Look beyond the fireworks on 4th of July weekend. A trio of worlds is converging for a pretty sunset sky show.

One hundred years after the Tunguska event in Siberia, scientists review what they've learned about the mysterious blast from the heavens.

This summer, NASA engineers will try to realize a dream older than the Space Age itself: the deployment of a working solar sail in Earth orbit. The name of the device is NanoSail-D and it is scheduled for launch onboard a SpaceX Falcon 1 rocket as early as July 29, 2008.

In 1967, Surveyor 3 landed on the Moon. Two years later, Apollo astronauts visited the little unmanned spacecraft and brought pieces of it home to Earth. Now, a portion of Surveyor's robotic arm, the scoop it used to sample moondust, is teaching researchers some long-lost secrets.

Sometimes you just can't believe your eyes. This week is one of those times. Check out the full Moon on June 18th and prepare to be deceived!

NASA's Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope left Earth today onboard a Delta II rocket. "The entire GLAST Team is elated," reports program manager Kevin Grady of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "The observatory is now on-orbit and all systems continue to operate as planned."

NASA has a daring new mission on the drawing board: Solar Probe Plus, a spacecraft tough enough to visit the sun itself.

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has found a bizarre ring of material around the magnetic remains of a star that blasted itself to smithereens. Although rings and spheres of material are common in the universe, this one is not like any ring astronomers have ever seen before.

Imagine a billion-ton cloud of gas launching itself off the surface of the sun and then ... doing a cartwheel. That's exactly what happened on April 9, 2008, when a coronal mass ejection or "CME" pirouetted over the sun's limb in full view of an international fleet of spacecraft.

NASA's Phoenix spacecraft landed in the northern polar region of Mars Sunday to begin three months of examining a site chosen for its likelihood of having frozen water within reach of the lander's robotic arm.

Gravitationally speaking, the moon is a strange place. Satellites in lunar orbit feel odd, sideways tugs and end up nose down in the moondust. Astronauts standing in the middle of lunar lava seas weigh more than they do standing on the shore. A new NASA mission named GRAIL aims to map the moon's quirky gravity field and thus pave the way for future exploration.

In 2005, NASA astronomers began watching the Moon to see how often meteoroids crashed into the lunar surface. They've just video-taped their 100th explosion.

At long last, astronomers have found one of the Milky Way's mysteriously missing supernovas.

NASA's Phoenix lander is getting ready to touch down on Mars and begin an unprecedented investigation of the Red Planet's arctic realm.

Astronauts are using a Star Trek tricorder-like device to keep track of microscopic life forms onboard the International Space Station.

A NASA-funded survey set to begin in 2008 could dramatically increase the number of known planets outside our solar system.

In September 1859, a solar flare erupted so intense that the explosion itself was visible to the human eye. A ferocious geomagnetic storm ensued in which Northern Lights descended as far south as Cuba, the Bahamas and Hawaii. Meanwhile, telegraph engineers disconnected their batteries and powered communications by electricity from the auroras! Could it happen again?

Today, NASA-funded researchers released to the general public a new "4D" live model of Earth's ionosphere. Without leaving home, anyone can now fly through the layer of ionized gas that encircles Earth at the edge of space itself.

An experiment in space has shed new light on the puzzling physics of some everyday substances such as blood, ketchup, motor oil and whipped cream.

Going to the Moon? Don't forget your duct tape. Thirty-six years ago when Apollo 17 astronauts found themselves a quarter million miles from home with a damaged moonbuggy, a roll of "good old fashioned American gray tape" saved the day.

NASA-supported researchers have realized that strange things may be happening on the full Moon when it gets hit by Earth's magnetic tail.

Unlike Earth, the firmament of the moon is directly exposed to charged particles from the sun. What happens to moondust under the onslaught of solar wind? Researchers in a NASA-supported lab are finding some surprising answers.

Contestants in NASA's 15th Annual Great Moonbuggy Race have crossed the finish line. And the winner is.... Read today's story to find out who crashed and who triumphed in the adventurous competition.

A crescent moon of perilous beauty is about to appear in the evening sky. The best night to look is Tuesday, April 8th, when the moon joins the Pleiades star cluster for a must-see conjunction.