Briefings

50th anniversary of Apollo 11 Moon landing

7-billion-year-old stardust is the oldest solid material on Earth

Asymmetrical motion of stellar winds shapes a rich diversity of planetary nebulae

A black hole with the lowest mass on record

Boron discovered on Mars

Campfires on the Sun

The closest black hole to Earth is in a star system visible to the naked eye

Cold super-Earth discovered around nearby star

Compelling evidence of active volcanoes on Venus

Completion of the Cassini mission to Saturn

Completion of the Dawn mission to the asteroid belt

Complex organic materials discovered on Mars

The "cosmic dawn" seen for the first time

Dark matter removed from a galaxy by tidal disruptions

Detection of the universe's first kind of molecule

Discovery of the first interstellar asteroid

Discovery of the most distant solar-system object, nicknamed Farout

Event Horizon Telescope captures first image of a black hole

Evidence found for plate tectonics on Europa

Extremely distant galaxy is surprisingly similar to Milky Way

First detection of a radioactive molecule in space

First detection of water vapor on a habitable-zone planet

The first launch of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket

The first mapping of the interior of a white dwarf star

Galileo space probe detects plume from Jupiter's moon Europa

Green airglow observed above Mars

Group of small black holes found in dense star cluster support theory of black hole evolution

The InSight mission to Mars begins

Iron carbide mineral that does not occur naturally on Earth found in meteorite

Launch of the BepiColombo mission to reveal Mercury's secrets

Light from aging stars fragmentizes asteroids

Massive neutron star on the brink of collapse into a black hole

Mild space weather forecast for 2020s predicts few solar storms

Mission's end for the Kepler spacecraft

The most complete profile of an exoplanet’s atmosphere yet

Neutron star collision detected through gravitational waves and light

New geologic map of Mars

New Horizons at Pluto

New Horizons: second destination

New mass measurement for the Milky Way Galaxy

New neutron star features discovered by the Hubble Space Telescope

Novel method for measuring the lifetime of neutrons from space

Observing quasar-hosting galaxies with the James Webb Space Telescope

Origin of "tiger stripes" on Saturn's moon Enceladus

Parker Solar Probe on mission to enter Sun's atmosphere

Phosphine gas, a sign of life, in the atmosphere of Venus

Physicists use spinning black holes to search for dark matter

Possible explanation for the Great Dimming of Betelgeuse

Powerful cosmic particle accelerator discovered in a blazar galaxy

Pulsar timing discrepancies hint at low-frequency background gravitational waves

Puzzlingly simultaneous star formation patterns across dozens of distant, isolated dwarf galaxies

Revised sunspot cycle predicts highly active solar period

Robot rover Curiosity lands on Mars

Robot rover Opportunity concludes mission on Mars

Robot rover Perseverance lands on Mars

Sensor to track dust-sized space junk

Sodium chloride discovered on Jupiter’s moon, Europa

Star's orbit of a supermassive black hole supports theory of relativity

Star's rosette-shaped orbit around a supermassive black hole supports general relativity

Teardrop-shaped star pulsates only on one side

Tidal locking causes iron rain to be common weather on exoplanet WASP-76b

Total solar eclipse of August 2017

Traces of radiation from supernova explosions preserved in tree rings

Transit of Mercury in May 2016

The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission begins

Universe’s missing baryonic matter identified as intergalactic hot gas

Unusually bright galaxies discovered in the early universe

Vast population of black holes discovered in the Milky Way's core

Voyager 1 crosses the heliopause into interstellar space

Voyager probe detects signal that allows continuous measurement of interstellar medium

Voyager spacecraft and the edge of the heliosphere

Water on Mars may be trapped within the planet's crust