Crazy Engineering: Ion Propulsion for the Dawn Mission

An update on findings from Cassini's latest flyby of Saturn's largest moon, Titan.

This movie uses data from NASA's Dawn spacecraft to simulate the view from the spacecraft flying over the surface of the giant asteroid Vesta.

As millions of people observed the total lunar eclipse on October 8, 2014, MESSENGER was also watching from Mercury.

This video shows the scientists' best guess to date of what the surface of the protoplanet Vesta might look like.

Cassini stares deep into the swirling hurricane-like vortex at Saturn's south pole, where the vertical structure of the clouds is highlighted by shadows. 

One of the glittering trails caused by small objects punching through Saturn's F ring is highlighted in this movie from NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

Animation of Cassini's final orbit, leading to a pass by the moon Titan which sends the spacecraft plunging into Saturn on Sept. 15, 2017. 

Arrival at Saturn

NASA JPL Software Engineer Melissa Soriano describes the third potential target for Scientist for a Day contestants: Pluto's moon Charon.

The shadow of Saturn's moon Tethys seems to disappear as it crosses the planet's rings, demonstrating variations in the density of particles across the rings.

This movie is based on data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft and shows a flyover of an area of Saturn's moon Titan known as Sotra Facula

Credit: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

Io Color Eclipse

This video demonstrates the hiss-like radio noise generated by electrons moving along magnetic field lines from the Saturnian moon Enceladus to a glowing patch of ultraviolet light on Saturn.

The moon Prometheus slowly collides with the diffuse inner edge of Saturn's F ring in this movie sequence of Cassini images.

How can you communicate with Mars spacecraft when the Sun is in the way? Learn more about 'solar conjunction' in this 60-second video.

This sequence of images shows the Sun from its surface to its upper atmosphere and in order of temperature from the first one at 6,000 degrees C on the surface out to about 10 million degrees C.

The beauty and spectacle of celestial motion is captured in this short movie of a moon shadow darting across Saturn's rings.

NASA/JPL Science Writer Jay Thompson outlines the challenges in the latest Scientist for a Day essay content.

A new video from NASA's Dawn spacecraft takes us on a flyover journey above the surface of the giant asteroid Vesta.

NASA's Dawn mission will be the first to explore a dwarf planet on March 6, 2015. This video details the spacecraft's approach and orbit insertion.

The Sun as seen in multiple wavelengths of light by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory over four days in August 2018.

On unexplored worlds, the sound of science is a harmonious melody of chimes, clicks and mechanical whirrs.

NASA's Cassini spacecraft, in orbit around Saturn for nearly 13 years, is beginning its Grand Finale — and it's thanks to some Crazy Engineering!  A team of engineers called astrodynamicists use ma...

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