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The findings have big implications for future missions to the moon.
On Io, the floor is basically lava.
The two are already collaborating on important science projects.
Who wouldn't?
Our humble satellite just got a heck of a lot more interesting.
This is the first company to travel to the Moon and explore its potential for resources.
It doesn't answer everything -- but it's a good point to start from.
He wasn't always right -- but he was pretty close.
Moon Express is going to the Moon -- if we can solve the paperwork.
Not much bigger than an apartment building, 2016 HO3 has been confirmed as Earth's newest satellite.
A research team discovered two geologically young craters — one 16 million, the other between 75 and 420 million, years old — in the Moon’s darkest regions.
A few years ago, the Cassini spacecraft made a surprising discovery: there are geysers erupting on Saturn’s moon Enceladus, spewing water and ice to great heights. However, the process which causes these geysers remained unknown or controversial. Now, scientists at the University of Chicago and Princeton University have pinpointed a mechanism through which Saturn’s tidal forces […]
Researchers studying the Moon’s ice have found evidence that Earth’s moon wandered off its original axis roughly 3 billion years ago. This would mean that our satellite is in a select group of wanderers, alongside only few other planetary bodies. Planetary scientist Matt Siegler at Southern Methodist University, Dallas, and colleagues were examining NASA data regarding lunar […]
Well, technically if you're not a space pirate, you'll be prosecuted by the laws governing your home country. On the International Space Station, that's another story.
If we want to have a permanent or long-term mission to Mars, then growing crops locally would be very useful.
It’s absolutely baffling that we’ve reached a level where we can not only study the geology of the Earth, but also that of other bodies in the solar system – in this case, the Moon. This is a false color mosaic constructed from a series of 53 images taken through three spectral filters by Galileo’s imaging […]
China’s National Space Administration released a trove of images from their lunar rover and they’re spectacular. We’re talking hundreds of tantalizing, HD and never-before-seen images of the Moon! You can set up an account on China’s Science and Application Center for Moon and Deepspace Exploration website and have a look for yourself, view and download all the […]
The moon does more than cause tides and delight lovers - according to a new study, it can also affect how much rainfall falls down on the ground.
Chinese researchers say their lunar rover found a new type of lunar rock unlike anything the Americans or Soviets had brought home before.
Astronomers describe that the present-day tilt of the Moon is likely a result of collision-free encounters of the early Moon with small planetary bodies.
Russia is locking up six women together to simulate a trip to the moon and back. But no one is taking this too seriously, it seems.
If you’ve ever wanted to plan a hiking trip on the Moon, now you have the perfect opportunity: a gorgeous pair of new lunar maps – the Image Mosaic and Topographic Maps of the Moon – is now available online for everyone to see and download. To me, it’s mind blowing that we have so high quality maps […]
The last time humans set foot on the moon was 1972. Feeling confident it had clearly showed its superiority over Russia, the US felt no more reason to prove itself and immediately shut down subsequent missions. Once with funding gone - and its budget has been thinning since - NASA had to settle for less ambitious goals, and it's not like we can blame them. Building on outpost on the moon, versus say the International Space Station, is not only a lot more expensive, but also impractical. Recent findings, however, suggest there's a lot to gain from having an outpost on the moon, of some sorts at least. That's because the interest has shifted from prestige, or at least not only, to the potentially bountiful economic activities. Minerals, helium-3 (fuel) or precious metals can all be mined from the moon, trillions worth. But before you can shuttle minerals back from the moon, you at least need a footing of some sort. Understanding this, the European Space Agency and Roscosmos banded together to send a robotic probe to an unexplored region of the moon. The ultimate goal, they say, is to prepare the ground for humans.
A company from Japan wants to become the first to advertise a product on the moon. The sports drink producer, Pocari Sweat, has contacted SpaceX - an American company that regularly ferries cargo to the International Space Station and is close to sending astronauts to the International Space Station - to land a canned sports drink. This would mark a milestone in human history: the first ad on the moon - both disturbing and interesting at the same time. Maybe any kind of interest in moon exploration (who knows what happens when you try to land a can on the moon?) in this moment is welcomed. Maybe.
We call it the "dark side" of the Moon, but that's a rather improper name - a better one would be the "far side", because it's not dark at all. As if to prove that point, NASA just released images of the moon that would be impossible to capture from Earth, highlighting the far side illuminated completely.
Dylan O’Donnell, an amateur photographer, took one of the luckiest shots ever: the International Space Station past the moon. Any astro buff would be envious.
The Apollo program returned 380.05 kg of lunar rocks and soil, and most of the samples are stored at the Lunar Sample Laboratory Facility. The samples of rocks, breccias, and regolith were polished into thin sections, allowing for optical geologic studies to be performed on them.
The Moon doesn’t have an atmosphere, but it is surrounded by a thick dust cloud; the dust constantly falls down to the lunar surface, but new dust constantly jumps to replenish it. The pattern of dust falling back to its home “in due time … will fill in craters,” says the University of Colorado, Boulder’s Mihaly […]
The nature of bright swirl patterns, some extending for hundreds of kilometers, on the moon's surface has eluded researchers for years. Now, the mystery seems to have been solved after a computer simulation suggests these were made following comet impacts. The tails of the comet, through made up of light-weight ice particles, likely blew off the upper, dark layer of the moon's surface, leaving behind a bright trail.
According to the Chinese Central Television, China wants to land rover on the far side of the moon, also know as the dark side of the moon, by 2020. This would make it the first nation to land a spacecraft of any sort there. First, the rover will orbit the moon piggy-bagged by the Chang'e 4 spacecraft then later deployed to a launch site. The rover will carry out some scientific missions, but the main goal really is to test China's space launching capabilities, but also as a show of force. Flex those muscles, sort to speak. Some analysts, however, speak out that there might be more to it, namely a bid for the moon's resources.
Good news for space exploration: Japan’s space agency JAXA revealed plans to land a rover on the Moon by 2018, joining a very small club of nations that directly explored our planet’s satellite. “This is an initial step and a lot of procedures are still ahead before the plan is formally approved,” a JAXA spokesperson told […]
Billions of years ago, our ancient planet collided with a Mars-sized object called Theia. The impact released tremendous amounts of energy which is thought to have produced a whole mantle magma ocean, which should have erased pre-existing chemical heterogeneities within the Earth. Following the onslaught, a new Earth formed, along with the moon. New geochemical findings hint that the impact didn't completely melt the whole planet, leaving clumps and patches intact. This ancient past is thought to still ripple in Earth's mantle.
Because the moon is tidally-locked to Earth, we’re used to seeing our cosmic neighbor like a stationary lonesome figure. Now, NASA released an animated simulation of the moon’s phase from its so-called dark side, offering an insightful glimpse from the other side of the coin. Far side of the moon – not so dark after […]
China’s has reached a new milestone in its space program – its latest spacecraft service module has entered orbit around the moon, after being successfully tested on Earth a few months ago. Chinese media reports that the service module of a test lunar orbiter has successfully began orbiting the Moon. The goal of this mission is to […]
Scientists have discovered an almost rectangular feature consisting of ancient magma. The features are similar to rifts here on Earth, a linear zone where the Earth’s crust and lithosphere are being pulled apart. However, since the Moon doesn’t have any plate tectonics to cause rifts, the origin of this magma is still questionable. Magma on the […]
Scientists have indirectly demonstrated the existence of a hot layer surrounding the Moon's core, through seismic and deformation studies. This layer is created by the gravity exerted by the Earth on the Moon and can provide valuable information regarding the evolution of the Earth-Moon system.
The Earth contains a lot of iron, but it is not alone in the solar system in that aspect. Venus, Mars, the Moon and asteroids such as Vesta all have iron in their structure, but Mercury is the champion in that aspect: about 70 percent of its mass is iron! Now, researchers believe they have […]
The Moon and sleep For centuries, people have thought that the Moon affects sleep patterns. But does it really? Many people report increased sleepiness when there is a full moon, and there have even been some studies linking the Moon with sleep patterns. However, a new study conducted by researchers from the Max Planck Institute of […]
Earth is not the only place in the solar system to hold watery oceans: Enceladus, one of Saturn’s moons also holds a liquid ocean, albeit one that is covered by ice. However, Enceladus is still an extremely exciting place to find extraterrestrial life – not only because of the water it holds, but because water […]
A new massive computer model that simulates the formation of the solar system from its early days when all it used to comprise was a huge disk of matter to present day shows that Earth’s moon formed some 65 million years later than previous estimates led us to believe. The method provides a new way […]
A piece of rock traveling at at 61,000 km/h punched a crater 40 metres wide on the surface of the Moon, producing a flash that could be seen from Earth. I feel like Hollywood can ruin your expectations when talking about huge meteoritic impacts – we’re dealing with a meteorite here that’s way smaller than […]
In the early hours of December 2nd, China deployed its Chang’e-3 spacecraft on route for the moon after launching it via a Long March 3B rocket from the Xichang launch centre in Sichuan. The spacecraft is expected to reach lunar orbit in about 4 days, if everything goes as planned. On 14 December, the probe is expected to touch […]
If astronauts are ever to live on the moon or in deep space outposts, a sustainable living plan in which they would grow their own food (plants) in greenhouses is required. NASA is taking the first steps in this direction by developing a project which aims to germinate plants on the moon’s surface. Thousands of […]
A lost moon of Neptune has not been seen since its discovery in the late 1980s – until now, that is. A new announcement from the 45th Meeting of the Division for Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society revealed the rediscovery of the moon of Neptune which was only glimpsed briefly back in the […]
An US astronomer recently reported that he and his team have discovered a new moon orbiting the eighth and farthest planet from the sun, Neptune. Designated S/2004 N 1, this is the 14th known moon to circle the giant planet. Some of you might find it odd that we’ve yet to spot all the moons orbiting […]
Pluto may not be a planet anymore, but it still has a few moons. The International Astronomical Union (IAU) is announcing that the names Kerberos and Styx have officially been recognised for the fourth and fifth moons of Pluto, which were discovered in 2011 and 2012. Both the names come from Greek mythology. Kerberos (or […]
As we’ve already posted today, NASA’s GRAIL mission did a great job of mapping out the gravitational features of the Moon. Just as a quick add to that, here’s two maps which I hope you’ll find interesting:
I have to say I’m a little sad writing this – engineers working at NASA‘s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) have received confirmation that the twin probes used to create the most accurate and detailed gravity map of the Moon have successfully crashed into the surface of our planet’s satellite. I say successfully because this is […]
The Ebb and Flow satellites, known together as the Grail mission are mapping the slight differences in gravity across the Moon. The results show that the Moon received a much bigger battering than previous expected. A troubled past Beneath its surface, the Moon’s interior bears clues from the very early solar system – unlike the […]
A group of researchers from the United States found out that the Moon is covered with a soil containing typical water structure. Weirdly enough, the water substructure packed soil is created by a constant stream of charged particles coming from the sun, according to the team. The key is hydroxyl. As you probably know, […]
