Asteroids

This orthographic projection shows Ceres, centered on Occator crater and the brightest spot on Ceres.

NASA Mission Shows Dwarf Planet Ceres Is Geologically Active

Seven studies of data from the Dawn spacecraft’s final orbit makes the case for liquid under the dwarf planet's surface

Artist's impression of the Chicxulub impact.

After the Dinosaur-Killing Impact, Soot Played a Remarkable Role in Extinction

The famous impact 66 million years ago kicked up soot into the atmosphere that played an even bigger role in blocking sunlight than experts had realized

An artist's impression of 'Oumuamua, first spotted in 2017.

Scientists Suggest New Origin Story for 'Oumuamua, Our Solar System’s First Interstellar Visitor

Perhaps the cigar-shaped object is a shard from a shredded planetary body, a computer simulation suggests

Hayabusa2 deployed a camera to film the plume of regolith thrown up by the impact.

Japan's Experiment to Calculate an Asteroid's Age Was a Smashing Success

The spacecraft Hayabusa2 hurled a four-pound copper ball toward the asteroid's surface at about 4,500 miles an hour to create an artificial crater

An artist's concept of the solar system

Where Will NASA Explore Next? Here Are the Four Shortlisted Missions

Targets include Venus, Jupiter’s moon Io and Neptune’s moon Triton

The asteroid Pallas, imaged by the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope

The Most Cratered Object in the Asteroid Belt Looks Like a Golf Ball

Pallas's odd orbit sends it crashing through the asteroid belt, colliding with other objects along the way

An image of asteroid 2020 AV2, taken on January 8, 2020 by the Elena robotic unit part of the Virtual Telescope Project

Astronomers Spot First Asteroid Nearer to the Sun Than Venus

Such “intervenusian” rocks are both rare and difficult to detect

The Quadrantids meteor shower, though fleeting, is famous for its especially bright, colorful "fireballs"

How to Catch the Quadrantids, the First Major Meteor Shower of the 2020s

This cosmic light show will peak in the predawn hours of January 4

After DART smashes into an asteroid, the Hera spacecraft will analyze the impact.

A Spacecraft Will Follow NASA's Asteroid-Smashing Mission to Measure the Effects of the Impact

The European Space Agency's Hera mission will collect data after NASA's DART mission impacts the asteroid Didymos B

NASA Names Most Distant Object Ever Explored 'Arrokoth,' the Powhatan Word for Sky

The space rock's initial nickname, Ultima Thule, drew criticism for its ties to Nazi ideology

An artist's depiction of an asteroid impacting the Earth.

What Happened the Day a Giant, Dinosaur-Killing Asteroid Hit the Earth

Using rock cores from Chicxulub crater, geologists piece together a new timeline of the destruction that followed impact

Astronomers Make Massive Discovery on the Far Side of the Moon

The heavy core of a giant asteroid may be buried beneath the moon's South Pole-Aitken basin

A field photo showing the impact deposit containing deformed pink sandstone.

An Ancient Asteroid Crater May Be Hiding Off Scotland’s Coast

Scientists think they have honed in on the spot where the collision occurred 1.2 billion years ago

This artist's-concept illustration depicts the spacecraft of NASA's Psyche mission near the mission's target, the metal asteroid Psyche.

NASA Prepares to Build Spacecraft Bound for a Metal Asteroid

The Psyche spacecraft, headed to an asteroid with the same name, will explore a metal world thought to be the leftover core of a destroyed planet

Scientists Find a Tiny Speck of Comet Inside a Meteorite

The little fragment found in Antarctica was protected from the elements and preserves the chemical signature of the early solar system

An artists concept of the Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security - Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft collecting a sample from the asteroid Bennu.

Asteroid Sample-Return Mission Arrives to Collect Primordial Rocks of the Solar System

As the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft arrives at its target asteroid Bennu, scientists on the ground prepare for a new bounty of planetary samples

An artist’s conception of a distant Solar System Planet X, which could be shaping the orbits of smaller extremely distant outer solar system objects like 2015 TG387.

New Discovery Stirs Up Signs of the Elusive Planet 9

A new minor planet called "the Goblin" is the second most distant known object in the solar system

Why Astronomers Want to Look for Earth's Mini-Moons

A new, powerful telescope in Chile will be able to detect tiny asteroid chunks circling our planet, which could be a goldmine for researchers

A view of the Perseid meteor shower over Northern Ireland in 2017.

Why This Year's Perseid Meteor Shower Promises to Be Especially Dazzling

Thanks to the moon’s conspicuous absence, those looking up at peak viewing hours will see 60-70 shooting stars every hour

Illustration of Sedna, a minor planet with an unusual orbit.

Is the Mysterious Planet Nine Just a Swarm of Asteroids?

Researchers investigate alternative explanations for wacky orbits of objects in our solar system

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