Amateur astronomers’ images of a rare double aurora may unlock its secrets

What happens when two different kinds of auroras get together? One spills the other’s secrets. Amateur astronomers have captured a strange combination of red and green auroras on camera, and…

A new look at the ‘mineral kingdom’ may transform how we search for life

If every mineral tells a story, then geologists now have their equivalent of The Arabian Nights. For the first time, scientists have cataloged every different way that every known mineral…

50 years ago, a new theory of Earth’s core began solidifying

How the Earth got its core – Science News, July 1, 1972 In the beginning, scientists believe there was an interstellar gas cloud of all the elements comprising the Earth.…

New Gaia data paint the most detailed picture yet of the Milky Way

1.6 billion stars. 11.4 million galaxies. 158,000 asteroids. One spacecraft. The European Space Agency’s Gaia space observatory, which launched in 2013, has long surpassed its goal of charting more than…

Samples of the asteroid Ryugu are scientists’ purest pieces of the solar system

Samples of the asteroid Ryugu are the most pristine pieces of the solar system that scientists have in their possession. A new analysis of Ryugu material confirms the porous rubble-pile…

Ice at the moon’s poles might have come from ancient volcanoes

Four billion years ago, lava spilled onto the moon’s crust, etching the man in the moon we see today. But the volcanoes may have also left a much colder legacy:…

These are the first plants grown in moon dirt

That’s one small stem for a plant, one giant leap for plant science. In a tiny, lab-grown garden, the first seeds ever sown in lunar dirt have sprouted. This small…

NASA’s InSight lander has recorded the largest Marsquake yet

Any Martians out there should learn to duck and cover. On May 4, the Red Planet was rocked by a roughly magnitude 5 temblor, the largest Marsquake detected to date,…

Lava and frost may form the mysterious lumps on Jupiter’s moon Io

On Jupiter’s moon Io, lava creeping beneath frost may give rise to fields of towering dunes. That finding, described April 19 in Nature Communications, suggests that dunes may be more…

U.S. planetary scientists want to explore Uranus and Enceladus next

The continuing search for life beyond Earth is driving many of the priorities for what’s next when it comes to U.S. planetary exploration. In a new report that could shape…