News by Subject Space & Planetary

Researchers have channeled the universe's earliest light - a relic of the universe's formation known as the cosmic microwave background - to solve a missing-matter mystery and learn new things about galaxy formation. Their work could also help us to better understand dark energy and test Einstein's theory of general relativity by providing new details about the rate at which galaxies are moving toward us or away from us.

The NASA-funded Seismometer to Investigate Ice and Ocean Structure (SIIOS) performed well in seismic experiments conducted in snowy summer Greenland, according to a new study by the SIIOS team led by the University of Arizona published this week in Seismological Research Letters.

The Chinese Carbon Dioxide Monitoring Satellite Mission (TanSat) was launched in December 2016. TanSat monitors global atmospheric CO2 concentrations and is capable of measuring global Solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF). The first TanSat SIF map was recently constructed.

Spending an extended period with reduced gravity, as would be experienced by astronauts on long space missions, may have a negative effect on cognitive performance, and in particular emotion recognition, reveals a new study. Hoping to counteract these changes, researchers found that short periods of artificial gravity did not have the desired effect. Research evaluating other countermeasures to support teams in future space travel is already underway.

The midnight births of the dramatic bright surges in Jupiter's aurora known as dawn storms are captured in a new study of data from the Juno space probe.

Astronomers using the VLA took advantage of the gravitational lensing provided by a distant cluster of galaxies to detect an even more-distant galaxy that probably is the faintest radio-emitting object ever found.

Lightning strikes were just as important as meteorites in creating the perfect conditions for life to emerge on Earth, according to new research. This shows that life could develop on Earth-like planets through the same mechanism at any time if atmospheric conditions are right.