This is Saturn’s yearly opposition. The ringed planet is now opposite the sun in our sky, rising at sunset, highest up for the night around midnight and setting at sunrise. It’s at its brightest and and best for 2020. Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/saturn-closest-and-brightest…
Tag: uranus
5 years after New Horizons flyby, 10 cool things about Pluto
Here are 10 of the coolest, weirdest and most unexpected findings about the Pluto system scientists have learned thanks to the New Horizons spacecraft’s flyby of the distant world in 2015. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/new-horizons-flyby-10-cool-things-about-pluto…
Super-Earths discovered orbiting nearby red dwarf
The nearest exoplanets to us provide the best opportunities for detailed study, including searching for evidence of life outside the solar system. In research led by the University of Göttingen, the RedDots team of astronomers has detected a system of super-Earth planets orbiting the nearby star Gliese 887, the brightest red dwarf star in the sky. Super-Earths are planets which have…
NASA simulation shows kaleidoscope of sunsets on other worlds
Have you ever wondered what a sunset on Uranus might look like? Source: https://phys.org/news/2020-06-nasa-simulation-kaleidoscope-sunsets-worlds.html…
Did ancient Mars have rings?
A new study of Mars’ smallest moon Deimos, by scientists from the SETI Institute and Purdue University, suggests that the planet used to have rings a few billion years ago. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/did-ancient-mars-have-rings-deimos…
Moon and 3 morning planets May 11 to 14
On the mornings of May 11, 12, 13 and 14, 2020, the waning moon will be sweeping past Jupiter, Saturn and finally Mars in the early morning sky. Great time to get acquainted! Source: https://earthsky.org/tonight/moon-3-morning-planets-may-11-14…
Are giant magnetic bubbles depleting Uranus’ atmosphere?
Researchers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, looking at old data from Voyager 2, have found evidence that plasmoids are slowly causing Uranus’ atmosphere to leak into space. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/uranus-atmosphere-plasmoids-voyager-2…
What are exoplanets?
Exoplanets are worlds orbiting distant stars. The history of our knowledge of exoplanets, the various types of exoplanets, how astronomers find them, and more, here. Source: https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/what-are-exoplanets…
How WFIRST will use warped spacetime to find exoplanets
NASA’s WFIRST mission – an infrared space observatory planned for launch around 2025 – will use the fact that the gravity of distant objects warps spacetime, bending and focusing light, thereby revealing new worlds. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/wfirst-exoplanets-microlensing-space-time-milky-way…
What smacked Uranus on its side? Something icy and as massive as Earth, scientists say.
Astronomers have worked out details of the giant impact that knocked Uranus so famously askew. Source: https://www.livescience.com/mystery-uranus-knocked-on-side.html