Explorer

There are almost one million asteroids and comets in our solar system. And every single one of them (we think) formed here, within our solar system, alongside the planets just over 4.5 billion years ago. However, in the summer months of 2017, an object not borne from the Solar System made a silent entrance, whipped around the Sun in September 2017, and started heading out again, never to return. This object, now named ‘Oumuamua, was the first asteroid discovered from outside the solar system

The first exosolar planet (a planet orbiting a star other than the Sun) was discovered in 1995, and since then humans have found over 3600 planets outside of our solar system. Some of those found are orbiting not one star like we do, but two stars. For example, stars Kepler-35A and 35B orbit each other, but a planet Kepler-35b, orbits both of them. This is much more like the fantasy word Tatooine in the space epic Star Wars than our own planet Earth. In A New Hope, we see young Luke Skywalker

When you read a scientific story in a popular blog or magazine, many times you will see the caveat "artist interpretation" next to some of the accompanying images. This as a gross undersell of the time, effort, and most important, accuracy, that goes into developing the renders. While we don't know what a black hole or an exoplanet looks like, it is important to attempt to visualize them, and to do it as accurately as possible. This video is an interview with two people who are responsible for

On 5 June 2017, India performed a full launch test of their GSLV-MK3, putting a test-satellite into geosynchronous transfer orbit. This is a huge step forward for the India Space Research Organisation (ISRO), which could eventually use this rocket for human space travel. For the details on the rocket itself, as well as a rundown of ISRO's history check out this article from the Planetary Society.

The Cassini spacecraft has only 11 more orbits left of the ringed planet Saturn before its destruction. On September 15th, 2017, Cassini will make a planned plunge into the clouds of Saturn, which will cause it to break up. The science is packed in for Cassini over these orbits: it will study the rings by imaging and sampling, create a more accurate gravitational map of Saturn, and measure the magnetic field of Saturn. Here take a look at the summary of science in the final phase of the Grand

A team of planetary scientists pulled together by NASA has created a preliminary report on how and when humans could send a probe to Uranus, Neptune, or both. The two Ice Giant planets are easily the least explored in the solar system, owing in part to their distance from the Sun, and competing interests elsewhere. However, with the success of recent missions to Jupiter and Mars, and Cassini coming to a close at Saturn, it has prompted NASA (and the space agencies of other countries) to look

NASA is in the middle of developing a new heavy-lift rocket, that will be used to get humans beyond low Earth orbit to places like the Moon and Mars. The last time NASA was in full scale development mode was in the late 1970s and early 1980s for the beginning of the Shuttle program. According to some investigations on the part of the Planetary Society, it looks like NASA's going to miss their launch date of Nov 2018.

On April 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin became the first human to venture into space. At just after 9 am local time at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, Gagarin launched into low earth orbit, completed a full orbit in 108 minutes, and returned safely. This achievement not only firmly set the Soviet Union has the leader in space technology at the time, but marked the beginning of the human exploration of space. Internationally, April 12 is now "Yuri's Night," an evening of celebration meant to

Human's have been launching satellites into space since 1957, and now the current number of objects in orbit larger than 10 cm is about 23,000. The growing number poses a real threat to the future of space exploration. Humanity will need to solve this problem moving forward, and ideas are currently being discussed.

NASA recently released a more in-depth look at its missions beyond low-Earth orbit. The whole vision is being dubbed the 'Journey to Mars:' a 2 phase program designed to step further and further way from Earth. The first phase will place a space station in lunar orbit. The second phase will see humans launching off to the red planet.