Latest Planetary science Stories
NASA and the Department of the Interior's U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) presented the 2012 William T. Pecora awards for achievement in earth remote sensing to Gilberto Camara of Brazil's National Institute for Space Research and Leung Tsang of the University of Washington in Seattle. Camara was recognized for his contributions to remote-sensing leadership as a scientist, program director, manager and agency head. Tsang is one of the world's leading experts on the theory of microwave remote...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The youngest still-forming solar system ever seen has been discovered by astronomers and reported about in the journal Nature. Astronomers found an infant star surrounded by a swirling disk of dust and gas more than 450 light-years from Earth in the constellation Taurus. The star has about one-fifth the mass of the Sun, but the scientists say it will likely pull in material from its surroundings to eventually match the Sun's mass....
[ Watch the Video: GRAIL's Gravity Tour of the Moon ] Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Scientists using data from NASA's GRAIL mission have determined that the Moon's interior is nearly completely pulverized. The latest finding from the Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission suggests that during the Moon's first billion years, it may have endured more fracturing from massive impacts than previously thought. Planetary scientists have stitched...
WASHINGTON, Dec. 4, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- NASA and the Department of the Interior's U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) presented the 2012 William T. Pecora awards for achievement in earth remote sensing to Gilberto Camara of Brazil's National Institute for Space Research and Leung Tsang of the University of Washington in Seattle. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) Camara was recognized for his contributions to remote-sensing leadership as a scientist,...
PHOENIX, Dec. 4, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- IO, a leading provider of next-generation modular data center technology and services, and Active Power (NASDAQ: ACPW), a manufacturer of UPS (uninterruptible power supply) systems and modular infrastructure solutions, today announced a strategic partnership and integration of IO.OS software into Active Power's PowerHouse and CleanSource UPS product portfolio. Through this partnership, Active Power customers will leverage the IO.OS software...
Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, has long been projected as an icy body with a vast ocean of liquid water underneath its crust. A recent analysis suggested that heat generated from within the natural satellite helps keep this ocean from freezing due to interactions it has with Saturn and the other moons. And now, a new analysis of the moon’s topography and gravity indicates that its icy outer crust is twice as dense as previously...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online A new study has found that many planets in other solar systems may be more habitable than our very own. Astronomers and geologists at Ohio State University teamed up to search for alien life in a whole new way; by studying eight "solar twins" of our sun in order to measure the amounts of radioactive elements they contain. Those stars came from a dataset recorded by the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS)...
Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The European Space Agency (ESA) has been observing Earth’s sister planet for six years with its polar orbiter Venus Express. During its visit of the second planet from the sun, the orbiter has shown huge changes in sulphur dioxide content in the planet’s atmosphere, leading experts to believe volcanic activity has been increasing on the surface of Venus. ESA officials explain that Venus’s thick atmosphere contains more than...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Slooh will be offering a real-time feed of Jupiter on the night it is at its closest to Earth until the summer of 2021. The coverage will be of Jupiter at its brightest and biggest, and will be taking place this Sunday, December 2, starting at 5:15 p.m. Pacific. Viewers will be able to watch the celestial event live from their PC, or smartphones powered by Apple's iOS or Google's Android. The Jupiter event will be hosted by...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online - Video 1 | Video 2 | Video 3 Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have discovered that the outer region of a dusty disc encircling a brown dwarf contains solid grains like those found in denser discs of newborn stars. The find challenges theories of how rock, Earth-scale planets form, suggesting the planets may be more common in the Universe than expected. Scientists believe rocky planets form...
Latest Planetary science Reference Libraries
Image Caption: Artistic concept of a planetary system. Credit: Wikipedia/NASA/JPL-Caltech The term Astronomy encompasses a broad range of topics, including the study of stars, galaxies, and planets. In order to focus on the different areas of study, many subfields of astronomy emerge. One such area is the study of planets known, appropriately, as Planetary Astronomy. Observational Planetary Astronomy Even within the field of Planetary Astronomy, there are several divisions to...
Solar cycles: what are they and why should we care about them? Solar cycles are made up of what are known as solar minimums (min) and solar maximums (max). We refer to a solar min at the time when the sun is not active with many sunspots, while a solar max is just the opposite when we see a large increase in sunspot activity. So how long do solar cycles last? Typically they run on what is known as an 11 year cycle from the max to the min and then start over again anew. As of 2012 we...
Planetary and Space Science is a peer-reviewed scientific journal established in 1959 and published by Elsevier 15 times per year. As of May 2012, the editor-in-chief is Rita Schulz (The Netherlands). The journal publishes original research articles and short communications. The main focus is on solar system processes which encompass multiple areas of the natural sciences. Research that involves planetary and space sciences involves many disciplines. Celestial mechanics is part of these...
Physics of the Earth and Planetary Interiors is a biweekly published peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Elsevier. As of April 2012, co-editors are G. Aelfric (University of Bristol), K. Hirose (Tokyo Institute of Technology), M. Jellinek (University of British Columbia), and K. Zhang (University of Exeter). This journal focuses on the physical and chemical processes of planetary interiors. Topics covered include planetary physics, geodesy and geophysics. Publishing formats...
Geophysical Journal International is a peer-reviewed scientific journal publish monthly by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society and the German Geophysical Society. The editor-in-chief is Jeannot Trampert of TA Utrecht, the Netherlands. The primary focus of this journal is fundamental research in Geophysics. Publishing formats are original research, research notes, letters, and book reviews. Coverage includes computational, theoretical, observational and applied...
