Just over 400 light-years away, a baby exoplanet is making its way into the Universe.

This, in itself, is not so unusual. We’ve detected thousands of exoplanets – planets outside the Solar System. Presumably they all had to be newborn at some point too. What makes this exoplanet special is that astronomers obtained a direct image of it – an almost vanishingly rare feat.

It’s named 2M0437b, and it’s one of the youngest exoplanets for which we have ever obtained a direct image. This could give us a new window into the planet formation process, which in turn could help us understand how the Solar System was born and evolved.

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NASA is getting ready to launch a spacecraft to test an experimental method to deflect near-Earth objects, and you can participate in the mission by testing your own planetary defense know-how.

The space agency’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission is designed to test a “kinetic impactor” technique for deflecting any asteroid or comet that might otherwise impact Earth.

NASA’s huge new space observatory must survive a daunting series of deployments if it’s to work.

In the Decadal Survey 2020 report, astronomers set out their wish list for the next decade. It includes giant telescopes and big views of habitable exoplanets.

It recommends that NASA coordinate, build and launch three flagship space observatories capable of detecting light over a broad range of wavelengths. It suggests that the US National Science Foundation (NSF) fund two enormous ground-based telescopes in Chile and possibly Hawaii, to try to catch up with an advanced European telescope that’s under construction. And for the first time, it issues recommendations for how federal agencies should fight systemic racism, sexism and ot… See more.

Its ‘decadal survey’ pitches big new space observatories, funding for large telescopes and a reckoning over social issues plaguing the field.