
Star-gazers focus on sun-grazer
A visiting comet could disintegrate when it runs a scorching gauntlet past the sun, treating star-gazers to a flashy spectacle.
A visiting comet could disintegrate when it runs a scorching gauntlet past the sun, treating star-gazers to a flashy spectacle.
The Maven spacecraft blasted off aboard an unmanned rocket from Cape Canaveral this morning NZT). It will take Maven 10 months to reach Mars following a journey of more than 440 million miles.
NASA hopes its newest Mars spacecraft lives up to its know-it-all name.
The European Space Agency says one of its research satellites re-entered the Earth's atmosphere on an orbit that passed over Siberia, the western Pacific Ocean, the eastern Indian Ocean and Antarctica.
The European Space Agency says its GOCE research satellite will crash to Earth on Sunday night or during the day on Monday, but debris is unlikely to cause any casualties.
A one-tonne satellite operated by the European Space Agency has run out of fuel and will fall back to Earth in an unknown location sometime in the next few days.
Scientists studying the terrifying meteor that exploded without warning over a Russian city last winter say the threat of space rocks smashing into Earth is bigger than they thought.
The Curse of Mars also applies to Asian countries, writes Gwynne Dyer. About two-thirds of the attempted missions to Mars have failed, many of them even before leaving Earth's orbit.
Space is vast, but it may not be so lonely after all: A study finds the Milky Way is teeming with billions of planets that are about the size of Earth, orbit stars just like our sun, and exist in the Goldilocks zone.
India is aiming to join the world's deep-space pioneers with a journey to Mars that it hopes will showcase its technological ability to explore the solar system while seeking solutions for everyday problems on Earth.
An Iranian newspaper is reporting that the Islamic Republic plans to send another monkey into space within a month.
Astronomers say they have found a lonely planet outside the solar system floating alone in space and not orbiting a star.
NASA's Jupiter-bound spacecraft hit a snag soon after it used Earth as a gravity slingshot to hurtle toward the outer solar system, but mission managers said it's on course to arrive at the giant planet in 2016.
Some prominent American astronomers are boycotting a meeting on exoplanets because Nasa has banned Chinese scientists from attending.
A Soyuz spacecraft carrying two Russians and an American lifted off today from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, soaring into the night sky for a six-hour trip to the International Space Station.
NASA's Voyager 1 probe has left the solar system, boldly going where no machine has gone before.
More than 200,000 people from 140 countries have applied to be the first human settlers on Mars, the group behind the project to colonise the red planet has said.
An Italian astronaut aboard the International Space Station has captured glimpses of New Zealand in images posted on social media this week.
The Saturn moons Mimas and Pandora remind us of how different they are when they appear together, as in this image taken by Nasa's Cassini spacecraft.
Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield and American colleague Thomas Marshburn who are avid users of Twitter aboard the International Space Station have taken several stunning photos of New Zealand as they orbit 370km above the Earth.