New gullies that did not exist in mid-2002 have appeared on a Martian sand dune. That's just one of the surprising discoveries that have resulted from the extended life of NASA's Mars Global Surveyor, which this month began its ninth year in orbit around Mars - NASA/JPL
NASA has unveiled full details of their plan to send astronauts to the Moon and Mars. The Agency says it will spend US$104 billion to put humans back on the Moon by 2018 - Nature, NASA
Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have identified the source of a mysterious blue light surrounding a supermassive black hole in our neighboring Andromeda
Galaxy (M31) - Space Telescope Science Institute
Unique data obtained by ESA’s Cluster and the joint Chinese/ESA Double Star missions provided the first evidence of cracks on a neutron star’s crust - ESA
The Universe was a more fertile place soon after it was formed than has previously been suspected. A team of French and Italian astronomers made indeed the surprising discovery
of a large and unknown population of distant galaxies observed when the Universe was only 10 to 30% its present age - European Southern Observatory
Smithsonian astronomer T.K. Sridharan (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics) and his colleagues have photographed a pair of stellar twins in infrared light, which penetrates the dust
- Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Astronomers are arguing bitterly over how to define a planet, with some proposing that the term be abandoned completely in favour of more specific labels based on where objects are located. Two competing proposals are expected to be put forward to a formal task group on Friday, but astronomers say the debate could drag on indefinitely - New Scientist
A Spanish astronomer has admitted he accessed internet telescope logs of another astronomer's observations of a giant object orbiting beyond Neptune – but denies doing
anything wrong - New Scientist