Space News

Thanks to a break in the dusty 'weather' over the giant Hellas Basin at the beginning of this year, ESA's Mars Express was able to look down into the seven kilometre-deep basin and onto the frosty surface of Hellas Chaos...

This four-image montage comprises images taken on 26 November from a distance of 30.1 km from the centre of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The image resolution is 2.4 m/pixel so each original 1024 x 1024 pixel frame measures...

"The Force Awakens" in the first trailer of the highly anticipated sequel (released on Nov. 28th, 2014).

"I love you sons of bitches. You're all I read any more. You're the only ones who'll talk all about the really terrific changes going on, the only ones crazy enough to know that life is a space voyage, and...

Marking a first in space, Sentinel-1A and Alphasat have linked up by laser stretching almost 36 000 km across space to deliver images of Earth just moments after they were captured....

The Van Allen belts are a collection of charged particles, gathered in place by Earth's magnetic field. They can wax and wane in response to incoming energy from the sun, sometimes swelling up enough to expose satellites...

Don’t take these spectacular Mercury images (below the jump) for granted. Three weeks ago, NASA’s orbiting Mercury spacecraft did an engine fire to boost its altitude above the hothouse planet. Another one is schedul...

Determining the distance of galaxies from our Solar System is a tricky business. Knowing just how far other galaxies are in relation to our own is not only key to understanding the size of the universe, but its age as we...

Our week through the lens: 24-28 November 2014

Feeling lucky? Events such as the Comet Siding Spring approach by Mars in October only happen about once every eight million years, according to NASA.

Maybe you can’t climb on a rocketship to Mars, at least yet, but at the least you can get your desire for exploration out through other means. Today, take comfort that humanity is sending 90,000 messages in the Red Pla...

Today marks the 50th anniversary of the launch of NASA’s Mariner IV spacecraft (November 28, 1964). In total, the mission gave us 21 complete images of Mars, including this, our first close... --

At T MINUS 1 Week on this Thanksgiving Holiday, all launch processing events remain on track for the first blast off of NASA's new Orion crew vehicle on Dec. 4, 2014 which marks the first step on the long road towards se...

In an earlier blog post about Christopher Nolan's latest blockbuster movie, Interstellar, I lauded the film for its ambition, its visuals     and the strong performances of its... --

It happens to all lovers of astronomy sooner or later. I once had a friend who was excited about an upcoming conjunction of Saturn and Venus. They were passing closer than the apparent diameter of the Full Moon in the da...

Marking a first in space, Sentinel-1A and Alphasat have linked up by laser stretching almost 36 000 km across space to deliver images of Earth just moments after they were captured.

These amazing images show the planet Mars passing below two nebulas. Astrophotographer Derek Demeter took the images from the Stardust Ranch in Okeechobee, Florida.

Astronomers are searching for gravitational waves possibly emitted by "strange stars," superdense objects made of exotic matter.

Most galaxies lie in clusters, groupings of a few to many thousands of galaxies. Our Milky Way galaxy itself is a member of the "Local Group," a band of about fifty galaxies whose other large member is the Andromeda Gala...

Oh, Black Friday, keep on rollin'*. Today in the US is that orgy of capitalistic materialism, Black Friday. It's a big shopping day, with people trying to find good prices for holiday gifts. I don't have too much of a pr...

The European Space Agency's JUICE (JUpiter ICy moons Explorer) mission has been given the green light to proceed to the next stage of development. This approval is a milestone for the mission, which aims to launch in 202...

ESA Top News: Earth observation image of the week: a retreating tropical ice cap in Peru, also featured on the Earth from Space video programme