probe

When NASA’s Parker Solar Probe flew close by the sun, telescopes were watching from Earth and space

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Telescopes on Earth and in space had the sun safely in their sights when NASA’s Parker Solar Probe made its 11th daring close flyby of the star on Feb. 25, all to understand more about the sun’s behavior. To be clear, the Parker Solar Probe wasn’t directly visible in the various instruments, as the van-sized … Read more

James Webb Space Telescope instrument gets ready to probe the universe’s chemistry

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NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is preparing for a deep-space chemistry experiment. During the observatory’s commissioning and ongoing mirror alignment, Webb’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) team successfully finished initial check-out and characterization of three mechanisms that are key for the instrument to do its work. “The NIRSpec team will continue their commissioning efforts. The whole team … Read more

Space Force plans to send a patrol probe out past the moon

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The U.S. military is planning to extend its reach in space to one day patrol the area around the moon. In a new video, the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) revealed the U.S. military’s big plans for its future work in space. These plans, the video showed, include extending space awareness capabilities beyond geostationary … Read more

James Webb Space Telescope plans probe of massive star radiation

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The James Webb Space Telescope will zero in on a portion of the famous Orion Nebula, the closest region of mass star-formation to Earth, to learn more about how massive young stars shape their environments. The Orion Nebula, some 1,350 light-years away from Earth, is known as a stellar nursery. Dense clouds of gas and dust … Read more

NASA’s daring Parker Solar Probe spacecraft zips past the sun again today

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The Parker Solar Probe is ready to make its 11th close flyby of the sun during its quest to understand how our neighboring star works. The plucky spacecraft, heavily shielded against the sun’s radiation and extreme heat, will dip to within 5.3 million miles (8.5 million kilometers) of the solar surface on Friday (Feb. 25). … Read more

A giant Mars dust pile is sculpted by the wind in this photo by a European probe

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The Medusae Fossae Formation on Mars.  (Image credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO) An enormous dust deposit on Mars shows the power of Martian wind in a new image snapped from orbit.  Standing on the surface of Mars is possibly the largest single dust source on the Red Planet: the Medusae Fossae Formation (MFF). … Read more

NASA probe snaps stunning photos of crescent Jupiter and its moon Ganymede

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Data captured by NASA’s Juno spacecraft is revealing incredible new images of Jupiter and its moon Ganymede. In a blog post on Monday (Feb. 14), Juno mission team members shared images of a huge crater on Ganymede as well as a backlit picture of Jupiter that the spacecraft captured during its dips in and out … Read more

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has captured the first visible-light images of Venus

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In between its main mission, the Parker Solar Probe just made a novel contribution to Venusian science. New images from the sun-focused mission, captured during a close flyby of Venus, show the planet in visible light for the first time. With time and analysis, the new images will provide valuable information about the planet’s geology … Read more

NASA Space Probe Unexpectedly Glimpses The Surface of Venus in Stunning New First

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New images recorded by NASA’s Parker Solar Probe have revealed the red-hot glow of Venus‘s surface radiating through its shroud of toxic clouds – a finding that could help us better understand the minerals making up this rocky and mysterious planet.   Using data from the Wide-field Imager for Parker Solar Probe (WISPR) instrument, scientists … Read more

Can scientists repair their relationship with Native people as they probe the past? | Science

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How and when people first set foot in the Americas is one of the enduring mysteries of human history. Most archaeologists now agree people lived in the Americas before Clovis-style tools—once thought to be linked to the first Americans—appeared about 13,000 years ago. Last year, for example, researchers reported human footprints in White Sands National … Read more