Space : Science World Report

May 14, 2012 11:42 AM EDT

Is a New Form of Life Really so Alien?

The idea of discovering a new form of life has not only excited astronomers and astrobiologists for decades, but also the wider public. The notion that we are the only example of a successful life form in the galaxy has, for many, seemed like an unlikely statistic, as we discover more and more habit...

May 14, 2012 08:34 AM EDT

Earth Observatory: Etosha Pan, Namibia

This astronaut photograph shows the white, salt-covered floor in the northwest corner of the Etosha Pan, a great dry lake in northern Namibia. Two rivers, the Ekuma and Oshigambo, transport water from the north down to the Pan. In a relatively rare event shown in this image, water from recent rains ...

May 14, 2012 07:41 AM EDT

Farewell to the Sun

The crew of the French-Italian Concordia research base in the Antarctic saw their last rays of Sun for over four months last weekend. Near the South Pole, the outpost will now continue its research and run self-sufficiently in darkness until September.

May 14, 2012 07:25 AM EDT

Meteorite Discovery Spurs Hunt For More Pieces

Meteorite fragments were recently scattered around Sutter's Mill in California, the same region where the first nugget of gold was found that sparked the Gold Rush in 1848. Scientists believe the meteorites may hold answers to unsolved mysteries about our solar system and the origins of molecules ne...

May 12, 2012 03:42 PM EDT

Earth Observatory: Plume from the Karymsky Volcano

Karymsky Volcano has erupted regularly for more than ten years. This natural-color satellite image shows the volcanoâ€™s typical low-level activity. A white gas plume rises above Karmymskyâ€™s summit, and fresh volcanic material coats the eastern slopes. This image was acquired by the Adva...

May 11, 2012 03:46 PM EDT

Mojave Desert Tests Prepare for NASA Mars Roving

Team members of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission took a test rover to Dumont Dunes in California's Mojave Desert this week to improve knowledge of the best way to operate a similar rover, Curiosity, currently flying to Mars for an August landing.

May 11, 2012 01:30 PM EDT

NASA's IBEX Reveals a Missing Boundary at the Edge of the Solar System

For the last few decades, space scientists have generally accepted that the bubble of gas and magnetic fields generated by the sun - known as the heliosphere - moves through space, creating three distinct boundary layers that culminate in an outermost bow shock

May 11, 2012 01:09 PM EDT

Dawn Reveals Complexities of Ancient Asteroidal World

New findings from NASA's Dawn spacecraft lay the groundwork for the first geological overview of asteroid (4)Vesta and confirm the existence of not one but two giant impact basins in its southern hemisphere. The findings, published today in a set of Science papers, will help scientists better unders...

May 11, 2012 12:55 PM EDT

Free-floating Planets in the Milky Way Outnumber Stars by Factors of Thousands

A few hundred thousand billion free-floating life-bearing Earth-sized planets may exist in the space between stars in the Milky Way. So argues an international team of scientists led by Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe, Director of the Buckingham Centre for Astrobiology at the University of Buckingh...

May 11, 2012 12:48 PM EDT

Asteroid Collision that Spawned Vesta's Asteroid Family Occurred more Recently than Thought

A team of researchers led by a NASA Lunar Science Institute (NLSI) member based at Southwest Research Institute has discovered evidence that the giant impact crater Rheasilvia on Asteroid (4) Vesta was created in a collision that occurred only about 1 billion years ago, much more recently than previ...

May 11, 2012 10:47 AM EDT

Unseen Planet Revealed by Its Gravity

More than a 150 years ago, before Neptune was ever sighted in the night sky, French mathematician Urbain Le Verrier predicted the planet's existence based on small deviations in the motion of Uranus. In a paper published today in the journal Science online, a group of researchers led by Dr. David Ne...

May 11, 2012 09:59 AM EDT

Fires in Western Australia

When this image was captured on May 2, 2012, dozens of fires-most likely management fires started by government authorities-were burning in the Kimberley region of Western Australia.