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Space & Cosmology

Mercury's plains

Mercury shaped by titanic vulcanism

Friday, 4 July 2008

Volcanic activity played a key role in shaping the planet Mercury's crater-riddled surface, and not asteroid impacts as previously thought.


Our Solar System is egg-shaped

Thursday, 3 July 2008

Millions of textbooks depicting our Solar System as spherical have got it all wrong, according to studies of data sent back from deep space by NASA's probe, Voyager 2.


Early Earth under bombardment

Fossils of early Earth life may be on the Moon

Wednesday, 2 July 2008

Evidence of the earliest forms of life on Earth may actually be scattered across the lunar landscape as meteorites, British scientists believe.


An image of the lopsided topography of Mars

Giant impact explains Martian mystery

Thursday, 26 June 2008

For nearly 30 years, space scientists have wrestled with one of the greatest enigmas in the Solar System: why does Mars have two faces?


Clutch of super-Earths discovered

Tuesday, 17 June 2008

Five 'super-Earths', each of them many times bigger than our planet, have been discovered in a trio of distant solar systems, European scientists say.


Alien origin for life on Earth

Monday, 16 June 2008

Genetic material from outer space found in a meteorite in Australia may well have played a key role in the origin of life on Earth, according to a new international study.


Phoenix has Martian soil in its scoop

After shakin', Phoenix ready to bake

Thursday, 12 June 2008

Scientists were all smiles last night after samples of Martian arctic soil finally dropped into the Phoenix lander's oven instrument, putting the search for signs of past life on Mars back on track.


GLAST telescope

A new look at exotic cosmology phenomena

Wednesday, 11 June 2008

A high-tech telescope NASA plans to launch tonight will fling open a new window on the universe, exploring extreme sources of gamma-rays that point to powerful and exotic phenomena.


Phoenix digs a hole

Phoenix to delve into Martian soil

Friday, 6 June 2008

NASA probe Phoenix is ready to dig its backhoe-like arm into the Martian arctic soil for samples that may hold signs of water and organic molecules indicative of life.


The crab nebula

What's slowing the Crab Pulsar?

Wednesday, 4 June 2008

Like a celestial spinning top, the neutron star known as the Crab Pulsar is slowing. Mysterious gravitational waves had been been fingered as the cause, but a new study reasons that they can't be to blame.


Magnetar star with a ghostly ring of matter surrounding it

Strange ring envelops highly magnetic star

Friday, 30 May 2008

Astrophysicists have found a strange ring surrounding a highly magnetised star left in the wake of a supernova. The discovery offers a rare glimpse into the formation of these unusual stars.


Phoenix flexes robotic arm

Friday, 30 May 2008

NASA's Phoenix Mars lander flexed its robotic arm Thursday in a successful test of the key element in the probe's mission to search for life.


Radio glitch hinders Mars lander mission

Wednesday, 28 May 2008

A communications glitch between the Phoenix Mars probe and Earth has delayed operations, two days after the spacecraft landed on on the Red Planet in search of conditions to support life.


Phoenix probe lands safely in Martian arctic

Phoenix probe lands safely in Martian arctic

Monday, 26 May 2008

NASA's Phoenix spacecraft has successfully landed on Mars' frigid north pole region in a risk-fraught mission to search for signs of habitability.


Jitters ahead of imminent Mars landing

Jitters ahead of imminent Mars landing

Monday, 26 May 2008

The first probe ever to the frigid Martian arctic is on course to land this morning as NASA scientists fret about the historically coin-flip odds of a successful mission to the Red Planet.