Explore Worlds
Find Life
Defend Earth
All
All
Sun
Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Small BodiesStories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
Discovery Finalists
Van Kane rounds up the missions selected to move onto the next round in NASA's Discovery proposal process.
NASA announces five Discovery proposals selected for further study
NASA announced the first-round selections for its next Discovery mission today. A total of five planetary mission concepts -- three targeted at asteroids, two at Venus -- will move to the next stage of the competition.
Proposals to Explore the Solar System’s Smallest Worlds
Van Kane rounds up some of the latest NASA Discovery mission proposals aiming to explore our solar system's smallest bodies.
Selecting the Next Creative Idea for Exploring the Solar System
With the release of the official Announcement of Opportunity (AO) early in November, NASA has officially begun the competition to select its next low cost ($450M) Discovery program planetary mission. Because planetary scientists are free to propose missions to any destination in the solar system other than the sun and Earth, these competitions bring out the creativity in the planetary science program.