Space & Planetary
Wet paleoclimate of Mars revealed by ancient lakes at Gale Crater
We have heard the Mars exploration mantra for more than a decade: follow the water. In a new paper published in the journal Science, the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) team presents recent results of its quest to not just follow the water but to understand where it came from, and how long it lasted on the surface of Mars so long ago.
Space & Planetary
The golden anniversary of black-hole singularity
When a star collapses forming a black hole, a space-time singularity is created wherein the laws of Physics no longer work.
Space & Planetary
Rock samples from Western US teach how to hunt for life on Mars
The search for life beyond Earth is one of the grandest endeavors in the history of humankind -- a quest that could transform our understanding of our universe both scientifically and spiritually.
Space & Planetary
Mars: new hypothesis on the origin of the megafloods
A study published in Scientific Reports-Nature puts forward a new explanation for the Martian megafloods: enormous discharges of subterranean water that dug out the biggest flood channels in the solar system over 3000 million years ago.
Space & Planetary
‘Fossils’ of galaxies reveal the formation and evolution of massive galaxies
An international team led by researchers at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich observed massive dead galaxies in the universe 4 billion years after the Big Bang with the Subaru Telescope's Multi-Object InfraRed Camera and Spectrograph (MOIRCS).
Geology
Globally unique double crater identified in Sweden
Researchers at the University of Gothenburg have found traces of two enormous meteorite impacts in the Swedish county of Jämtland, a twin strike that occurred around 460 million years ago.
Space & Planetary
scientists think ‘planetary pebbles’ were the building blocks for the largest planets
Researchers at Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) and Queen's University in Canada have unraveled the mystery of how Jupiter and Saturn likely formed. This discovery, which changes our view of how all planets might have formed, will be published in the Aug. 20 issue of Nature.
Space & Planetary
Meteorite impacts can create DNA building blocks
A new study shown that meteorite impacts on ancient oceans may have created nucleobases and amino acids.
Space & Planetary
First measurements taken of South Africa’s iron age magnetic field history
Ancient Ritualistic Village Burnings Opened the Door to Data Collection
Space & Planetary
Earth’s magnetic shield is 500 million years older than previously thought
Since 2010, the best estimate of the age of Earth’s magnetic field has been 3.45 billion years. But now a researcher responsible for that finding has new data showing the magnetic field is far older.
Physics
Lost lithium destroyed by ancient stars
Lithium, the lightest metal, used in batteries and mood-stabilising drugs, is rarer than it should be. Models of the period after the Big Bang explain how it, hydrogen and helium were synthesised in nuclear reactions, before the universe cooled enough for the stars and planets that we see today to come into being.
Space & Planetary
Technique may reveal the age of moon rocks during spaceflight
Researchers are developing instruments and methods for measuring the ages of rocks encountered during space missions to the Moon or other planets.