Mars

Radar images from the Zhurong rover reveal clues to the history of a largely unexplored region

NASA’s Perseverance rover has collected four rock samples from an ancient river delta where organisms might have thrived

Seismology has been a long-overlooked tool in planetary exploration, but the success of NASA’s InSight lander has reignited the field

Organisms on Earth produce a wide array of durable “biofluorescent” materials. If those on other planets do, too, the Compact Color Biofinder should be able to detect them

Planetary scientists are eager to bring Red Planet rocks, soil and even air to Earth, but critics fear the risk of contaminating our world’s biosphere 

Rolling up an ancient river delta in Jezero Crater, the rover starts crucial rock sampling.

We now know that plants survive but fail to thrive in lunar soil

NASA’s three-and-a-half-year mission to collect seismic data from Mars is running out of juice

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine ended hopes of launching the ExoMars rover in 2022. Now the mission may never lift off at all

Scientists are beginning to dream of how a new generation of super-heavy-lift rockets might enable revolutionary space telescopes and bigger, bolder interplanetary missions

The aircraft’s sorties are helping NASA’s Perseverance rover scout a path into an ancient Martian river delta

Interplanetary voyages are among several space science collaborations delayed or doomed by the ongoing conflict