Warwick UK (SPX) Apr 08, 2021
Astronomers have found evidence that the first exoplanet that was identified transiting its star could have migrated to a close orbit with its star from its original birthplace further away. Analysis of the planet's atmosphere by a team including University of Warwick scientists has identified the chemical fingerprint of a planet that formed much further away from its sun than it currently resid

Pasadena CA (JPL) Apr 08, 2021
Using data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, scientists have identified the three fastest-spinning brown dwarfs ever found. More massive than most planets but not quite heavy enough to ignite like stars, brown dwarfs are cosmic in-betweeners. And though they aren't as well known as stars and planets to most people, they are thought to number in the billions in our galaxy. In a study app

Heidelberg, Germany (SPX) Apr 08, 2021
Why do asteroids in the solar system have the sizes we observe? Two researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy have found an answer to that fundamental question: For the birth planets and planet precursors in our solar system 4.5 billion years ago, turbulence played a key role, helping to bring together pebble-like objects to form larger aggregations known as planetesimals. The presen

Beijing (XNA) Apr 08, 2021
The lander and rover of the Chang'e 4 probe have resumed work for a 29th lunar day on the far side of the moon. The lander woke up at 9:43 pm Tuesday (Beijing Time), and the rover, Yutu-2 (Jade Rabbit-2), awoke at 3:54 am Tuesday, according to the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the China National Space Administration. The Chang'e 4 probe, switching to dormant mode duri

Washington DC (UPI) Apr 7, 2021
NASA's Mars helicopter Ingenuity, the first powered aircraft on another planet, is free of the Perseverance rover that carried it and appears to be functioning well ahead of its first flight on Sunday, the space agency said. NASA plans to broadcast the results of that first flight at 3:30 a.m. EDT Monday after the helicopter transmits data and images to Perseverance, which will send the

Beijing (XNA) Apr 08, 2021
The port city of Ningbo in Zhejiang province is building a 20 billion yuan ($3.05 billion) rocket launch site to meet surging demand for putting satellites into orbit and further develop the industrial cluster of the commercial aerospace sector, according to the local authorities. Highlighted in the recently revealed draft for mega projects in Zhejiang during the 14th Five-Year Plan period

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Apr 08, 2021
Engineers working on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope have successfully folded and packed its sunshield for its upcoming million-mile (roughly 1.5 million kilometer) journey, which begins later this year. The sunshield - a five-layer, diamond-shaped structure the size of a tennis court - was specially engineered to fold up around the two sides of the telescope and fit within the confines of its

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Apr 08, 2021
NASA's OSIRIS-REx completed its last flyover of Bennu around 6 a.m. EDT (4 a.m. MDT) April 7 and is now slowly drifting away from the asteroid; however, the mission team will have to wait a few more days to find out how the spacecraft changed the surface of Bennu when it grabbed a sample of the asteroid. The OSIRIS-REx team added this flyby to document surface changes resulting from the To

Pasadena CA (JPL) Apr 08, 2021
NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft launched 20 years ago on April 7, making it the oldest spacecraft still working at the Red Planet. The orbiter, which takes its name from Arthur C. Clarke's classic sci-fi novel "2001: A Space Odyssey" (Clarke blessed its use before launch), was sent to map the composition of the Martian surface, providing a window to the past so scientists could piece togethe

Pasadena CA (JPL) Apr 08, 2021
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover took a selfie with the Ingenuity helicopter, seen here about 13 feet (4 meters) away in this image from April 6, 2021, the 46th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Perseverance captured the image using a camera called WATSON (Wide Angle Topographic Sensor for Operations and eNgineering), part of the SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman and Luminesce