On August 27th, NASA’s Juno spacecraft made its closest scheduled approach to Jupiter during the first of 36 flybys. Traveling at 130,000 mph (208,000 kilometers per hour), the spacecraft collected data from an altitude of 2,600 miles (4,200 kilometers) above the planet’s cloudy surface. During the flyby, all of Juno’s …
Today, the scientific journal Nature released what could amount as the most important astronomical discovery of the century. Scientists confirm an Earth-like planet orbits the closest star to our Sun. Dreams of Earth 2.0 Our closest existing exoplanet, Proxima Centauri b, orbits the star Proxima Centauri, a faint red dwarf …
The search for alien worlds has expanded into its own branch of astronomical research. The prospect of finding “Earth Proxima” or Earth 2.0 not only excites the imagination, but also represents a tangible possibility in what could be the near future. According the NASA’s Exoplanet Archive, as of August 18th, …
Surface: The first planet from the Sun, Mercury’s small size (4,879 kilometers in diameter- the smallest planet in the Solar System) deceptively hides its extreme nature. Surface temperatures can reach a scorching 800 degrees Fahrenheit (430 degrees Celsius) during the day, only to drop 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit to a nighttime …
