SUNSET: 
Deep Space 1 Mission Ends
When launched, the Deep Space 1 spacecraft weighed 486 kg, including 82 kg of xenon to fuel its ion-drive engine. Its solar-cell 'wings' measure 11.8 meters (38.6 feet) from tip to tip.Courtesy NASA/JPL. At noon today (Pacific time), engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, officially concluded the…
Eight New Extrasolar Planets Found
The number of known extrasolar planets keeps on rising.
September 11th Asteroid Memorials
Astronomy and all of science, at their best, embody the finest aspects of the human race — and its grandest hopes for an enlightened future. Guided by such thoughts, a committee of the International Astronomical Union has announced its memorial of the events of September 11th. Sky & Telescope senior…
Mars's Bumpy Magnetism
A three-dimensional portrayal of Mars, as seen from the Sun, shows how magnetized regions of the planet's crust create electromagnetic 'bubbles' that extend hundreds of kilometers into the atmosphere.Courtesy David A. Brain (University of Colorado). In its infancy, Mars must have had a churning, conductive core and a magnetic field…
Genesis Science Begins
The Genesis spacecraft, launched on August 8th, reached its destination 1.5 million kilometers from the Earth. For the next 29 months it will reside there, collecting solar material.Courtesy JPL/LMA. On November 16th the Genesis spacecraft reached its destination — Earth's L1 Lagrangian point, 1.5 million kilometers (930,000 miles) away —…
NASA Pulls Plug on 28-Year-Old Spacecraft
The Interplanetary Monitoring Platform (IMP) 8 spacecraft has radioed solar-wind conditions to Earth since 1973. The drum-shaped craft weighs 371 kilograms.Courtesy NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center. Bowing to pressure from NASA Headquarters to cut costs, a space-science review panel has recommended that the agency cease communications with an ancient, virtually unknown…
How Hot Can Venus Get?
Wind-sculpted details in the dense, sulfuric-acid clouds of Venus are accentuated in this ultraviolet image acquired by the Pioneer Venus Orbiter in February 1979.Courtesy NASA/Ames Research Center. The planet Venus is a textbook case of greenhouse warming run amok. Sunlight filters down through the planet's dense, cloud-choked atmosphere, where the…
The Fuzzy Face of Ceres
The first known asteroid, 1 Ceres, is also the largest body in the asteroid belt. These Hubble Space Telescope images, taken in ultraviolet light about 3 hours apart, reveal a vague, dark circular feature about 250 kilometers across. Astronomers propose to name it Piazzi, to honor the asteroid's discoverer.Courtesy Joel…
"Twin" Trojan Found
The Trojan asteroid 617 Patroclus is actually two asteroids, as seen in this false-color image taken with the 8.1-meter Gemini North telescope atop Mauna Kea, Hawaii.Courtesy William Merline (Southwest Research Institute), Laird Close (University of Arizona), Amanda Baker (Cardiff University). The total of known or suspected binary asteroids grew to…
Mars in a Dust Cocoon
The Hubble Space Telescope captured a dramatic change in Mars's weather.Courtesy NASA, James Bell (Cornell University), Michael Wolff (STScI), and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA). The dust storm that wiped out Martian surface features in amateur telescopes last July could hardly be more dramatic than in the pair of natural-color…
Lunar Soil Reveals Solar Secrets
Samples of lunar soil collected by Apollo 17 astronauts in 1972 continue to yield new findings; they contain an isotope of beryllium that is providing clues to the workings of the Sun's atmosphere. Eugene A. Cernan and Harrison H. Schmitt (pictured here) returned to Earth with more than 100 kilograms…
Odyssey's First Look at Mars
NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft took this false-color infrared view of the red planet from a distance of 22,000 kilometers (13,600 miles). The limb-to-limb image indicates surface temperature, with blue being coldest and red warmest. The large blue area is the southern polar cap, whose carbon dioxide ice is –120°…
Turning a Keen Eye Toward Andromeda
The Subaru Telescope Eyes The Andromeda Galaxy
The End of NASA's "Goldin Era" of Space Exploration
After serving for nearly 10 years, Daniel S. Goldin's term as NASA Administrator ends today, and with it comes the end of an era. To replace him, President George W. Bush has nominated Sean O'Keefe, deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget, who many worry is more of…
The Heart of Omega Centauri
Left: Some 50,000 stars are individually resolved in a Hubble Space Telescope view through the center of the globular cluster Omega Centauri. Click on the image for a low-resolution view, or here for a full-resolution view. Right: The Hubble frame is only 13 light-years wide, but the entire cluster sprawls…
Looking Below A Sunspot's Surface
The Michelson Doppler Imager aboard the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory measures the sound speed and motions of gas under and around a sunspot. Red is hot gas; blue is cooler, denser gas. The newly discovered convective cycle around and under sunspots, indicated here with arrows, is what holds a spot…
Mars Odyssey Arrives
An artist's depiction of the 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft firing its engine upon reaching Mars. The brightly colored landscape at upper right represents the surface-composition mapping that will be a major mission objective.Courtesy NASA/JPL. After cruising across 460 million kilometers of interplanetary space over 6½ months, NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey…
MAP Hits Its Mark
The Microwave Anisotropy Probe took a convoluted path to reach its observing post at the L2 Lagrangian point, 1.5 million kilometers from Earth.Courtesy MAP/NASA. Three months ago NASA launched its newest astrophysics satellite, the Microwave Anisotropy Probe (MAP), from Cape Canaveral, Florida. After circling Earth three times and getting a…
Chicago's Controversial Ray of Light
Chicago's Palmolive Building plans to feature a 7 billion candlepower light. Local Amateur Astronomers are concerned.
