Space and Planetary Sciences

Findings from NASA’s Dawn Mission shed new light on Ceres

Laura Roberts-Artal April 15, 2015

PIA19063 - Dawn's First Color Map of Ceres This map-projected view of Ceres was created from images taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft during its initial approach to the dwarf planet, prior to being captured into orbit in March 2015. Image Credit: NASA/JPL –Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA

Scientists working on NASA’s Dawn mission revealed new findings from the spacecraft at EGU’s General Assembly. This blog post is brought to you by Nikita Marwaha, reporting on the press conference in Vienna, Austria. The very first press conference of the 2015 General Assembly this year took a closer look at the surface of Ceres. Scientists working on NASA’s Dawn Mission shared new results from th ...[Read More]

Imaggeo on Mondays: Mirror Image

Laura Roberts-Artal April 6, 2015

Water reflection in Svalbard. Credit: Fabien Darrouzet (distributed via imaggeo.egu.eu)

This week’s Imaggeo on Mondays image is brought to you by Fabien Darrouzet, who visited the icy landscapes of Svalbard back in 2012. Whilst the aim of his trip was not to better understand the geology of the landscapes, his eyes were very much focused on goings on up, up in the sky, it didn’t stop him taking this still of the snow covered peaks. This picture was taken in Svalbard (78° lat.) in Jun ...[Read More]

Geosciences Column: The quest for life on Mars

Laura Roberts-Artal February 20, 2015

Jarosite deposits on Mars. Image Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

Understanding where we come from and whether Earth is the only habitable planet in the Solar System has been a long standing conundrum in science. Partly because it is our nearest neighbour, partly because of its past and current similarities with our own home, Mars, the red planet, is a likely contender in the quest for extra-terrestrial life. In this guest blog post, James Lewis, a PhD student a ...[Read More]

When Astronomy Gets Closer to Home: Why space weather outreach is important and how to give it impact

Laura Roberts-Artal December 19, 2014

When the public think about natural hazards, space weather is not the first thing to come to mind. Yet, though uncommon, extreme space weather events can have an economic impact similar to that of large floods or earthquakes. Although there have been efforts across various sectors of society to communicate this topic, many people are still quite confused about it, having only a limited understandi ...[Read More]