Comets Asteroids News Today

A research group from Kobe University has demonstrated that the heat generated by the impact of a small astronomical body could enable aqueous alteration and organic solid formation to occur on the surface of an asteroid. These results have significantly increased the number of prospective astronomical bodies that could have brought water and the origins of life to Earth.

NASA has selected Northern Arizona University assistant research professor Alicia Rutledge as one of only five early-career scientists in the country to receive funding through its Planetary Science Early Career Award program, which supports outstanding early-career individuals. Rutledges proposal, Ice, Ice, Rock: Analog Studies in Cold Environments to Understand Past Climate, outlined how the award would enable her to invest in a portable laboratory that she could use to better conduct her rese...

A new study by a Belgian team using data from the European Southern Observatorys Very Large Telescope has shown that iron and nickel exist in the atmospheres of comets throughout our Solar System, even those far from the Sun. A separate study by a Polish team, who also used ESO data, reported that nickel vapor is also present in the icy interstellar comet 2I/Borisov. This is the first time heavy metals have been found in the cold atmospheres of distant comets.

 E-Mail Credit: ESO/P.Guzik/M.Drahus Unbound nickel atoms and other heavy elements have been observed in very hot cosmic environments, including the atmospheres of ultra-hot exoplanets and evaporating comets that ventured too close to our Sun or other stars. A new study conducted by JU researchers reveals the presence of nickel atoms in the cold gasses surrounding the interstellar comet 2I/Borisov. The teams finding is being published in Nature on 19 May 2021. Interstellar comets and asteroid...

High-precision noble gas analyses indicate that solar wind particles from our primordial Sun were encased in the Earths core over 4.5 billion years ago. Researchers from Heidelberg University have concluded that the particles made their way into the overlying rock mantle over millions of years. The scientists found solar noble gases in an iron meteorite they studied. Because of their chemical composition, such meteorites are often used as natural models for the Earths metallic core.

 E-Mail IMAGE: The new Test-Bed Telescope 2, a European Space Agency telescope, is housed inside the shiny white dome shown in this picture, at ESOs La Silla Observatory in Chile. The telescope... view more  Credit: I. Saviane/ESO Part of the world-wide effort to scan and identify near-Earth objects, the European Space Agencys Test-Bed Telescope 2 (TBT2), a technology demonstrator hosted at ESOs La Silla Observatory in Chile, has now started operating. Working alongside its northern-h...

 E-Mail IMAGE: This artists concept shows the planned flight path of NASAs OSIRIS-REx spacecraft during its final flyby of asteroid Bennu, which is scheduled for April 7. view more  Credit: Credits: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona NASAs OSIRIS-REx mission is on the brink of discovering the extent of the mess it made on asteroid Bennus surface during last falls sample collection event. On Apr. 7, the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will get one last close encounter with Bennu as it performs a...

 E-Mail IMAGE: An illustration of early Earth, as it would have looked around 4 billion years ago view more  Credit: Lucy Entwisle Lightning strikes were just as important as meteorites in creating the perfect conditions for life to emerge on Earth, geologists say. Minerals delivered to Earth in meteorites more than 4 billion years ago have long been advocated as key ingredients for the development of life on our planet. Scientists believed minimal amounts of these minerals were als...

 E-Mail IMAGE: An infrared image of the dust clouds in the Cocoon region taken with the Spitzers Space Telescopes IR photometer. The HAWC TeV gamma-ray excess (color from green to yellow to... view more  Credit: TeV: Binita Hona (HAWC Collaboration), IR: Hora et. al, Spitzers Growing Legacy, ASP Conference Series, 2010, P. Ogle, ed. LOS ALAMOS, N.M., March 11, 2021--A long-time question in astrophysics appears to finally be answered, thanks to a collection of large, high-tech water t...

 E-Mail The planet Mars has no global magnetic field, although scientists believe it did have one at some point in the past. Previous studies suggest that when Mars global magnetic field was present, it was approximately the same strength as Earths current field. Surprisingly, instruments from past Mars missions, both orbiters and landers, have spotted patches on the planets surface that are strongly magnetized--a property that could not have been produced by a magnetic field similar to Earths...