Have we really found the first samples from beyond the Solar System? The evidence is not convincing
Avi Loeb, an astrophysicist at Harvard University in the US, has published a press release claiming that some of the 700 or so spherical metallic fragments (spherules) he recovered from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, just off the coast of Papua New Guinea, are from beyond the...
Engineering Problems – Why is it so difficult to send people to Venus?
Venus: the trouble with sending people there Venus, often called Earth’s “evil twin” planet, formed closer to the Sun and has since evolved quite differently from our own planet. It has a “runaway” greenhouse effect (meaning heat is completely trapped), a thick carbon-dioxide-rich atmosphere, no magnetic field and a...
Nasa considers sending swimming robots to habitable ‘ocean worlds’ of the Solar System
Nasa has recently announced US$600,000 (£495,000) in funding for a study into the feasibility of sending swarms of miniature swimming robots (known as independent micro-swimmers) to explore oceans beneath the icy shells of our Solar System’s many “ocean worlds”. But don’t imagine metal humanoids swimming frog-like underwater. They...