Argentine astronomer calculated orbits of Halley’s Comet and Saturn’s outermost moon

September 17th, 2009 WASHINGTON - In high-resolution images of comet Holmes, which erupted in 2007, astronomers have detected multiple "mini comets" bursting out at 451 kilometers an hour, which is the largest known cometary outburst in history. According to National Geographic News, the fragments were recently revealed in high-resolution images of comet Holmes, a relatively small body discovered in 1892 that mysteriously erupted in 2007.

September 14th, 2009 WASHINGTON - An international team of astronomers has discovered that Jupiter had captured the comet 147P/Kushida-Muramatsu as its temporary moon in the mid-20th century, in an irregular orbit for about twelve years. There are only a handful of known comets where this phenomenon of temporary satellite capture has occurred and the capture duration in the case of Kushida-Muramatsu, which orbited Jupiter between 1949 and 1961, is the third longest.

August 27th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Astronomers have confirmed that an email promising a "Mars spectacular" event on August 27, when the Red Planet will look as large as the full moon, is nothing but a hoax. According to a report in National Geographic News, the anonymous message from an unknown part of the globe says that the red planet "will look as large as the full moon" in the night sky, and that "no one alive today will ever see this again." The claim has been bombarding people's inboxes worldwide every summer for five years.

August 11th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Reports indicate that the Perseid meteor shower, which will be visible on August 11 and 12, would yield more than 80 meteors an hour streak across the sky during the best viewing time. Meteors are bits of dust or rock that collide with Earth's atmosphere and heat up gas particles to produce a glowing trail.

July 31st, 2009 LONDON - Did far-off comets housing vast oceans of water during the first million years of formation harbour some kind of primitive life? The existence of water in comets bolsters support for a possible connection between life on Earth and comets. The theory, known as Cometary Panspermia and pioneered by Chandra Wickramasinghe and the late Sir Fred Hoyle, argues that life was introduced to Earth by comets.

July 31st, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new University of Washington research indicates it is highly unlikely that comets have caused any of Earth's mass extinctions or have been responsible for more than one minor extinction event. The work also shows that many long-period comets that end up in Earth-crossing orbits likely originate from a region astronomers have long believed could not produce observable comets.

July 28th, 2009 LONDON - A new study of ancient rocks in Greenland has suggested that icy comets - not rocky asteroids - launched a dramatic assault on the Earth and moon around 3.85 billion years ago, thus causing the lunar surface to become scarred. "We can see craters on the moon's surface with the naked eye, but nobody actually knew what caused them - was it rocks, was it iron, was it ice?" Uffe Grae Jorgensen, an astronomer at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, Denmark, told New Scientist.

July 22nd, 2009 WASHINGTON - Something slammed into Jupiter, creating a dark bruise about the size of the Pacific Ocean, according to an astronomer. The bruise was noticed by amateur astronomer Paul Kalas of the University of California - Berkeley (UC-B) on July 19, with the help of Keck II telescope in Hawaii.

July 21st, 2009 NASA images show Jupiter apparently hit by objectPASADENA, Calif. — Astronomers say Jupiter has apparently been struck by an object, possibly a comet.

July 21st, 2009 Aussie stargazer spots scar from Jupiter collisionLOS ANGELES — An amateur stargazer in Australia spotted an Earth-sized gash on Jupiter, possibly caused by a collision with a comet, NASA scientists say. Using an infrared telescope on Hawaii, NASA scientists found evidence that Jupiter was apparently struck in recent days near its south pole.

July 21st, 2009 WASHINGTON - Scientists have found evidence in the form of a new dark "scar" which indicates that another object has bombarded Jupiter, exactly 15 years after the first impacts by the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9. Following up on a tip by an amateur astronomer, Anthony Wesley of Australia, that a new dark "scar" had suddenly appeared on Jupiter, scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, using NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility at the summit of Mauna Kea, Hawaii, gathered evidence indicating an impact.

July 21st, 2009 WASHINGTON - Jupiter appears to have again been hit by a speeding celestial object that left a giant dark scar in the giant gaseous planet's atmosphere, NASA astronomers said. The US space agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory received a tip early Monday from Australian amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley who had spied the spot near the planet's south pole.

June 25th, 2009 LONDON - A new research by European scientists has provided evidence that an enormous plume of water spurts in giant jets from the south pole of Saturn's moon Enceladus is fed by a salty ocean, a discovery that may have implications for the search for extraterrestrial life. The Cassini spacecraft made a surprising discovery about Saturn's sixth largest moon, Enceladus, on its exploration of the giant ringed planet in 2005.

June 15th, 2009 SYDNEY - The Cassini spacecraft has found long shadows in a ring gap created by the eight-kilometre-wide Saturn moon Dephnis, which orbits in the planet's outer A ring. According to a report by ABC News, taking advantage of a very low sun angle relative to the planet's rings, Cassini scientists found the shadows in the ring gap.

June 3rd, 2009 Swiss astronomer claims discovery of 2 asteroidsFALERA, Switzerland — A Swiss amateur astronomer claimed Wednesday that he has discovered two new asteroids among the hundreds of thousands between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. The asteroids identified by Jose De Queiroz have a diameter of between 1 kilometer and 2 kilometers, said a statement Mirasteilas observatory, which he runs.