Articles

Emily Lakdawalla

In a milestone for the mission, JAXA's Hayabusa2 sample return spacecraft has sighted its destination, asteroid Ryugu.

Emily Lakdawalla

After a hiatus of nearly 500 sols, Curiosity is ready to attempt drilling into a Mars rock again.

Emily Lakdawalla

Some of the biggest discoveries we make in planetary science rely on the seemingly simple act of picking up and analyzing pieces of other worlds. When things go awry, scientists and engineers can sometimes squeeze amazing science out of a tough situation.

Jason Davis

Possible outcomes of next week's test include an explosion or a car launched into orbit around the Sun.

Emily Lakdawalla

Throughout 2018, New Horizons will cruise toward its January 1 encounter with 2014 MU69. Preparations for the flyby are nearly complete.

Jason Davis

The International Space Station stays open for business; everything else is at least somewhat affected.

Marc Rayman

Permanently in residence at dwarf planet Ceres, Dawn is now preparing to add some finishing touches to its mission.

Emily Lakdawalla

The latest and greatest update of Emily's list of all the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE images that contain Curiosity hardware, tracks, or traverses.

Emily Lakdawalla

Curiosity is climbing across the top of Vera Rubin Ridge, spying varicolored rocks. It's getting closer to being ready to drill again, and has performed a wet chemistry experiment for the first time.

A.J.S. Rayl

With the Martian winter on the run, Opportunity cruised closer to its 14th anniversary of exploring the Red Planet in December as she deliberated a distinctive “fork in the road” deep in Perseverance Valley and wrapped another record year.

Emily Lakdawalla

Three launches to the Moon and one each to Mercury and Mars; two arrivals at near-Earth asteroids; and an approach to an encounter with a distant Kuiper belt object are highlights we anticipate in 2018.

Emily Lakdawalla

India plans a return to the Moon with an orbiter, lander, and rover on the Chandrayaan-2 mission.

Marc Rayman

Building on the successes of its primary mission and its first extended mission, NASA has approved the veteran explorer for a second extended mission.

A.J.S. Rayl

As brutally cold got even colder at Endeavour Crater in October, the depths of winter gripped Opportunity, and ‘life’ on Mars slowed. But the robot field geologist continued to work on through the doldrums of the season.

Marc Rayman

A decade after leaving its first home in the solar system, Dawn is healthy and successful at its current residence around Ceres.

A.J.S. Rayl

The Martian winter began to grip Endeavour Crater in September, slowing Opportunity's pace. But she braved the brutal cold in Perseverance Valley and followed her commands to visually document everything in sight.

Emily Lakdawalla

As expected, OSIRIS-REx's Earth flyby on September 22 was a success. The mission is slowly releasing beautiful images of our home worlds taken by its many cameras following the flyby.

Larry Crumpler

Opportunity is continuing its drive down Perseverance Valley, a possible channel that was cut in the inner wall of the 22 km-diameter Endeavour impact crater on ancient Mars.

Emily Lakdawalla

OSIRIS-REx launched on September 8, 2016. Now, a year later, it's returning to its home to get a second boost on to its destination, the asteroid Bennu. It'll test all its cameras on Earth and the Moon in the 10 days after the flyby.

Emily Lakdawalla

Cassini is no more. At 10:31 according to its own clock, its thrusters could no longer hold its radio antenna pointed at Earth, and it turned away. A minute later, it vaporized in Saturn’s atmosphere. Its atoms are part of Saturn now.