The Solar System remains a unique natural laboratory for exploring the processes that govern planetary formation, evolution and dynamics. Contemporary research continues to refine our understanding of ...

A suite of scientific balloons is about to lift off from NASA’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility’s field site in Fort Sumner, New Mexico, carrying instruments that will help scientists understand ...

Our solar system is a weird place. Much more than a home to eight planets, it’s filled with a myriad of fascinating other smaller bodies, including moons, asteroids, and comets. In recent decades, ...

The Solar Close Observations and Proximity Experiments (SCOPE) mission will send a spacecraft into the solar atmosphere and follow an orbit with perihelion, aphelion, and inclination of 5 R⊙, 123 R⊙, ...

Space is very, very cold. The baseline temperature of outer space is 2.7 kelvins — minus 454.81 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 270.45 degrees Celsius — meaning it is barely above absolute zero, the ...

The workings of our solar system are roughly the same now as they have been for millions of years. Moons circle their planets, the planets circle the sun, the sun’s magnetic fields and sunspots wax ...

Science Facts: The solar system is a collection of celestial bodies held together by the sun's gravitational pull. Our solar system is located in the Milky Way galaxy. The solar system consists of ...

All of the objects in our solar system are acted upon by forces. Forces are pushes or pulls. Every force has both a strength and a direction. Applying a force on something–like pushing a toy car–can ...

If you look up on a clear night, the brightest and largest object in the sky will probably be the moon. And unless you have a decent telescope, it is the only natural satellite you can see with your ...

Chauncey grew up on a farm in rural northern California. At 18 he ran away and saw the world with a backpack and a credit card, discovering that the true value of any point or mile is the experience ...