Topic: Solar Systems
Ryugu Sample Supports Invading Life

Ryugu Sample Supports Invading Life

Ryugu samples showing signs of bacteria contamination. Trying to understand the evolution of planets and life is really a driving motivation for a lot of science and science fiction. Landing squarely in the “I think I read a horror story about this,” scientists found that all attempts to prevent earth life from sneaking into a sample of material from the asteroid Ryugu were futile. According to a paper led by Matthew Genge and appearing in Meteoritics & Planetary Science, “the sample was contaminated with microorganisms during the preparation of the polished block” prior to X-ray...

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Iron Identified in Planet-Forming Disk

Iron Identified in Planet-Forming Disk

Observations with the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) found various silicate compounds and potentially iron, substances we also find in large amounts in the Solar System’s rocky planets. Credit: Jenry I’ve said it...

Alien Atmospheric Change

Alien Atmospheric Change

This is an artist’s impression of the exoplanet WASP 121-b, also known as Tylos. The exoplanet’s appearance is based on Hubble data of the object. Credit: NASA, ESA, Q. Changeat et al., M. Zamani (ESA/Hubble) Astronomers have only been able to identify planets...

Closer Look: The Requirements for Life

Closer Look: The Requirements for Life

Hydrothermal-vent chimney. In the center of the photo, you can see the vent fluid which appears like dark smoke due to the high levels of minerals and sulfides contained in the fluid. Look closely, and you will also see the chimney is crawling with Chorocaris shrimp...

Small star hosts (smaller) huge planet

Small star hosts (smaller) huge planet

Artistic rendering of the possible view from LHS 3154b towards its low mass host star. Given its large mass, LHS 3154b probably has a Neptune-like composition. Credit: Penn State Solar systems keep finding new ways to surprise us and to convince us that we don’t...

Six planets in coordinated orbits

Six planets in coordinated orbits

https://youtu.be/KfZCGBhwpes In my personal opinion, one of the mathematically coolest things in our solar system is the orbits of Jupiter's three inner Galilean moons. It just happens, that these worlds orbit to a beat, with innermost Io circling four times for every...

You can visit a piece of Bennu

You can visit a piece of Bennu

Credit: NMNH We would be remiss if we didn’t update you all on the Bennu sample return mission. As of writing, no word has been released on if the science team has managed to get the TAGSAM capsule open, yet. Remember how that boop became a shove and the capsule had...

Lucy finds a moonmoon

Lucy finds a moonmoon

Credit: NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL Last episode, we brought you some early science results from the Lucy mission, which is out exploring asteroids in the main belt on the way to hanging out amongst Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids. The biggest piece of news was the...