Category: Space

New research boosts prospects for finding life in the icy plumes of Saturn’s moon Enceladus

28 September 2026

How likely are we to find extra terrestrial life in our Solar System? A study published in Science Advances involving OU academics shows that potential traces of life in the hidden ocean of Saturn’s moon Enceladus may be easier to detect than previously thought. The research demonstrates that components of the ocean water become separated from […]

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BepiColombo swings by Mercury for the final time

9 January 2025

On 8 January 2025, the ESA/JAXA BepiColombo mission flew past Mercury for the sixth time, successfully completing the final ‘gravity assist manoeuvre’ needed to steer it into orbit around the planet in late 2026. As with BepiColombo’s previous flybys, the spacecraft’s monitoring cameras (M-CAMs) did not disappoint. “Wonderful to see” David Rothery (Professor of Planetary Geosciences) […]

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Astronomers make new discovery about the grain structure of interstellar ice

4 July 2024

Astronomers, including Open University (OU) academics Helen Fraser and Hugh Dickinson and OU PhD student Zak Smith, have discovered the spectral signature of water ice that reveals new information about how ice forms and evolves during the birth of stars and planets. Their findings have been published today in the journal Nature Astronomy. A spectral […]

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