Since the time of Galileo, Saturn’s rings have remained an unexplained mystery. A new idea may have finally solved the longstanding puzzle.
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If a large asteroid strikes Earth, it has the potential to release an enormous amount of energy, leading to local or even global catastrophes. The strike that led to the […]
Think there are habitable super-Earths out there? Think again. Here in our Solar System, we have two very distinct types of planets: small, terrestrial, rocky worlds, with thin (or no) atmospheres […]
Finding alien technology on the seafloor would be truly incredible. This extraordinary claim, however, is debunked by the actual evidence.
Astronomers possibly solve the mystery of how the enormous Oort cloud, with over 100 billion comet-like objects, was formed.
The definitive answer requires better, unbiased data. Despite all the advances that have occurred in human history, one extraordinary puzzle still remains right in our own backyard: we aren’t sure how […]
While Mars is known as a frozen, red planet today, it has all the evidence we could ask for of a watery past, lasting for approximately the first 1.5 billion […]
If dark energy gets stronger with time, our fate could be an utter catastrophe. When it comes to the entire Universe, one of the biggest existential questions we’re capable of […]
Debris from Pluto-sized collisions, not aliens, are streaming through the galaxy. In 2017, scientists discovered an object passing through our Solar System that was unlike anything else we had ever seen. […]
The meteorites suggest astronomers may have small, early planets wrong.
With launch costs dropping and enormous numbers of new satellites filling the sky, can’t we just do it all from space?
A 71% wet Mars would have two major land masses and one giant ‘Medimartian Sea.’
Science can teach us so much about our planet, but something more must compel us to take care of it. If you want to understand our planet, the best way to […]
It peaks the nights of August 11–13, but it’s no longer the year’s most reliable meteor shower. Every year, beginning in mid-July, planet Earth commences passing through an enormous debris […]
In 2006, Pluto was demoted in a very controversial decision. Unless you ignore nearly all of planetary science, it’ll never be one again.
There’s more light than we can account for, and we’ve just measured it robustly for the first time. When we look out at the darkest night skies available on Earth, even […]
The Sun will eventually become a red giant star, swallowing Mercury and Venus in the process. But what will happen to Earth? There are a few existential questions we can ask […]
Avi Loeb says it’s aliens. Every other astronomer disagrees. Here’s why. In 2017, an astronomical event occurred that was unlike any other: for the first time, we observed an object that […]
We once thought the Moon was completely airless, but it turns out it has an atmosphere, after all. Even wilder: It has a tail of its own.
We’re not made out of the densest elements, but we’re the densest planet nonetheless. Here’s why. Of all the planets, dwarf planets, moons, asteroids and more in the Solar System, only […]
The largest moon in our Solar System, often overlooked, is a water-rich world. Does that mean life? Here on Earth, life took hold very early on in our planet’s history, and […]
If everything eventually dies and decays, is there a way to prolong the inevitable? Our Universe, as it exists today, puts us in an incredibly privileged position. Had we come […]
The night sky is already noticeably different, and bigger changes are ahead. For all of human history until the launch of Sputnik, the only objects in the night sky were naturally […]
“The Expanse” is the best vision I’ve ever seen of a space-faring future that may be just a few generations away.
The process of digging into hard questions makes the moment of discovery all the more satisfying.
‘Fast Optical Bursts’ will confound ground-based astronomy. As of 2021, planet Earth is currently experiencing the least pristine night sky in recorded history. Prior to the development of artificial lighting, […]
Could 16 Psyche make every person on Earth a billionaire? The space mining race is heating up.
Over the coming decades, over 100,000 new satellites are expected. For countless millennia, whenever we were faced with a clear, cloudless, moonless night, all of humanity was able to witness […]
The rings are raining down onto the planet, and disappearing surprisingly fast. 4.5 billion years ago, our Solar System first formed. Protoplanetary disks, which all solar systems are thought to […]
Objects coming into our solar system have an origins story to tell.