Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ

<p>A mission to study dynamic changes in the atmosphere of Mars over days and seasons led by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) involves the Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ as the leading U.S. scientific-academic partner.</p>

<p>Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ astronomers, who helped design and build instruments for and have made hundreds of observations using the Hubble Space Telescope since its launch, are celebrating the observatory’s 25th anniversary.</p>

<p>In another advance at the far frontiers of timekeeping by National Institute of Standards and Technology and Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ researchers, the latest modification of a record-setting strontium atomic clock has achieved precision and stability levels that now mean the clock would neither gain nor lose one second in some 15 billion years—roughly the age of the universe.</p>

<p>NASA’s MESSENGER mission to Mercury carrying an $8.7 million Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ instrument is slated to run out of fuel and crash into the planet in the coming days after a wildly successful, four-year orbiting mission chock full of discoveries.</p>

<p>NASA’s Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft has observed two unexpected phenomena in the Martian atmosphere: an unexplained high-altitude dust cloud and aurora that reaches deep into the Martian atmosphere.</p>

<p>A new study by a team of Cassini mission scientists led by the Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ have found that microscopic grains of rock detected near Saturn imply hydrothermal activity is taking place within the moon Enceladus.</p>

<p>The Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ will serve as the Science Operations Center for a NASA mission launching this month to better understand the physical processes of geomagnetic storms, solar flares and other energetic phenomena throughout the universe.</p>

<p>Up for a romantic Valentine’s Day evening? Then head to the Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ’s Fiske Planetarium to <em>Relativity for Lovers – A Valentine’s Day Among the Stars</em>, for music, film and a talk on the genius of Albert Einstein.</p>

<p>Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ researchers will update NASA officials next week on a revolutionary space telescope concept selected by the agency for study last June that could provide images up to 1,000 times sharper than the Hubble Space Telescope.</p>

<p>Â鶹Ãâ·Ñ°æÏÂÔØ Distinguished Professor W. Carl Lineberger was honored today by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) for his extraordinary scientific achievements.</p>