Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences
- The cross-campus Grand Challenge initiative this week announced the selection of three new additions to the Grand Challenge portfolio starting this fall.
- After a highly successful mission, the Cassini spacecraft will give up Saturn's last secrets to CU Boulder scientists before disintegrating in the planet's dense atmosphere Sept. 15.
- Tremendous amounts of soot following a massive asteroid strike 66 million years ago would have plunged Earth into darkness for nearly two years, according to a news release from NCAR.
- CU Boulder program helps underserved and underrepresented students in the STEM fields gain valuable research experience for graduate school.
- Three University of Colorado Boulder students are among 36 nationwide who have won 2017 Brooke Owens Fellowships for “exceptional undergraduate women” seeking careers in aviation and space exploration.
- Solar wind and radiation are responsible for stripping the Martian atmosphere, transforming Mars from a planet that could have supported life billions of years ago into a frigid desert world.
- A team of astronomers, including one from CU Boulder, used the super-sharp radio vision of the National Science Foundation's Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) to find the shredded remains of a galaxy that passed through a larger galaxy, leaving only the smaller galaxy's nearly-naked supermassive black hole to emerge and speed away at more than 2,000 miles per second.
- Having captured the summer solstice and a week’s worth of sunsets, sunrises and their lunar equivalents from the vantage point of ancient Chacoan people in southwestern Colorado, using parabolic video technology, a multi-disciplinary team from the University of Colorado Boulder counted its June 2015 trip a success.