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Mars vs. Europa: Are we looking in the wrong place for alien life?

Mars, Europa - NBC News

A British astrobiology conference has revived a years-old debate over the best place to look for life elsewhere in the solar system: Mars, or the moons of Jupiter and Saturn? "For reasons I don't really understand, the wider solar system and the potential for life there has not been high priority," The Telegraph quoted Robert Pappalardo, a senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, as saying on BBC Radio 4.

 

Ocean bubbles to Jupiter moon's surface

The huge ocean sloshing beneath the icy shell of Jupiter's moon Europa likely makes its way to the surface in some places, suggesting astronomers may not need to drill down deep to investigate it, a new study reports.

 

Astronomers spy a planet untethered to any star; there may be many more

Planemos

There’s an orphan planet roaming our galactic neighborhood. It’s a globe of gas about the size of Jupiter, astronomers say. And it’s out there by its lonesome, untethered to any star, drifting about 100 light-years from Earth. (In astronomical terms, that’s close.)

 

Two Earth-Size Planets Born of Battered "Jupiter"?

A pair of Earth-size worlds orbiting a dying star may be the fractured remnants of a single Jupiter-like gas giant, a new study says.

 

Jupiter’s moon Europa: Lake theory boosts hopes for life

Jupiter’s moon Europa: Lake theory boosts hopes for life

For explorers searching for life beyond Earth, the siren song of Europa, Jupiter’s icy moon, trills sweetly. “Europa has the best chance of having life there today,” said Britney Schmidt, who studies the moon at the University of Texas at Austin. Astrobiologists think so because NASA’s Galileo probe found strong evidence for a deep, briny ocean covering the entire moon deep under the icy surface.

 

NASA set to launch spacecraft to planet Jupiter

NASA is on the verge of launching a new solar-powered spacecraft all the way to Jupiter....

 

NASA going green with solar-powered Jupiter probe

NASA going green with solar-powered Jupiter probe

NASA's upcoming mission to Jupiter can't get much greener than this: a solar-powered, windmill-shaped spacecraft....

 

NASA's Dawn Spacecraft Enters Orbit Around Asteroid Vesta

NASA's Dawn spacecraft on Saturday became the first probe ever to enter orbit around an object in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

 

Planets may be vastly more numerous than believed

Planets may be vastly more numerous than believed

The Milky Way galaxy may be filled with millions upon millions of Jupiter-sized planets that have escaped their solar systems and are wandering freely in space, researchers said Wednesday in a finding that seems certain to make astronomers rethink their ideas about planetary formation.

 

Collision of Two Asteroids Spotted For the First Time

Collision of Two Asteroids Spotted For the First Time

Jupiter and Mars aren't the only recent impact victims in our solar system. In two talks today at the Division for Planetary Sciences in Pasadena, California, astronomers report that a small asteroid located in the inner asteroid belt between those two planets took a major hit early last year.

 

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