An excellent summary of the planets with the right amount of facts, writes reviewer Ian Welland. It uses a geological approach and each chapter deals with specific topics rather than being devoted to one planet in turn. “A super value book that will appeal to more than the beginner or younger reader,” he says.
The European Space Agency’s Venus Express spacecraft has found the best evidence yet for active volcanism on Earth’s neighbour planet. Seeing the planet’s surface is extremely difficult due to its thick atmosphere, but radar observations by previous missions to Venus have revealed it as a world covered in volcanoes and ancient lava flows.
Astronomers using the several of the largest telescopes on Earth and in space have discovered CR7, a galaxy three times brighter than the brightest distant galaxy in the early universe known up to now. The scientists also found strong evidence that examples of the first generation of stars lurk within it.
Emboldened by renewed contact with Europe’s comet lander, engineers are repositioning the mission’s Rosetta mothership this week to establish a reliable a communications link with the dishwasher-sized Philae landing craft, a prerequisite for resuming a science campaign abbreviated by a power shortfall last year.
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