Phoenix Spends Sleepless Night
	Mission controllers kept NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander in full operational mode during the Martian night on Monday in order to coordinate it with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to make detailed observations in the atmosphere of the Red Planet. The lander monitored changes in the lower atmosphere with the help of its weather station, stereo camera and the thermal and conductivity probe while the MRO observed the atmosphere from orbit. ... [read more >>]
	23 July 2008, 03:08GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

No Organics Present in the Outskirts of Pinwheel Galaxy
	Messier 101, also known as the Pinwheel galaxy, is a spiral galaxy located about 27 million light-years in the constellation Ursa Major, having a diameter about twice that of the Milky Way and containing vast amounts of high-density hydrogen gas, which gives it a fluffy-looking appearance. According to some estimations, it measures up to one trillion solar masses and is seems it is asymmetrical to one side, suggesting that in the past it i ... [read more >>]
	22 July 2008, 03:01GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Astronomers Discover the Smallest Exo-Planet to Date
	As expected, the Gliese 581 system did not disappoint and is now revealing the smallest planet outside our solar system, bringing the total number of planets found orbiting around the red dwarf star to three. When the star was first targeted by astronomers nearly two years ago, only a single planet was detected. The newly found object weighs about 5 times more than Earth, has a rocky surface, and its orbit could allow the existence of liqu ... [read more >>]
	21 July 2008, 08:31GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Deep Impact Gets Alien Glimpse of Earth
	NASA's comet chaser Deep Impact became famous on July 4, 2005 as the first spacecraft in the history of space exploration to collide an impactor into the nucleus of a comet in order to study its internal composition. As it turns out, Deep Impact provided recently two short films showing how our planet and its moon look like from a distance of about 50 million kilometers away, or 0.3 astronomical units, allowing us to see how our Earth ... [read more >>]
	18 July 2008, 07:03GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Mars Had Significant Amounts of Liquid Water on the Surface
	Mars had liquid water on the surface in its distant past and quite a lot of it too, according to the high-resolution spectrometry images relayed back to Earth by the CRISM instrument on board NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. CRISM revealed that there is a great abundance of clay minerals, which usually form in the presence of water, and if Mars did indeed support life the best place to look for evidence would be these clay deposits ... [read more >>]
	17 July 2008, 05:10GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Massive, Rocky, Hot Planets Could also Support Life
	There is no reason why other rocky planets in the universe should not be able to support life, but a considerable amount of time will pass before a planet such as our own is found in the galaxy, mostly because of its relatively small size. So far, a couple of hundred of planets have been discovered by astronomers, orbiting around other stars, most of which are gas giants. Just recently, the latest technological advancements have enabled th ... [read more >>]
	12 July 2008, 03:56GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix's Robotic Arm Delivers Second Sample
	NASA confirmed that the robotic arm of the Phoenix Mars Lander delivered its second sample for analysis to the wet chemistry laboratory of the spacecraft. While the first sample test of the lander failed to detect any chemicals that may be essential to the appearance and evolution of life as we know it on the Red Planet, the results of the second test will act as a scale for the accuracy of the ones obtained during the first analysis perfo ... [read more >>]
	08 July 2008, 10:29GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Life Could Have Originated Earlier than Thought
	Currently, it is widely considered that life first appeared on our planet approximately 3.5 billion years ago in the outcome of a period that is currently known as the Late Heavy Bombardment, which saw the Earth under a rain of debris coming from out of space. Such an effect would have most likely prevented the evolution of any living being on the planet and destroyed life preceding its onset. But a new finding indicates that life may have ... [read more >>]
	03 July 2008, 07:18GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Short Circuit Comes Back to Hunt Martian Lander
	The first investigation of the Phoenix Mars Lander on the Martian soil collected from its surroundings failed to detect any chemicals that may be essential to life at all, and although another seven single-use test ovens are expecting further analysis, the next experiment could just as well be the last one for the spacecraft. The problem, NASA researchers say, is that the short circuit suffered in the early days of the mission by ... [read more >>]
	03 July 2008, 06:21GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

DNA and RNA Came from Space
	For some reason or another, all of us like to believe that Earth is special - after all, our planet is the only one able to sustain life that we know of. Indeed, Earth is special in its own way, but life would not have been possible without the significant contribution of material coming form space. In fact, a new study shows that the compounds making up DNA and RNA actually originated in space, not on Earth as previously thought, and were ... [read more >>]
	14 June 2008, 04:46GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Back on Track - Soil Sprinkling Works
	After another couple of days of delay related to the unsuccessful attempt to deliver soil samples to the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer, NASA reported that the Phoenix Mars Lander was again back on schedule and pursuing the primary tasks of its mission. In a press conference yesterday, mission controllers said that the shaking technique destined to reduce the clumpiness of the sample worked exactly as expected and as proof they released ... [read more >>]
	11 June 2008, 02:45GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Martian Lander Mission in Danger of Failing
	The mission of the Phoenix Mars Lander seems to have hit a snag last week after soil samples delivered by the robotic arm of the spacecraft failed to pass through the screen of the test oven of the Thermal and Evolved Gas Analyzer instrument. The TEGA instrument is equipped with seven other such ovens, which could possibly have identical screens. If this is indeed the case and an alternative solution is not found, then the Phoenix mission ... [read more >>]
	10 June 2008, 06:50GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Finding Extrasolar Moons
	Until now, several hundred planets have been found orbiting around nearby stars while the number of moons remained at a constant zero. It’s not that they're not there, it’s just that we can't see them with today's technology. To put it even simpler, the smallest planet ever found was a terrestrial one, at least three times the mass of the Earth, but finding a moon today is more like finding a specific molecule of water insid ... [read more >>]
	09 June 2008, 09:59GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Fails to Make First Analysis of Martian Soil
	The Thermal and Evolved Gas Analyzer instrument, or TEGA for short, on board the Phoenix Mars Lander, failed to pass its first sample test after the Martian soil delivered by the robotic arm of the lander was unable to reach the instrument. Mission controllers said on Saturday that they would try to determine what went wrong in the days to come. The images show that the test oven of TEGA is almost fully covered with soil (see ... [read more >>]
	09 June 2008, 03:38GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Relays Back Images of Martian Dust Particles
	This is the highest resolution image ever sent back to Earth by the Phoenix Mars Lander featuring dust and sand particles. The image was captured by the camera of the optical microscope instrument on board the spacecraft and shows particles of dust as small as one-tenth of the diameter of the human hair. The mission of the Phoenix Mars Lander is to study whether or not the Red Planet as we know it was ever habitable for life. [ADMARK=1 ... [read more >>]
	06 June 2008, 03:19GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Digs Its First Scoop
	Phoenix Mars Lander, designed to carry NASA's 420 million US dollar three month mission to the Red Planet, which touched down on the surface just a little over a week ago, made its first dig test in the Martian soil on Sunday with the 2.4 meter long robotic arm, revealing brigh ... [read more >>]
	03 June 2008, 05:57GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Astronomers Set Record for Smallest Found Exoplanet
	The newly discovered object, dubbed MOA-2007-BLG-192Lb, is a terrestrial planet roughly three times as heavy as Earth orbiting a star called MOA-2007-BLG-192L located about 3,000 light years away from us. The finding also marks the discovery of the smallest star to have a planet orbiting around it, since it only weighs an estimated 6 percent of the mass of the Sun, thus being unable to sustain nuclear fusion reaction in the core. [ADMAR ... [read more >>]
	03 June 2008, 03:32GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Camera Shows Possible Ice Beneath Phoenix Mars Lander
	On Saturday, NASA and University of Arizona mission controllers revealed an image taken with the camera on Phoenix's robotic arm showing a white patch of soil under the lander, which the team members believe to be water ice. The patch is about one meter in diameter, seems to be bright white and is surrounded by the three legs of the lander. Previously, the team members had stated that they were hopping to find such a feat ... [read more >>]
	02 June 2008, 02:54GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Looks Beneath its Belly, Suffers Short Circuit
	The robotic arm of the Phoenix Mars Lander was used yesterday along with the camera attached to it to view the ground beneath the spacecraft and make certain that the soil is clear of any big rocks. The arm has also touched the ground of the landing area for the first time while one ... [read more >>]
	31 May 2008, 03:51GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Water May Not be Enough for Life on Mars
	As soon as it arrived on the surface of the Red Planet, the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity investigating the south equatorial regions discovered evidence of the past existence of liquid water, fueling even further the idea that Mars was once able to support life. However, a new assessment of the conditions required for the appearance of life on a particular planet shows that liquid water alone is not enough to support life. ... [read more >>]
	30 May 2008, 07:05GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Prepares to Start Digging
	The Phoenix Mars Lander has now more than 24 hours on the Red Planet and it is still undergoing preparations for expected digging missions, which it will need to complete in the following months. As soon as it set foot on Martian soil, Phoenix went right to work and in approximately two hours after the landing it sent its first pictures back to Earth, revealing ... [read more >>]
	27 May 2008, 03:32GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Organism Found Living at Extreme Depths beneath Seafloor: 1.6 Kilometers
	The previous greatest depth under the surface of the seafloor at which life was found is about two times less than that of the current record of 1.6 kilometers, thus encouraging future life searches on other planets in the solar system. The newly found microscopic life is also believed to be one of the hottest ever discovered, since it is living at temperatures ranging between 60 to 100 degrees Celsius. The evidence comes from sediment ... [read more >>]
	26 May 2008, 11:19GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Other Star Systems in Danger of Being Contaminated with Earth Life
	There are already several tens of spacecrafts wandering through the solar system, each one a possible carrier of microbes originating on Earth. It’s no secret that some life forms on Earth are extremely resilient to space radiation and may possibly reach other planets and their moons to colonize them. In the case of these vehicles there is nothing much that we can do to prevent a future contamination, although researchers believe that the ... [read more >>]
	24 May 2008, 06:10GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Spirit Stumbles Upon Pure Silica on Mars
	After a long hibernation period during its second Mars winter in the northern regions of the Home Plate, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit is again on the move and is now investigating the Gusev Crater where it found what appears to be a deposit of pure silica similar to the one created around hydrothermal vents on Earth in the Yellowstone National Park, US. The discovery was made last year, although NASA couldn’t afford to make a ... [read more >>]
	23 May 2008, 05:35GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Life Can Grow Just About Anywhere
	Finding inhospitable places for life on Earth is extremely difficult; just about any location you can lay your eyes on is most likely populated to some extent with microbial life, if not with other living specimens. Researchers from the Mars Astrobiology Research and Technology Experiment, MARTE for short, have recently found such an inhospitable place in the ground beneath Rion Tito in Spain. The area was colonized nearly 2 million years ... [read more >>]
	22 May 2008, 10:00GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Nothing Special About the Sun
	If you're still wondering whether or not the 'giant ball of fire' in the sky has special characteristics that enabled the appearance and evolution of life on Earth, you should probably know that the Sun is about as special as several billion other stars in the visible universe. At least that's what ANU astronomers say following a comprehensive comparison of the Sun with other stars, fueling even more the idea that the ... [read more >>]
	22 May 2008, 07:41GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Mars Is Much Cooler than We Thought
	New radar investigations with NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter probing the north pole of Mars revealed that the Red Planet is much colder than previously believed, meaning that any previous hope of finding liquid water near the surface of the planet has been shattered. Nevertheless, liquid water could still be available on Mars, only at larger depths than expected, where the temperatures would rise slightly in response to the proxim ... [read more >>]
	16 May 2008, 04:12GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Space Rocks Could Re-Colonize Earth
	Asteroid and comet collisions usually bring havoc to Earth, often provoking mass extinctions, but they can also seed life. In fact, we're most likely the product of such an event that took place several hundred million years ago. The last large impact that occurred is dated about 65 million years in the past and was probably responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs at the end of the Cretaceous Period. The impact would have r ... [read more >>]
	15 May 2008, 10:02GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Europa's Poles May Have Shifted to the Equator
	Jupiter's Europa moon is covered by an icy outer shell believed to be housing a global ocean beneath it, where life could exist. New observations on the moon's surface reveal that the icy shell might have shifted as much as 80 degrees in a matter of only 60 million years, supporting the idea that an ocean may indeed lie under the icy crust. As spheres spin, most of the centrifugal force concentrates towards the equat ... [read more >>]
	15 May 2008, 05:21GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Magnetite Deposits May Hide Martian Life
	Magnetite is a naturally occurring compound on Earth and some quantities can even be produced by bacteria on our planet. Considering that magnetism can be detected relatively easy with the help of instruments produced with the current technology, a future mission to the Red Planet could find and return magnetite mineral back to Earth in order to be studied for any evidence of bacteria or other life forms similar to terrestrial magnetite pr ... [read more >>]
	09 May 2008, 04:59GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Beagle 2 Could Have Settled the Argument of 'Life on Mars'
	Look at all this technology! Orbiters circling Mars, rovers running on the surface… But how many of them are able to say whether or not life was or is present on the Red Planet? None. Of course, the Beagle 2 probe carried by the Mars Express orbiter had such capabilities until contact was lost upon separation. Not much is known about the whereabouts of the Beagle 2 probe, but the general belief is that either it was destroyed by the impact ... [read more >>]
	08 May 2008, 09:31GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Earth Formation Theory Discredited by New Findings
	It is widely believed even today that most of the water on our planet along with other 'iron-loving' elements were brought to Earth during the last couple of hundred million years by asteroids, meteorites, comets and other such objects passing through the inner regions of the solar system. FSU's Department of Geological Sciences and National High Magnetic Field Laboratory researcher, Munir Humayun on the other hand thinks ot ... [read more >>]
	05 May 2008, 10:27GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Urey Instrument to End the 'Life on Mars' Debate
	Is there, or has there ever been life on Mars? Well, we've been studying Mars for nearly four decades and the answer is nowhere to be found. Simply put, there is no direct proof of life on the Red Planet but neither is there evidence to exclude such possibility. The ESA on the other hand plans to put an end to this question once and for all by launching in 2013 the ExoMars mission, which will carry an instrument able to establish whet ... [read more >>]
	05 May 2008, 07:00GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Earth-like Exo-planet Search Picks Up Speed
	It may seem strange to some of us but, in fact, it is easier to identify a planet as having the characteristics of our own than actually finding a planet with a size comparable to Earth. For example, there are currently about 270 known exo-planets, of which only a handful have rocky surfaces. By studying light scattered through their atmosphere, or reflected off the surface, researchers can tell whether the planet is habitable, has liquid ... [read more >>]
	26 April 2008, 04:25GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Possible Hot Springs Found on Mars
	It is possible that there may have been much weather on Mars in its distant past. If true that hydrothermal springs could have easily appeared on its surface; and where there are hydrothermal springs, there is a good change that life is as well. There have been several claims in the past that hot springs were spotted on Mars, however they haven't been confirmed yet. Now, the high-resolution camera on board the Mars Reconnais ... [read more >>]
	25 April 2008, 06:07GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Mars Could Have Been Through Ice Ages
	Mars is often viewed as a planet that has been climatically active in a distant past, having flowing water on its surface as early as 3.5 billion years ago. At some point in time around this date, Mars' clime took a turning point rendering it much as the way we see it today. New discoveries made with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter reveal that Mars' clime may have been in fact much more active than previously thought, a ... [read more >>]
	24 April 2008, 05:40GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

This Is How a Low Calorie Diet Prolongs Life
	Various researches have showed that a restrictive diet slows down the aging process. A new study carried out at the University of Washington and published in the Cell journal has taken a few further steps in explaining why that happens. The research made on yeast cells connected ribosomes, the protein-making organelles in living cells, and Gcn4, a protein involved in genome activity, to the pathways of diet and aging. It’s a known fact ... [read more >>]
	24 April 2008, 04:22GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Bigger Brain Means Longer Life
	It seems that a big brain does not mean only higher intelligence, but also a longer life, according to a new research published in the Journal of Human Evolution. The largest brain of a terrestrial animal is that of the elephant, weighing 10.5 pounds (4.78 kg). And the elephants are known to live up to 60 and more. Still, the brain of the elephant makes up for less than 0.1% of its body weight. Human brain has an average weight o ... [read more >>]
	22 April 2008, 16:16GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Stephen Hawking Spoke at NASA's 50th Anniversary
	Renowned British physicist Stephen Hawking was invited yesterday to speak at NASA's 50th anniversary at Washington, DC. During his lecture, professor Hawking attacked the matters of Moon and Mars colonization, the underfunding of space exploration and the possibility of existence of alien life in the universe. He believes that the top priority of space exploration would by to create two permanent colonies on Mars and the Moo ... [read more >>]
	22 April 2008, 03:01GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Life May be Present on Saturn's Enceladus
	While looking for evidence of life on other bodies in the solar system, researchers often evaluate the degree of habitability relying on the presence of water, sunlight, oxygen and so on. However, in the last decades, we came to learn that none of these three basic ingredients is absolutely required in order to sustain life. For example, on Earth, microbes may be found several kilometers underground, living without the need for oxygen or l ... [read more >>]
	21 April 2008, 04:54GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

The Probability of Intelligent Alien Life
	For a long time we have been asking ourselves whether we are alone in the universe. The truth is that we still do not know the answer to this question, however there is a high probability that there are other life forms besides those on Earth. After all, for all we know the universe may be infinite in space-time. Nevertheless, the odds finding alien life in the universe, especially on planets similar to Earth, are relatively low. Profe ... [read more >>]
	17 April 2008, 04:18GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

The Birds of the Cities
	The emergence of the human settlements during the Neolithic, 10,000 years ago, created a new biotope. In the new environment, not only domestic animals started to flourish, but also wild fauna that began to depend on human villages – and later cities – for shelter, food, and even security. And not all are useful. For example, house mice and rats rely on food provided by people, from food stores to wastes. Perhaps the largest ... [read more >>]
	15 April 2008, 10:11GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Phoenix Mars Lander Prepares for Landing
	In anticipation of the expected landing of the Phoenix Mars Lander on 25 May, NASA engineers applied a trajectory correction to the flight path. Further modifications to the flight path are expected after the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter photographs the designated landing area. The Phoenix spacecraft will most likely land in a polar region known as "Green Valley," a flat valley about 100 kilometers long and 20 kilometers wide shap ... [read more >>]
	11 April 2008, 10:59GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Newly Found Exo-Planet is the Smallest Ever
	The new exo-planet, dubbed GJ 436c, moves in an orbit around the star GJ 436, located in the Leo constellation, 30 light years away from Earth. Relying on the mass of the planet, scientists believe that it could be a rocky planet, about five times heavier than our own. The discovery was made by researchers from the University College London in collaboration with the Spanish Research Council. GJ 436c completes an orbit around ... [read more >>]
	10 April 2008, 03:25GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Twins of Saturn and Jupiter Found in Distant Star System
	During the span of the Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting that took place last week in Belfast, astronomers revealed the latest results of their studies. One of the scientists present there, Martin Dominik from the St Andrews University, pointed out that he and his team discovered a distant star system bearing two planets relatively similar to our two largest gas giants, Jupiter and Saturn, orbiting around the cen ... [read more >>]
	07 April 2008, 02:55GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Robots, the Spearhead of Space Exploration
	Why are we so fascinated with the Moon? I mean just look around you, the universe is more than the Earth and its large satellite. Mars, Venus and Mercury are just around the corner, why are we so reluctant at sending a manned mission to any of these planets? The truth is that space missions are extremely dangerous and very expensive, that’s why we prefer sending robots instead. And frankly, sending a manned mission to Mars won't make ... [read more >>]
	04 April 2008, 06:05GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Ten New Exo-Planets Found
	The Wide Area Search for Planets international collaboration announced that it had found 10 new extra solar planets, by using of robotic camera systems, which survey solar systems other than our own, in the hope of understanding how planets are formed around stars. Astronomers are expected to detail their findings today at the Royal Astronomical Society's national Astronomy meeting. The robotic cameras use a detection technique re ... [read more >>]
	02 April 2008, 04:22GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

The Search for Alien Life, a Search for Cellulose
	According to University of North Carolina researchers, the search for extraterrestrial life forms does not necessarily require the find of the actual life forms. Evidence of its existence could be just as rewarding. They reveal that life on Earth could have actually appeared 200 million years earlier than previously believed. One of the most abundant biological material produced by plants, algae and bacteria on Earth is cell ... [read more >>]
	31 March 2008, 03:46GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Humans May Be Half-Aliens
	Primitive organic molecules can be found throughout the whole solar system, but they are mostly present in carbonaceous chondrite meteorites. They can also be found amongst the interplanetary dust particles which formed in the early days of the solar system. However, the materials that have the most scientific value for researchers are the organic molecules known to us as amino acids, because amino acids are the building blocks of proteins ... [read more >>]
	28 March 2008, 10:37GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia

Cassini Finds Precursors for Life on Enceladus
	The results of the fly-by made by the Cassini orbiter around Saturn's moon Enceladus reveal that the plume of water vapor above its surface is rich in primitive organic molecules necessary for the appearance and evolution of life as we know it. On 12 March the probe was sent in a fly-by at an altitude of 50 kilometers above the surface, to make detailed measurements of the watery plume regarding composition, density and particles size ... [read more >>]
	27 March 2008, 04:01GMT | (c) 2008 Softpedia