Astronomers at the Very Large Telescope(VLT) in Chile are using this laser to measure the distortions of Earth’s ever changing atmosphere.
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The only way out is to modify the laws of gravity, and new constraints rule those modifications out. “The discrepancy between what was expected and what has been observed has […]
Is the largest object in our galaxy — our central black hole — poised to devour a massive gas cloud? “What makes us love… is when we learn all these fantastic stories. Feeding the imagination […]
How the last open cluster ever discovered by Messier himself still holds some amazing secrets and wonder more than 200 years after its discovery. “The journey is difficult, immense. We […]
A big, bright, dust-rich barred spiral galaxy that won’t stay this way for long! “When we are sure that we are on the right road there is no need to plan […]
If we knew all we do about math and physics, but had never seen the heavens, what would we conclude? “Both the solutions must be rejected, and as these are […]
Nobody knows when the next galactic supernova might occur, but thanks to the development of massive neutrino detectors, we would have an “unprecedented peek at the action.”
Summer is coming, and with it, the most famous nebula in the night sky. “The self-same atoms which, chaotically dispersed, made the nebula, now, jammed and temporarily caught in peculiar positions, […]
The internet is really, really great… for cats. In space. “There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.”-Albert Schweitzer We spend all week together wondering […]
How afraid of them does the science say you should actually be? “Most estimates of the mortality risk posed by asteroid impacts put it at about the same risk as flying […]
From Earth and beyond, these time lapses show our one-of-a-kind motion through the Universe. “Building one space station for everyone was and is insane: we should have built a dozen.” […]
With help from NASA’s Kepler space telescope, astronomers have calculated that of all the stars in our galaxy that resemble our sun, one in five hosts an Earth-sized planet at a distance that allows for liquid water at the surface.
Of all the galaxies in our local supercluster, one outweighs them all. “I recognize my limits, but when I look around I realise I am not living, exactly, in a world […]
Found by the Hubble Space Telescope, it’s the farthest galaxy located to date, and is giving astronomers one of the earliest glimpses of what the universe was like after the Big Bang.
The stars, gas and dust of our own galaxy dominates our night sky. But what secrets does the Universe hold beyond that? “Who are we? We find that we live on […]
Stargazer John Chumack used a homemade telescope and a QHY8 cooled single shot color CCD camera to capture this image.
Keep politics out of science? Of course. But think what we could achieve with more science in our politics. “One of my favorite philosophical tenets is that people will agree […]
The core of the nearest great galaxy cluster holds a glorious sight unlike any other. “Man must rise above the Earth, to the top of the atmosphere and beyond, for only […]
Someday, the Sun will expand, engulfing Mercury and Venus, and then some. Will we survive? “They do not see what lies ahead, when Sun has faded and Moon is dead.”-J.R.R. Tolkien […]
Now that the Higgs has been discovered, the Standard Model is complete. But are there any other new particles? “The particle and the planet are subject to the same laws […]
How many times would you have to fold a piece of paper in half for it to reach the Moon? “Only on paper has humanity yet achieved glory, beauty, truth, knowledge, […]
Inflation tells us that it’s likely real, but can it be the answer to any of our scientific questions? Probably not. “Physical reality does not require that we be pleased with […]
Bill Nye: Our intellect and treasure is really best used in exploring space.
The speed of light in a vacuum is the limit for massless particles, but massive ones are limited even further! “All our sweetest hours fly the fastest.” -Virgil If you’ve been […]
Does space stretch or does new space get created, and what does that mean for the conservation of energy? “If you put yourself in a position where you have to stretch […]
The brightest galaxy in a spectacular close grouping of three provides a beacon of insight into our far future. “Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead.” -Benjamin […]
Capitalism, the dominant secular faith of our times, risks a reformation.
Two new studies agree that Kepler-78b is about the same size and composition as Earth, but because it orbits its star at one-tenth the distance of our orbit, it’s way too hot to support life.
The greatest Messier object of them all, a treat all winter long. “What caused me to undertake the catalog was the nebula I discovered above the southern horn of Taurus on […]
NASA’s “black-hole-hunter” spacecraft, the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, has serendipitously discovered its first 10 supermassive black holes.