Space : Science World Report

Jan 07, 2013 07:19 PM EST

461 more Kepler exoplanets found, analysis expects 17 billion Earth-sized planets

Kepler mission scientists announced Monday that a new batch of analysis yielded 461 more exoplanet candidates - and that is from within a relatively small cross-section of our galaxy, bringing the total number of potential planets awaiting confirmation to 2,740. Of the several dozen Earth-sized plan...

Jan 07, 2013 05:47 PM EST

Another 15 exoplanets within habitable zone discovered - by amateur astronomers

The project Planet Hunters today announced the discovery of another 15 exoplanets within the "Goldilocks" zone around their respective stars, where the planet is at the right distance from a star to have liquid water. The project enlists the help of "citizen scientists" to help sort through the huge...

Jan 06, 2013 02:20 AM EST

Strange dark material on protoplanet Vesta likely carbon from asteroid impact

A new study related to NASA's Dawn mission found an answer on the whereabouts of dark spots on the giant asteroid Vesta. A carbon-rich asteroid possibly crashed into Vesta two to three billion years ago and formed dark blemishes on its surface.

Jan 05, 2013 03:41 PM EST

Mars could've looked like Earth 2 billion years ago, wetter and warmer

Our red neighbor planet Mars most probably had an atmosphere, rivers and water 2 billion years ago, according to very recent discoveries thanks to the Mars Exploration Rovers like Opportunity and Curiosity, and orbiting satellites like the European Mars Express. Just last week, a study of the Martia...

Jan 05, 2013 02:35 PM EST

International Space Station gearing up for scientific results in 2013

While it was a success in itself to construct the $100 billion space station ISS, and to keep it manned consistently since over a decade now, the on-board laboratories and experimental capabilities are underutilized and didn't yield abundant results until now. Only 72 percent of NASA's science rack...

Jan 04, 2013 07:17 PM EST

Solar eruption on NYE [NASA Image of the day]

While it was New Year's Eve on Earth, the NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory captured this solar eruption, a truly gigantic and magnificent kind of firework. The flare shot about 260,000 kilometers out from the Sun. While it was a rather small eruption, it corresponds to 20 times the size of Earth with...

Jan 04, 2013 06:54 PM EST

Arianespace to launch VNREDSat-1A built by Astrium for Vietnam

VNREDSat-1A will be launched during the second quarter of 2013 by the second Vega launcher, VERTA 1, performed by Arianespace at the Guiana Space Center, French Guiana, for the European Space Agency (ESA). The satellite will be carried in the lower position on the Vespa multiple launch structure use...

Jan 04, 2013 04:44 PM EST

Plan for dragging asteroid into lunar orbit surfaced

Plans by NASA to utilize a robotic spacecraft to drag a small asteroid to a lunar orbit surfaced today. According to researchers with the Keck Institute for Space Studies in California, such a mission would cost about $2.6 billion and could happen by the 2020s

Jan 04, 2013 10:47 AM EST

Planet formation is the norm, thus there are billions in our galaxy, says study

Look up at the night sky and you'll see stars, sure. But you're also seeing planets -- billions and billions of them. At least

Jan 04, 2013 10:32 AM EST

Giant Andromeda Galaxy circled by disk of dwarf galaxies

A new study shows an unexpected phenomenon in our nearest giant cosmic neighbor, the Andromeda galaxy. A majority of its dwarf galaxy companions are aligned in a giant disk that appears to rotate around the bright host also known as Messier 31.

Jan 03, 2013 06:29 PM EST

Snow-Covered Desert [NASA Image of the day]

Snow-covered deserts are rare, but that's exactly what the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite observed as it passed over the Taklimakan Desert in western China on Jan. 2, 2013. Snow has covered much of the desert since a storm blew through the area on Dec....

Jan 03, 2013 06:21 PM EST

Meteorite from Martian surface contains high amount of water

A small meteorite, found 2011 in the Sahara Desert, could be the first ever discovered from the Martian surface or crust. Researcher who analyzed it over the course of 2012 announced that it contains between 10 and 30 times more water than other Martian meteorites, that are from unknown origins.