The effect of starlight on the atmospheres of mini-Neptunes
Exoplanet surveys have discovered the first planets with sizes between 2 and 3.5 Earth radii—slightly smaller than the size of the planet Neptune in our solar system. These planets, dubbed...
View ArticleFour rockets launched into northern lights to study turbulence
Four NASA soundings rockets were launched within a half hour into the northern lights in an effort to better understand and visualize turbulent air currents in the upper atmosphere.
View ArticleHow Venus Express outperformed expectations for eight years
It was a hell of a ride to our hellish sister planet. Eight long years of studying Venus is way more than ESA scientists were expected from its mission. Venus Express spacecraft that launched on Nov....
View ArticleRocket into Northern Lights studies the "invisible aurora's" electric currents
The aurora borealis lights up the Arctic night skies. Also called the Northern Lights, the phenomenon is the result of beams of charged particles tracing along the Earth's magnetic field and entering...
View ArticleMAVEN spacecraft completes first deep dip campaign
NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution has completed the first of five deep-dip maneuvers designed to gather measurements closer to the lower end of the Martian upper atmosphere.
View ArticleComparing the genomes of the leprosy bacteria
Leprosy is a chronic infection of the skin, peripheral nerves, eyes and mucosa of the upper respiratory tract, affecting over a quarter million people worldwide. Its symptoms can be gruesome and...
View ArticleUnexplained warm layer discovered in Venus' atmosphere
A group of Russian, European and American scientists have found a warm layer in Venus' atmosphere, the nature of which is still unknown. The researchers made the discovery when compiling a temperature...
View ArticleLook mom, no eardrums: Studying evolution beyond the fossil record
Researchers at the RIKEN Evolutionary Morphology Laboratory and the University of Tokyo in Japan have determined that the eardrum evolved independently in mammals and diapsids—the taxonomic group that...
View ArticleAscent or no ascent? How hot material is stopped in the Earth's mantle
The largest magmatic events on Earth are caused by massive melting of ascending large volumes of hot material from the Earth's interior.
View ArticleAna tightens up and becomes tropical
Up until Saturday morning, Ana had been referred to as a subtropical storm, rather than a tropical storm. What's the difference? The difference lies is how the two different storms are "born."...
View ArticleAll NASA eyes on Tropical Storm Dolphin
Three NASA satellite instruments took aim at Tropical Storm Dolphin. Dolphin responded by posing for pictures as it headed west towards Guam gathering strength and speed as it moves. The MODIS...
View ArticleScientists simulate gravity waves propagating toward space
Just as waves ripple across a pond when a tossed stone disturbs the water's surface, gravity waves ripple toward space from disturbances in the lower atmosphere.
View ArticleClimate scientists find elusive tropospheric hot spot
Researchers have published results in Environmental Research Letters confirming strong warming in the upper troposphere, known colloquially as the tropospheric hotspot. The hot has been long expected...
View ArticleProbing iron chemistry in the deep mantle
Carbonates are a group of minerals that contain the carbonate ion (CO32-) and a metal, such as iron or magnesium. Carbonates are important constituents of marine sediments and are heavily involved in...
View ArticleSimilarities between aurorae on Mars and Earth
An international team of researchers has for the first time predicted the occurrence of aurorae visible to the naked eye on a planet other than Earth.
View ArticleSupersonic NASA parachute torn to pieces in latest test
NASA scientists working toward putting people on Mars said Tuesday a supersonic parachute they are developing to slow a vehicle's approach to the Red Planet partially deployed in a test, but...
View ArticleStone tools from Jordan point to dawn of division of labor
Thousands of stone tools from the early Upper Paleolithic, unearthed from a cave in Jordan, reveal clues about how humans may have started organizing into more complex social groups by planning tasks...
View ArticleScientists make new estimates of the deep carbon cycle
Over billions of years, the total carbon content of the outer part of the Earth—in its upper mantle, crust, oceans, and atmospheres—has gradually increased, scientists reported this month in the...
View ArticleNASA image: Night-shining clouds
In the late spring and summer, unusual clouds form high in the atmosphere above the polar regions of the world. As the lower atmosphere warms, the upper atmosphere gets coooler, and ice crystals form...
View ArticleMAVEN results find Mars behaving like a rock star
If planets had personalities, Mars would be a rock star according to recent preliminary results from NASA's MAVEN spacecraft. Mars sports a "Mohawk" of escaping atmospheric particles at its poles,...
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