When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. An image of Vesta captured as NASA's Dawn spacecraft retreated ...

When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. For decades, scientists thought that Vesta was a protoplanet rather than an asteroid. NASA's Dawn ...

For years, astronomers treated Vesta as more than just an asteroid. With its rocky surface, distinct layers, and volcanic history, it seemed to be a miniature version of Earth—something between a rock ...

A robotic probe currently studying the giant asteroid Vesta is going into bonus rounds in the asteroid belt, with NASA clearing the spacecraft to spend 40 extra days gleaning more of the space rock's ...

For more than a decade, scientists have debated the true identity of asteroid Vesta, a 500-kilometer-wide body that sits in a gray area between asteroid and planet. Too complex to be considered a ...

Asteroid Vesta is currently the second largest asteroid in the solar system, having been studied in-depth by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft between July 2011 and September 2012. But a recent study published ...

For decades, scientists believed Vesta, one of the largest objects in our solar system's asteroid belt, wasn't just an asteroid and eventually concluded it was more like a planet with a crust, mantle ...

All that snow we've had has been making it hard to get out and observe the heavens. This week's two most unusual sights are challenging ones even without snowbanks. But another heavenly sight- the ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. – For decades, scientists believed Vesta, one of the largest objects in our solar system’s asteroid belt, wasn’t just an asteroid. They concluded that Vesta has a crust, mantle and ...

This big asteroid, called Vesta, doesn’t look THAT scary. Then again, it’s 300,000 miles away from the camera. I’m sure it’d look a whole lot scarier from, say, 30,000 miles away. And 3,000 miles away ...

Asteroids always get left out of the party. Send a spacecraft to Jupiter or Saturn or one of the solar system’s other glamor spots and the press will be all over you. But asteroids? Not so much.

The correlation between gravity and gravity from shape, and effective density. Credit: Nature Astronomy (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41550-025-02533-7 For decades, scientists believed Vesta, one of the ...