Richard Binzel: Eyes on the skies and a passion for planetary science
Over more than three decades at MIT, Binzel developed key insights into the solar system and played a role in multiple NASA missions.
A “hot Jupiter’s” dark side is revealed in detail for first time
The planet’s night side likely hosts iron clouds, titanium rain, and winds that dwarf Earth’s jetstream.
OSIRIS-REx mission carrying MIT student experiment wins Space Foundation award
John L. "Jack" Swigert, Jr. Award for Space Exploration honors project team’s success harvesting a sample from asteroid Bennu.
MIT engineers test an idea for a new hovering rover
A levitating vehicle might someday explore the moon, asteroids, and other airless planetary surfaces.
Could acid-neutralizing life-forms make habitable pockets in Venus’ clouds?
A new study shows it’s theoretically possible. The hypothesis could be tested soon with proposed Venus-bound missions.
NASA selects three MIT alumni for astronaut training
Marcos Berríos ’06, Christina Birch PhD ’15, and Christopher Williams PhD ’12 make up a third of the 2021 NASA astronaut candidate class.
TESS discovers a planet the size of Mars but with the makeup of Mercury
The boiling new world, which zips around its star at ultraclose range, is among the lightest exoplanets found to date.
One year on this giant, blistering hot planet is just 16 hours long
A newly discovered “ultrahot Jupiter” has the shortest orbit of any known gas giant.
Rover images confirm Jezero crater is an ancient Martian lake
The findings include signs of flash flooding that carried huge boulders downstream into the lakebed.
Professor Emeritus Gordon Pettengill, radio astronomy pioneer, dies at 95
Planetary physicist and former director of the MIT Center for Space Research and the Arecibo Observatory helped repurpose military radar technology for science and space exploration.
Aboard NASA’s Perseverance rover, MOXIE creates oxygen on Mars
Thanks to an MIT-designed instrument, a NASA mission has produced oxygen on another planet for the first time.
With Perseverance, MIT teams prepare for Mars rover landing
Following touchdown, MOXIE will brew up oxygen while geologists comb for sediments to sample.
Astronomers detect extended dark matter halo around ancient dwarf galaxy
Findings suggest the first galaxies in the universe were more massive than previously thought.
Search for axions from nearby star Betelgeuse comes up empty
Results significantly narrow the range of possible places to find the hypothetical dark matter particles.
Field geology at a distance
As part of NASA’s Mars 2020 mission, Professor Tanja Bosak helps determine the best samples to bring home for clues about life 4 billion years ago.