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

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has issued a challenge to its public: increase the efficiency of one of its high-level research software and win $55,000 USD. Many of us forget that NASA also works in aeronautics, not just space. In order to develop cutting edge air planes and other flight tech, NASA begins with simulating airflow using a Fortran code called FUN3D. However, FUN3D isn't able to keep up with some of the simulations its been given. As a result, NASA has

Around this time of year, the Black Sea blooms with a massive growth of phytoplankton. This particular species of phytoplankton known as coccolithophores, are plated with white calcium carbonate, making the bloom very easy to see from space. NASA's Aqua satellite gathered these data.

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

The Cassini spacecraft took this image of the north pole of Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, in the near-infrared. The dark spots near the top of the image are Titan's massive polar lakes of methane. Also visible are white streaks of cloud. The Saturnian system has moved into summer solstice for the northern hemisphere, shedding more light on Titan's north pole.

The Cassini spacecraft has made some truly remarkable discoveries within the Saturnian system, where it has been orbiting for the last 13 years. One such discovery is of the walnut-shaped moons: Atlas, Daphnis, and Pan. These moons sport a prominent equatorial ridge pattern circumnavigating the moons (Saturn's moon Iapetus also as an equatorial feature, though not as prominent as these). The ridges are due to where the moons are located. They are all located in or very near to the ring system

NASA's Cassini-Huygens mission has begun its final mission phase, making its first dive between the planet Saturn and its rings. It is the only craft to ever make that plunge. Check out some of the amazing images it took as it went through, including the north pole hexagonal vortex.

The NASA/ESA Cassini spacecraft completed its first of 22 dives between the planet Saturn and its ring system; no spacecraft has ever flown that trajectory before. During the pass by the rings, Cassini was out of radio contact. Upon regaining communications, Cassini sent back an image of Saturn, the closest of the planet ever taken. Cassini will continue to dive closer and closer to the atmosphere of Saturn until it ultimately burns up on September 15th, 2017.

On Wednesday April 19, 2017, Orbital ATK's 7th resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS) launched from Cape Canaveral. The Cygnus cargo module was launched atop an Atlas V rocket with over 7600 lbs of supplies and science equipment. Three days later, the module got close enough to the ISS for European Space Agency's (ESA) Thomas Presquet to take this image of the Cygnus capsule on approach. Just a bit later, Presquet and ISS Commader Peggy Whitson used CanadArm to secure the