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Categories: Space: The Solar System

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Earthbound detectives rely on fingerprints to solve their cases; now astronomers can do the same, using 'light-fingerprints' instead of skin grooves to uncover the mysteries of exoplanets.

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In summer 2018 the planets Mars and Saturn are, one after the other, in opposition to Earth. During this event the planets are relatively close to Earth, allowing astronomers to observe them in greater detail. Hubble took advantage of this preferred configuration and imaged both planets to continue its long-standing observation of the outer planets in the solar system.

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Twelve new moons orbiting Jupiter have been found -- 11 'normal' outer moons, and one that they're calling an 'oddball.' Astronomers first spotted the moons in the spring of 2017 while they were looking for very distant solar system objects as part of the hunt for a possible massive planet far beyond Pluto.

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Uranus was hit by a massive object roughly twice the size of Earth that caused the planet to tilt and could explain its freezing temperatures, according to new research.

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Using mass spectrometry data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft, scientists found that large, carbon-rich organic molecules are ejected from cracks in the icy surface of Saturn's moon Enceladus. Scientists think chemical reactions between the moon's rocky core and warm water from its subsurface ocean are linked to these complex molecules.

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The planets and moons of our solar system are continuously being bombarded by particles from the sun. On the Moon or on Mercury, the uppermost layer of rock is gradually eroded by the impact of sun particles. New results show that previous models of this process are incomplete. The effects of solar wind bombardment are much more drastic than previously thought.

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Bumper car-like interactions at the edges of our solar system -- and not a mysterious ninth planet -- may explain the dynamics of strange bodies called 'detached objects,' according to a new study.

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Scientists have discovered dunes on Pluto, and say they are likely to have been formed of methane ice grains released into its rarefied atmosphere.

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Scientists integrated NASA's New Horizons discoveries with data from ESA's Rosetta mission to develop a new theory about how Pluto may have formed at the edge of our solar system.

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A planetary scientist has used careful mathematical calculations to determine the density of Mercury's crust, which is thinner than anyone thought.

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Scientists have examined a slice from a meteorite that contains large diamonds formed at high pressure. The study shows that the parent body from which the meteorite came was a planetary embryo of a size between Mercury and Mars.

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Theoretical physicists used simulations to explain the unusual readings collected in 2009 by the Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry, and Ranging mission. The origin of energetic electrons detected in Mercury's magnetic tail has puzzled scientists. This new study provides a possible solution to how these energetic electrons form.

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Legendary explorers and visionaries, real and fictitious, are among those immortalized by the IAU in the first set of official surface-feature names for Pluto's largest moon, Charon.

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Chemical models developed to help limit the emission of pollutants by car engines are being used to study the atmospheres of hot exoplanets orbiting close to their stars.

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Project Mercury proved that humans could live and work in space, paving the way for all future human exploration.

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A hot, metallic, Earth-sized planet with a density similar to Mercury -- situated 339 light years away -- has been detected and characterized by a global team of astronomers.

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Three billion miles away on the farthest known major planet in our solar system, an ominous, dark storm -- once big enough to stretch across the Atlantic Ocean from Boston to Portugal -- is shrinking out of existence as seen in pictures of Neptune taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

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Building a submarine gets tricky when the temperature drops to -300 Fahrenheit and the ocean is made of methane and ethane. Researchers are working to determine how a submarine might work on Titan, the largest of Saturn's many moons and the second largest in the solar system. The space agency plans to launch a real submarine into Titan seas in the next 20 years.

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Scientists have provided the first experimental evidence for superionic conduction in water ice at planetary interior conditions, verifying a 30-year-old prediction.

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A planet can be no bigger than about 10 times the size of Jupiter, an astrophysicist has calculated.