Mission Updates: ExoMars, InSight, Venus, and Juno
Mission Updates: ExoMars’s twin performs tests on simulated terrain. NASA InSight uses dirt to remove dust from solar panels. Two Venus missions chosen by NASA. And NASA’s Juno will flyby Ganymede.
Massive Survey Confirms Ideas on Universe’s Evolution
The Dark Energy Survey has released 29 new scientific papers from their collaboration of 400 scientists spread across 25 institutions in seven countries. This mound of papers looks at the distribution of 226 million galaxies, their morphologies, and the structures they combine to form.
Volcano Updates: Kīlauea, Great Sitkin, and Iceland
Volcano Updates: Kīlauea stops erupting, Great Sitkin sends up an ash cloud, and we take a look at how the Icelandic Meteorological Office monitored the recent eruption before it even began.
Star’s Magnetic Field Twirls Gas
A young, fast-rotating white dwarf is spinning so fast and has such a strong magnetic field that the infalling material is just flung away like it is hitting fan blades.
Light Delays Disk Formation in White Dwarf Systems
When we look at the youngest white dwarf stars, we don’t see debris disks because the extreme heat blasts the dust apart, preventing the disk’s formation.
Ghostly Young Nebula Catches Star Formation
New observations of nebula RCW120 show that it is expanding at 15 km/s, triggering new rings of star formation that are unlike anything we’ve seen before.
Eta Carinae’s Light Drowns Its Nebula
Supernova candidate Eta Carinae continues to brighten, threatening to drown out its nebula, but it may not be sharing mass with its companion star as expected.
What’s Up: Mercury-Venus Conjunction and Manhattanhenge
An incredibly close conjunction of Mercury and Venus can be seen just above the horizon at dusk, and the first Manhattanhenge pair of 2021 is May 29 and 30.
Europa’s Ocean Floor Could Host Volcanoes
New work details observations and modeling of Jupiter’s moon Europa and how the tidal forces from Jupiter and the other Galilean moons may cause enough inner heating for Europa to have volcanoes on its seafloor.
Ice Stream Features on Mars May Signal Subsurface Water
New research provides evidence for past ice streams under the surface of Mars that exist in flat, low-lying region that could be a potential landing spot for future astronauts.
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