have tried to find out what distinguishes stars with planetary systems from their barren cousins," says Garik Israelian, lead author of a paper appearing this week in the journal Nature. "We have now found that the amount of lithium in Sun-like stars depends on whether or not they have planets." view more (2009-11-12)
32 new exoplanets found
The latest batch of exoplanets announced today comprises no less than 32 new discoveries. Including these new results, data from HARPS have led to the discovery of more than 75 exoplanets in 30 different planetary systems. view more (2009-10-20)
Satellite reveals surprising cosmic 'weather' at edge of solar system
The first solar system energetic particle maps show an unexpected landmark occurring at the outer edge of the solar wind bubble surrounding the solar system. view more (2009-10-19)
IBEX discovers that galactic magnetic fields may control the boundaries of our solar system
The first all-sky maps developed by NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) spacecraft, the initial mission to examine the global interactions occurring at the edge of the solar system, suggest that the galactic magnetic fields had a far greater impact on Earth's history than previously conceived, and the future of our planet and others may... view more... (2009-10-16)
Dirty stars make good solar system hosts
Some stars are lonely behemoths, with no surrounding planets or asteroids, while others sport a skirt of attendant planetary bodies. New research published this week in The Astrophysical Journal Letters explains why the composition of the stars often indicates whether their light shines into deep space, or whether a small fraction shines onto... view more... (2009-10-07)
Laser technique has implications for detecting microbial life forms in Martian ice
An innovative technique called L.I.F.E. imaging used successfully to detect bacteria in frozen Antarctic lakes could have exciting implications for demonstrating signs of life in the polar regions of Mars. view more (2009-10-02)
Sea level stargazing: Astronomers make key sighting with Fla. telescope
This summer, University of Florida astronomers inaugurated the world's largest optical telescope on a nearly 8,000-foot mountaintop 3,480 miles away. view more (2009-09-29)
James Webb Space Telescope Begins to Take Shape at Goddard
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope is starting to come together. A major component of the telescope, the Integrated Science Instrument Module structure, recently arrived at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. for testing in the Spacecraft Systems Development and Integration Facility. view more (2009-09-16)
Trigger-happy star formation
A new study from two of NASA's Great Observatories provides fresh insight into how some stars are born, along with a beautiful new image of a stellar nursery in our Galaxy. view more (2009-08-13)
IAU0916: The violent youth of solar proxies steer course of genesis of life
One of the hottest topics at this year's XXVIIth General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil involves the study of the astrophysical conditions favourable for the development and survival of primordial life. view more (2009-08-11)
Unveiling the true face of a gigantic star
An international team of astronomers, led by Keiichi Ohnaka at the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy (MPIfR) in Bonn, has made the most high resolution images of a dying giant star to date. view more (2009-08-07)
Seeing the Cosmos Through
NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has taken its first shots of the cosmos since warming up and starting its second career. The infrared telescope ran out of coolant on May 15, 2009, more than five-and-half-years after launch, and has since warmed to a still-frosty 30 Kelvin (about minus 406 Fahrenheit). view more (2009-08-06)
Primitive asteroids in the main asteroid belt may have formed far from the sun
Many of the objects found today in the asteroid belt located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter may have formed in the outermost reaches of the solar system. view more (2009-07-16)
How the moon got its stripes
A new study has revealed the origins of tiger stripes and a subsurface ocean on Enceladus- one of Saturn's many moons. These geological features are believed to be the result of the moon's unusual chemical composition and not a hot core, shedding light on the evolution of planets and guiding future space exploration. view more (2009-07-15)
University of Hawaii at Manoa astronomers discover pair of solar systems in the making
Two University of Hawai'i at Mānoa astronomers have found a binary star-disk system in which each star is surrounded by the kind of dust disk that is frequently the precursor of a planetary system. view more (2009-07-01)
IBEX spacecraft detects fast neutral hydrogen coming from the moon
NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) spacecraft has made the first observations of very fast hydrogen atoms coming from the moon, following decades of speculation and searching for their existence. view more (2009-06-19)
Meteorite grains divulge Earth's cosmic roots
The interstellar stuff that became incorporated into the planets and life on Earth has younger cosmic roots than theories predict. view more (2009-06-16)
A tiny frozen microbe may hold clues to extraterrestrial life
A novel bacterium that has been trapped more than three kilometres under glacial ice in Greenland for over 120 000 years, may hold clues as to what life forms might exist on other planets. view more (2009-06-15)
New definition could further limit habitable zones around distant suns
As astronomers gaze toward nearby planetary systems in search of life, they are focusing their attention on each system's habitable zone, where heat radiated from the star is just right to keep a planet's water in liquid form. view more (2009-06-11)
The search for ET just got easier
Astronomers using the Science and Technology Facilities Council's (STFC) William Herschel Telescope (WHT) on La Palma have confirmed an effective way to search the atmospheres of planets for signs of life, vastly improving our chances of finding alien life outside our solar system. view more (2009-06-11)
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