Neptune

Beyond Neptune, It Sure Is Crowded With Icy Objects

Faster than you can say “trans-Neptunian object” three times, the reaches beyond Neptune’s orbit start to fill out in this animation. And it’s astounding. Dots representing icy bodies large and small fill the area. What’s more sobering is realizing how little we knew about this region 20 years ago. Pluto was the first object in…

io9 Elizabeth Howell – Universe Today

Neptune’s Long Lost Moon Reappears

Neptune has a moon called Naiad that was discovered by Voyager 2 in 1989 when the space probe made its flyby — but it hasn’t been heard of since. Now, some 24 years later, astronomers have finally been able to spot it from Earth, and they did so using archived photographs. Naiad is an irregularly…

io9 George Dvorsky

Energetic Oil Paintings of Our Solar System’s Planets

Most of the space porn we come across is constructed from recorded images of objects in space. But painter Erik Olson prefers to interpret our solar system through his own lens, rendering our celestial neighbors with oil on canvas. Olson’s painting also step outside our solar system, with quasars, nebulae, and more. It’s interesting to…

io9 Lauren Davis

Astronomers Found a New Moon of Neptune–Hidden in Images From 2009

Astronomers have spotted a new moon orbiting Neptune—the first to be discovered in over a decade—by studying images that were archived all the way back in 2009. The new moon, known as S/2004 N1,was discovered in images acquired by the Hubble Space Telescope. Mark Showalter, based at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, stumbled…

Space & Spaceflight Jamie Condliffe

Hubble has spotted a previously undiscovered moon orbiting Neptune

It’s been a decade since astronomers last spied a moon orbiting Neptune. Now, the Hubble Space Telescope has spotted a new satellite circling our solar system’s most far-flung planet. Dubbed S/2004 N 1 (for now), the moon measures just 12 miles across, making it the smallest known moon in the Neptunian system. Its diminutive size…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Listen To Music Through Your Cheekbones While You Swim Laps

It’s hard to listen to music while you’re swimming because even waterproof earbuds that actually stay on try to conduct sound through air to reach your eardrums, and there’s not a lot of air underwater. The FINIS Neptune works on this issue by sending sound waves straight into your face. Total bombardment. In a good…

Tech News Lily Hay Newman

Alien life in our solar system, according to pulp-art legend Frank R. Paul

Almost fifty years after his death, Frank R. Paul remains one of the biggest names in science fiction art and pulp magazine illustration. These visions of life on moons and planets throughout our solar system (recently posted to reddit with no attribution to Paul, his work, or his impact) provide us with another fantastic example…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Flag Designs for Earth & The Solar System in 2020 and Beyond

Redittor thefrek has designed a kick-ass series of flags for the Solar System and its planets. But flags, as we all know, change over time. So he’s also created possible revisions for those flags reaching as far as 800 years into the future. Below you’ll find thefrek’s concept designs for “Earth/Solar flags throughout the future,”…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

10 Moons Every Person Should Know

Pretty much everyone can rattle off the names of our solar system’s eight (formerly nine) planets, but ask the average person to list some moons and you’ll be lucky if they can tell you more than two or three. Now, you obviously can’t expect people to remember the name of every single satellite in the…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

The planets of the Solar System, according to crazed pulp comics of the 1940s

Back in the Forties, the science fiction rag Planet Comics published the ongoing feature “Life On Other Worlds.” This section peppered scientific know-how amongst whatever gonzo shit the writer happened to make up. Here’s a tour of our Solar System using old issues of Planet Comics. Did you know that Mars is occupied by gargantuan…

io9 Cyriaque Lamar

Our solar system might have once had an extra gas planet

This solar system just doesn’t work. According to a new computer simulation, the planets could never have come together in their current configuration. The only explanation is that we once had a fifth gas giant…and it’s still out there somewhere. That’s a pretty big claim to make, so let’s see how David Nesvorny of Colorado’s…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Exoplanet’s impossible orbit reveals “invisible” companion

Exoplanet Kepler-19b orbits its star in ways that violate the laws of physics, speeding up and slowing down its orbit for no apparent reason. The only explanation is a second, hidden planet…making it the first “phantom” exoplanet ever found. Discovered by (and named after) NASA’s exoplanet-hunting Kepler Space Telescope, Kepler 19-b is located about 650…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Can the World’s Largest Undersea Observatory Find a Kraken in the Next 25 Years?

The worst part about exploring the sea floor is that there’s water everywhere. It’s dark, cold and not terribly compatible with breathing. But with Neptune Canada sprawled along 500 miles of the sea floor like an ancient serpent, nothing down there will escape our study. The Neptune—North-East Pacific Time-series Undersea Networked Experiments—Canada Ocean Network is…

Tech News Andrew Tarantola

A map of all the water in the solar system

We’ve just learned that there’s strong evidence that saltwater flows on the surface of Mars. It’s another reminder that water is everywhere in our solar system, whether it’s ice, vapor, or liquid. Here’s a handy guide to where all the water can be found. Our map is mainly focused on the places where we might…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Earth’s first known Trojan asteroid follows our orbit like a second Earth

Trojan asteroids are objects that share a planet’s orbit around the Sun but reside in what are basically gravitational dead zones. We’ve discovered Earth’s first Trojan asteroid…but how did it get there, and why have we only just found it? In any system where a smaller object orbits a larger one – say the Moon…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

A complete guide to the planets’ birthdays

Last week saw Neptune Day, the first anniversary – in Neptune years – of the planet’s discovery on September 23, 1846. That got us thinking: what are the “birthdays” for all the other planets? Here’s a handy, mildly insane guide. https://gizmodo.com/today-is-the-first-anniversary-of-the-discovery-of-nept-5820120 As you might recall, a Neptune year is equivalent to 164.79 Earth years, which…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Today is the first anniversary of the discovery of Neptune — in Neptune years

July 11, 2011 marks the first full orbit of the planet Neptune since its discovery on the night of September 23-24, 1846. The discovery of Neptune is a fascinating story, full of near misses and the triumph of math. For many years we’ve been taught that the discovery of Neptune was done by mathematical calculations.…

io9 Charlie Jane Anders

Neptune Is About to Turn One Year Old. What?

About 165 years ago, astronomers figured out that Neptune is a planet. Since then, Pluto has lived and died as a planet, but Neptune is just now finishing its first solar cycle: It’ll turn 1 in Neptune years on July 12. Neptune is the only planet in our solar system that can’t be seen with…

Tech News Kyle Wagner

Scientists calculate Neptune’s spin time

When it come to making your head spin, Jupiter revolves on its axis in less than 10 hours. Up until now, it was the only gas planet in our solar system that had an accurate spin measurement. But grab your top and cut it loose, because University of Arizona planetary scientist Erich Karkoschka has clocked…

io9 Tammy Plotner - Universe Today

Should Earth get demoted from planet status just like Pluto?

There were many reasons why Pluto got demoted to dwarf planet status, one of which was that it couldn’t clear its orbit of asteroids and other debris. But Earth’s orbit is also crowded…too crowded for Earth to be a planet? Earth is indeed in a very crowded orbit, surrounded by tens of thousands of asteroids…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

Beyond Neptune, It Sure Is Crowded With Icy Objects

Neptune’s Long Lost Moon Reappears

Energetic Oil Paintings of Our Solar System’s Planets

Astronomers Found a New Moon of Neptune–Hidden in Images From 2009

Hubble has spotted a previously undiscovered moon orbiting Neptune

Listen To Music Through Your Cheekbones While You Swim Laps

Alien life in our solar system, according to pulp-art legend Frank R. Paul

Flag Designs for Earth & The Solar System in 2020 and Beyond

10 Moons Every Person Should Know

The planets of the Solar System, according to crazed pulp comics of the 1940s

Our solar system might have once had an extra gas planet

Exoplanet’s impossible orbit reveals “invisible” companion

Can the World’s Largest Undersea Observatory Find a Kraken in the Next 25 Years?

A map of all the water in the solar system

Earth’s first known Trojan asteroid follows our orbit like a second Earth

A complete guide to the planets’ birthdays

Today is the first anniversary of the discovery of Neptune — in Neptune years

Neptune Is About to Turn One Year Old. What?

Scientists calculate Neptune’s spin time

Should Earth get demoted from planet status just like Pluto?

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