Solar System News

March 3, 2025

Top Headlines

Lunar Trailblazer Blasts Off to Map Water on the Moon

Feb. 25, 2025 — On Wednesday 26 February, a thermal imaging camera blasted off to the Moon as part of NASA's Lunar Trailblazer mission. This aims to map sources of water on the Moon to shed light on the lunar water cycle and to guide future robotic and human ...

Adsorptive Regolith on Mars Soaks Up Water, Researchers Reveal

Feb. 26, 2025 — Researchers are looking underfoot to uncover the mysterious past of Mars: Martian regoliths in the soil. Their water storage capabilities may help us understand the change in water on Mars over ...

Why Is Mars Red? Scientists May Finally Have the Answer

Feb. 25, 2025 — A new study shows a water-rich mineral could explain the planet's color -- and hint at its wetter, more habitable ...

Deposits Found on a Nearby Asteroid Point to Salty Water in the Outer Solar System

Feb. 14, 2025 — Asteroids that orbit close to the Earth inevitably cause us some anxiety due to the even remote possibility of a collision. But their proximity also offers ample opportunities to learn more about the ...

Latest Headlines

updated 4:03pm EST

Tidal Energy Measurements Help Scientists Understand Titan's Composition, Orbital History

Feb. 12, 2025 — Scientists are studying Saturn's moon Titan to assess its tidal dissipation rate, the energy lost as it orbits the ringed planet with its massive ...

Temperamental Stars Are Distorting Our View of Distant Planets

Feb. 7, 2025 — 'Temperamental' stars that brighten and dim over a matter of hours or days may be distorting our view of thousands of distant planets, suggests a new ...

Meteorite Discovery Challenges Long-Held Theories on Earth's Missing Elements

Feb. 5, 2025 — Earliest inner solar system planetesimals shaped the inventory of moderately volatile elements in terrestrial ...

Life-Bearing Water Arrived on Earth Later Rather Than Sooner

Feb. 3, 2025 — Scientist have concluded water did not arrive as early during Earth's formation as previously thought, an insight that bears directly on the question of when life originated on the planet. The ...

Exploring Mysteries of Asteroid Bennu

Jan. 29, 2025 — Scientists found that asteroid Bennu contained a set of salty mineral deposits that formed in an exact sequence when a brine evaporated, leaving clues about the type of water that flowed billions of ...

Life's Building Blocks in Asteroid Bennu Samples

Jan. 29, 2025 — Scientists detected all five nucleobases -- building blocks of DNA and RNA -- in samples returned from asteroid Bennu by NASA's OSIRIS-REx ...

A Super-Earth Laboratory for Searching Life Elsewhere in the Universe

Jan. 28, 2025 — Thirty years after the discovery of the first exoplanet, we detected more than 7000 of them in our Galaxy. But there are still billions more to be discovered! At the same time, exoplanetologists have ...

Follow the Water: Searching for a Lunar Oasis

Jan. 28, 2025 — As humankind imagines living off-planet -- on the moon, Mars and beyond -- the question of how to sustain life revolves around the physical necessities of oxygen, food and water. We know there is ...

Explaining Persistent Hydrogen in Mars' Atmosphere

Jan. 28, 2025 — The fact that the cold, dry Mars of today had flowing rivers and lakes several billion years ago has puzzled scientists for decades. Now, researchers think they have a good explanation for a warmer, ...

Dwarf Planet Ceres: Building Blocks of Life Delivered from Space

Jan. 27, 2025 — The dwarf planet is a bizarre, cryovolcanic world. However, the organic deposits discovered on its surface so far are unlikely to originate from its interior. The organic material found in a few ...

How Titan Maintains Its Atmosphere

Jan. 27, 2025 — Scientists have performed laboratory experiments to better understand how Saturn's moon Titan can maintain its unique nitrogen-rich atmosphere. Titan is the second largest moon in our solar ...

Extreme Supersonic Winds Measured on Planet Outside Our Solar System

Jan. 21, 2025 — Astronomers have discovered extremely powerful winds pummeling the equator of WASP-127b, a giant exoplanet. Reaching speeds up to 33,000 km/h, the winds make up the fastest jet-stream of its kind ...

Astrophysicists Reveal Structure of 74 Exocomet Belts Orbiting Nearby Stars in Landmark Survey

Jan. 17, 2025 — Astrophysicists have imaged a large number of exocomet belts around nearby stars, and the tiny pebbles within them. The crystal-clear images show light being emitted from these millimeter-sized ...

The Moon: A Chunk Ejected from Earth?

Jan. 16, 2025 — A research team has discovered another piece in the puzzle of the formation of the Moon and water on Earth. The prevailing theory was that the Moon was the result of a collision between the early ...

Super-Earth Vs. Sub-Neptune? The Winner Is Super-Venus!

Jan. 15, 2025 — New observational data and simulation models have confirmed a new type of planet unlike anything found in the Solar System. This provides another piece of the puzzle to understand how planets and ...

Pluto-Charon Formation Scenario Mimics Earth-Moon System

Jan. 7, 2025 — A researcher has used advanced models that indicate that the formation of Pluto and Charon may parallel that of the Earth-Moon system. Both systems include a moon that is a large fraction of the size ...

Mysteries of Icy Ocean Worlds

Dec. 20, 2024 — A study introduces a novel thermodynamic concept called the 'centotectic' and investigates the stability of liquids in extreme conditions -- critical information for determining the ...

Best Glimpse Ever Into Icy Planetesimals of the Early Solar System

Dec. 19, 2024 — New studies offer a clearer picture of how the outer solar system formed and evolved based on analyses of trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) and centaurs. The findings reveal the distribution of ices in ...

Origins of Lunar Water and Its Connection to Earth's Early History

Dec. 19, 2024 — Scientists have unveiled groundbreaking research on the origins of lunar water, offering insights that could reshape our understanding of the Earth-Moon system and the broader solar system. The ...

Scientists Solving Meteorological Mysteries on Mars

Dec. 19, 2024 — Scientists are changing our understanding of climate and weather on Mars and providing critical insights into Earth's atmospheric processes as ...

New Evidence Exists for Hidden Water Reservoirs and Rare Magmas on Ancient Mars

Dec. 19, 2024 — A new study explores how variations in Mars' crustal thickness during its ancient history may have influenced the planet's magmatic evolution and hydrological systems. The research suggests ...

Uncovering a Centaur's Tracks: Scientists Examine Unique Asteroid-Comet Hybrid

Dec. 18, 2024 — Scientists recently led a team that found, for the first time, that Chiron has surface chemistry unlike other centaurs. Its surface it has both carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide ice along with ...

A 'Remelting' of Lunar Surface Adds a Wrinkle to Mystery of Moon's True Age

Dec. 18, 2024 — Scientists propose a 'remelting' of the Moon's surface 4.35 billion years ago due to the tidal pull of Earth causing widespread geological upheaval and intense ...

New Paper Examines the Elusive Nature of Liquid Brines on Mars

Dec. 16, 2024 — The combination of low temperature, atmospheric pressure and water vapor pressure on Mars means any liquid water found there would likely freeze, boil or evaporate immediately, making its presence ...

Anthropologists Call for Tracking and Preservation of Human Artifacts on Mars

Dec. 16, 2024 — Anthropologists argue physical artifacts of human exploration on Mars deserve cataloging, preservation and care in order to chronicle humanity's first attempts at interplanetary ...

Heart of Jovian Moon's Volcanic Rage

Dec. 13, 2024 — A new study points to why, and how, Io became the most volcanic body in the solar ...

NASA's Hubble Celebrates Decade of Tracking Outer Planets

Dec. 9, 2024 — A NASA Hubble Space Telescope observation program called OPAL (Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy) obtains long-term baseline observations of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune in order to understand ...

Mars' Infamous Dust Storms Can Engulf the Entire Planet: A New Study Examines How

Dec. 9, 2024 — Dust storms on Mars could one day pose dangers to human astronauts, damaging equipment and burying solar panels. New research gets closer to predicting when extreme weather might erupt on the Red ...

Astronomers Find the Smallest Asteroids Ever Detected in the Main Belt

Dec. 9, 2024 — Astronomers have found a way to spot the smallest, 'decameter,' asteroids within the main asteroid belt. They used their approach to detect more than 100 new asteroids, ranging from the ...

Researchers Deal a Blow to Theory That Venus Once Had Liquid Water on Its Surface

Dec. 2, 2024 — A team of astronomers has found that Venus has never been habitable, despite decades of speculation that our closest planetary neighbor was once much more like Earth than it is ...