Astronomers peering into the dust surrounding a nearby red dwarf star have found that the dust grains have a fluffiness comparable to that of powder snow, the ne plus ultra of skiers and snowboarders.

Earth's inhabitants are used to temperatures that vary, sometimes greatly, between day and night. New measurements for three planets outside our solar system indicate their temperatures remain fairly constant - and blazing hot - from day to night, even though it is likely one side of each planet always faces its sun and the other is in permanent darkness.

Eleven months ago, NASA's Stardust mission touched down in the Utah desert with the first solid comet samples ever retrieved from space. Since then, nearly 200 scientists from around the globe have studied the minuscule grains, looking for clues to the physical and chemical history of our solar system.

An energetic storm on the Sun has forced ESA mission controllers to react to anomalies or take action to avoid damage to spacecraft. Several missions, including Integral, Cluster and Envisat, felt the storm's effects, highlighting the need for ESA's ongoing development of space weather forecasting tools.

Particles returned to Earth last January by the Stardust spacecraft from comet Wild 2 are yielding precious information about the origin of the solar system, thanks to the brilliant X-rays produced at several of the world's synchrotron facilities, including the ESRF.

Particulate materials captured from the comet Wild 2 have revealed clues about the birth of our solar system that counter some of the basic theories that the solar nebular is gently collapsing inward to form the sun and the planets.

Scientists explore the grains retrieved by NASA's Stardust spacecraft from comet Wild 2 at 2004. The analysis make scientist to change their opinion about cold emissaries and the whole solar system.

Our Solar System may have been created in a gigantic mixing process far more extensive than previously imagined, according to research published today.