We have known for a while that asteroid 3200 Phaethon acts like a comet. It brightens and forms a tail when it's near the Sun, and it is the source of the annual Geminid meteor shower, even though ...
An intriguing new celestial object known as Comet Nishimura is enduring a bumpy ride through the inner solar system despite having its tail torn off by an outburst from the sun. Japanese amateur ...
At a distance of 64 million miles (103 million kilometers) from Earth, the comet is still quite far but close enough for ...
Mercury's comet-like tail is made predominantly of sodium ions. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. Mercury has been spotted ...
A stunning new image of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS (C/2025 N1 ATLAS) reveals the cosmic visitor's ion tail has grown ...
Comets aren't the only celestial object that can carve a stunning tail across the sky, as pictures snapped of Mercury as it passed close to the sun show a long tail dragging out behind the planet. The ...
Is 3I/Atlas an alien spacecraft or just a really interesting rock hurling through the cosmos? That debate has been raging ever since the comet, only the third known interstellar object to enter our ...
A serendipitous flythrough of the tail of a disintegrated comet has offered scientists a unique opportunity to study these remarkable structures. A serendipitous flythrough of the tail of a ...
“It almost seems like a magical thing,” said one of the astronomers involved in studying the lunar phenomenon. By Robin George Andrews Carl Sagan once said that Earth is but a “mote of dust suspended ...
This illustration depicts asteroid Phaethon being heated by the Sun. The asteroid’s surface gets so hot that sodium inside Phaethon’s rock likely vaporizes and vents into space, causing it to brighten ...
Scientists thought asteroid Phaethon, which is the source of the Geminid meteor shower, was shedding dust to form a comet-like tail, but NASA solar observatories show the tail isn't dusty. A weird ...