Stardust mission yields white hot results.

The first results from a mission to catch dust from a comet’s tail have revealed a surprise: these balls of dirty snow are born of fire as well as ice. Scientists were stunned to find a huge range of minerals in the particles captured by NASA’s Stardust probe as it swooped past the comet Wild 2 on 2 January 2004. Many of the compounds could only have formed close to a star – far from the chilly outskirts of the Solar System where the comet first coalesced.

Read the news@nature.com story (you’ll need a password) here.

And see all blog entries from the conference here.

Stardust mission yields white hot results.

The first results from a mission to catch dust from a comet’s tail have revealed a surprise: these balls of dirty snow are born of fire as well as ice. Scientists were stunned to find a huge range of minerals in the particles captured by NASA’s Stardust probe as it swooped past the comet Wild 2 on 2 January 2004. Many of the compounds could only have formed close to a star – far from the chilly outskirts of the Solar System where the comet first coalesced.

Read the news@nature.com story (you’ll need a password) here.

And see all blog entries from the conference here.