Rods and filaments of organic matter, interpreted as filamentous microorganisms, were observed on the sample's surface. Variations in size and morphology of these structures resembled known terrestrial microbes. Observations showed that the abundance of these filaments changed over time, suggesting the growth and decline of a prokaryote population with a generation time of 5.2 days.

Population statistics indicate that the microorganisms originated from terrestrial contamination during the sample preparation stage rather than being indigenous to the asteroid.

Results of the study determined that terrestrial biota had rapidly colonized the extraterrestrial material, even under strict contamination control. Researchers recommend enhanced contamination control procedures for future sample-return missions to prevent microbial colonization and ensure the integrity of extraterrestrial samples.

A new investigation with NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope into K2-18 b, an exoplanet 8.6 times as massive as Earth, has revealed the presence of carbon-bearing molecules including methane and carbon dioxide. Webb’s discovery adds to recent studies suggesting that K2-18 b could be a Hycean exoplanet, one which has the potential to possess a hydrogen-rich atmosphere and a water ocean-covered surface.

Scientists have been working on models of planet formation since before we knew exoplanets existed. Originally guided by the properties of the planets in our Solar System, these models turned out to be remarkably good at also accounting for exoplanets without an equivalent in our Solar System, like super Earths and hot Neptunes. Add in the ability of planets to move around thanks to gravitational interactions, and the properties of exoplanets could usually be accounted for.

Today, a large international team of researchers is announcing the discovery of something our models can't explain. It's roughly Neptune's size but four times more massive. Its density—well above that of iron—is compatible with either the entire planet being almost entirely solid or it having an ocean deep enough to drown entire planets. While the people who discovered it offer a couple of theories for its formation, neither is especially likely.

Astronomers have uncovered a link between Neptune's shifting cloud abundance and the 11-year solar cycle, in which the waxing and waning of the Sun's entangled magnetic fields drives solar activity.

Magnetars are some of the most extreme objects we know about, with magnetic fields so strong that chemistry becomes impossible in their vicinity. They're neutron stars with a superfluid interior that includes charged particles, so it's easy to understand how a magnetic dynamo is maintained to support that magnetic field. But it's a little harder to fully understand what starts the dynamo off in the first place.

The leading idea, which benefits from its simplicity, is that the magnetar inherits its magnetic field from the star that exploded in a supernova to create it. The original magnetic field, when crushed down to match the tiny size of the resulting neutron star, would provide a massive kick to start the magnetar off. There's just one problem with this idea: we haven't spotted any of the highly magnetized precursor stars that this hypothesis requires.

It turns out that we have been observing one for years. It just looked like something completely different, and it took a mor

New observations of a faraway rocky world that might have its own magnetic field could help astronomers understand the seemingly haphazard magnetic fields swaddling our solar system’s planets.

When JAXA’s Hayabusa-1 spacecraft delivered samples from asteroid Ryugu to Earth in late 2020, anticipation was high. What could the space rock possibly be waiting to tell us?

Asteroids are time capsules of the Solar System, containing material from early in its history. As a 2021 study found, the Ryugu samples contained carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen, all necessary ingredients for life, and a 2022 study discovered evidence of water (and possibly a subsurface lake) that had long since dried up. Ryugu and its parent body were also revealed to carry some of the most ancient rocks in the Solar System. However, the pieces of this asteroid still had more to say.

It turned out that two of the Ryugu samples each had a shard of something that visually stood out. Researchers discovered they were seeing fragments, or clasts, of rock with a chemical composition that differed from the rest of Ryugu. These clasts were higher in sulfur and iron, but lower in oxygen, magnesium, and silicon. That mean

Four years from now, if all goes well, a nuclear-powered rocket engine will launch into space for the first time. The rocket itself will be conventional, but the payload boosted into orbit will be a different matter.

NASA announced Wednesday that it is partnering with the US Department of Defense to launch a nuclear-powered rocket engine into space as early as 2027. The US space agency will invest about $300 million in the project to develop a next-generation propulsion system for in-space transportation.

While rovers have made incredible discoveries, their wheels can hold them back, and erratic terrain can mean damage. There is no replacing something like Perseverance, but sometimes rovers could use a leg up, and they could get that from a small swarm of four-legged robots.

On Wednesday, researchers announced the discovery of a new astronomical enigma. The new object, GPM J1839–10, behaves a bit like a pulsar, sending out regular bursts of radio energy. But the physics that drives pulsars means that they'd stop emitting if they slowed down too much, and almost every pulsar we know of blinks at least once per minute.

GPM J1839–10 takes 22 minutes between pulses. We have no idea what kind of physics or what kind of objects can power that.

[...]to accurately interpret some of the neutron stars’ signals, researchers must first understand what goes on inside them. They have their hunches, but experimenting directly on a neutron star is out of the question. So scientists need another way to test their theories. The behavior of matter in such a superdense object is so complicated that even computer simulations aren’t up to the task. But researchers think they may have found a solution: an earthly analog.

Though young neutron stars can have temperatures in the millions of degrees in their interior, by one important energetic measure neutrons are considered “cold.” Physicists think that is a characteristic they can exploit to study the inner workings of neutron stars. Instead of looking to the sky, researchers are peering into clouds of ultracold atoms created in laboratories here on Earth. And that might help them finally answer some longs

The co-founder of California-based startup Varda Space Industries says his company’s first space mission—a miniature lab that has grown crystals of the drug ritonavir in orbit—is on track to end in the coming weeks with a first-of-its-kind re-entry and landing in Utah.

Varda’s spacecraft launched June 12 as part of a rideshare mission on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, then completed several weeks of checkouts before starting a 27-hour drug-manufacturing experiment last week. When ground controllers gave the go-ahead, the mini-lab began growing crystals of ritonavir, a drug commonly used to treat HIV.

The experiment’s 27-hour run was completed on June 30, and data downlinked from the spacecraft showed everything went well.

Researchers have discovered the most distant active supermassive black hole to date with the James Webb Space Telescope. The galaxy, CEERS 1019, existed just over 570 million years after the big bang, and its black hole is less massive than any other yet identified in the early universe. Not only that, they’ve easily “shaken out” two more black holes that are also on the smaller side, and existed 1 and 1.1 billion years after the big bang. Webb also identified eleven galaxies that existed when the universe was 470 to 675 million years old. The evidence was provided by Webb’s Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science (CEERS) Survey, led by Steven Finkelstein of the University of Texas at Austin. The program combines Webb’s highly detailed near- and mid-infrared images and data known as spectra, all of which were used to make these discoveries.

CEERS 1019 is not only notable for how long ago it existed, but also how relatively little its black hole weighs. This black hole clocks in at abou

Hundreds of Internet-exposed devices inside solar farms remain unpatched against a critical and actively exploited vulnerability that makes it easy for remote attackers to disrupt operations or gain a foothold inside the facilities.

The devices, sold by Osaka, Japan-based Contec under the brand name SolarView, help people inside solar facilities monitor the amount of power they generate, store, and distribute. Contec says that roughly 30,000 power stations have introduced the devices, which come in various packages based on the size of the operation and the type of equipment it uses.

Searches on Shodan indicate that more than 600 of them are reachable on the open Internet. As problematic as that configuration is, researchers from security firm VulnCheck said Wednesday, more than two-thirds of them have yet to install an update that patches CVE-2022-29303, the tracking designation for a vulnerability with a severity rating of 9.8 out of 10. The flaw stems from the failure to neutraliz

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe accomplished a milestone on June 27, 2023 – its 16th orbit of the Sun. This included a close approach to the Sun (known as perihelion) on June 22, 2023, where the spacecraft came within 5.3 million miles of the solar surface while moving at 364,610 miles per hour. The spacecraft emerged from the solar flyby healthy and operating normally.

On Aug. 21, 2023, Parker Solar Probe will swing past Venus for its sixth flyby of the planet. To prepare for a smooth course, the mission team at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) applied a small trajectory correction maneuver on June 7, 2023, the first course correction since March 2022. This flyby will be the sixth of seven planned flybys of Venus during Parker’s primary mission. Parker uses Venus’ gravity to tighten its orbit around the Sun and set up a future perihelion at just 4.5 million miles from the Sun’s surface. As the Sun becomes increasingly active, this perihelion will be especially important t