NASA Begins Mission To Find Life on Jupiter’s Moon

Medicine & Technology May 31, 2015

NASA has now begun its mission to learn if Europa, Jupiter’s icy moon could potentially harbor an ocean filled with alien life. So far, the mission is just in its early stages, but the agency has selected nine science instruments for the trip, which is a follow to the Galileo mission that found strong evidence that Europa could be concealing an ocean beneath its frozen crust.

See What Tools Made the Cut Aboard the Upcoming Europa Clipper Mission

May 27, 2015

What would you pack for the 390 million mile trip to Jupiter's icy moon, Europa? Last year, NASA posed that question to a bevy of scientists and after whittling down the final 33 proposals, they have decided on nine items that will rocket aboard the Europa Clipper, which is set to blast off sometime after 2020.

NASA Learns What the Mysterious Dark Material on Europa Is

May 14, 2015

Scientists at NASA have found evidence using laboratory experiments that the dark material that dusts the surface of Europa, Jupiter's ice covered moon, may actually be sea salt from a subsurface ocean.

From the Surface of Jupiter's Moon—Europa Reveals Icy Glass

May 13, 2015

The European Space Agency (ESA) has just published a striking picture of Europa, Jupiter's icy moon. In the image the surface looks like shattered glass; it reveals many interlocking cracks in the moon's icy crust which were formed by an ocean below the moon's surface. Now a team from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) led by planetary scientist Kevin Hand has identified the cracks as sea salt.

Are Ceres' Bright Spots Signs of Alien Life? NASA Wants You to Weigh In

May 02, 2015

From the moment they were discovered by NASA's Dawn spacecraft, the two bright spots on Ceres have fascinated scientists and amateur astronomers across the world. What are they and why are they there? Scientists believed that once Dawn reached orbit they would be able to learn more about these two mysterious spots, but even now they remain a mystery. NASA has made an unusual move by inviting the public to weigh in on what they believe is the nature of these two bright spots.

Scientists Catch Light Bouncing Off Exoplanet

Apr 24, 2015

An international team of astronomers says they have managed to take the first visible light spectrum from an exoplanet, giving them yet another new tool to probe the nature of the exoplanet known as 51 Pegasi b, otherwise known as “hot Jupiter.”

Ganymede's Aurora Hints at Ocean Under Jupiter Moon's Surface

Mar 25, 2015

Aurora Hints at Ocean under Ganymede

Jupiter Could Forever Be Known as the Solar System's Wrecking Ball

Mar 24, 2015

Our solar system may have once been made up of a number of super-Earths, until Jupiter came through the system like a giant wrecking ball, according to a new study.

Jupiter and Its Moons Set to Put on Astronomical Show

Mar 03, 2015

In February, Mars and Venus put on quite a show in the skies above. Determined not to be outdone, Jupiter, the fifth and largest planet in our solar system, will put on a show of its own along with its moons during the month of March.

Three Moons Cast Shadow on Striped Gas Giant—Jupiter

Feb 05, 2015

Though researchers have studied the four natural satellites orbiting around Jupiter, a new set of images courtesy of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals a rare new view of three of the moons in action. In a rare, and short-lived event, three of the moons moved across the striped face of the gas giant, casting shadows on the planet below.

Researchers Reveal Method for Magnetic Field Calculation of Exoplanets

Nov 22, 2014

Knowing the level of a planet’s magnetic field can be an important fact to know in the study of how they interact. But studying the fields of an exoplanet, outside of our solar system and orbiting a foreign star, can be a difficult task that researchers have not yet been able to achieve. Though in nearly two decades of looking past our solar system to investigate exoplanets, researchers have developed several methods to estimate magnetic fields at quite a distance.