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And is blue even a rare color for planets? “Whenever I gaze up at the moon, I feel like I’m on a time machine. I am back to that precious […]

There’s no reason why humanity can’t re-establish its moon presence while also keeping an eye on the red planet.

Who has the best chance of success for reaching Mars by 2030? Government-funded programs or private organizations?

Twenty-one strangers with different values and views, thrown together on a Grand Canyon rafting trip, managed to set aside those differences and build community.

The highest-resolution panorama ever taken by a rover illuminates unprecedented detail of the red planet’s surface. “Studying whether there’s life on Mars or studying how the universe began, there’s something […]

Catch MIT scientist Sara Seager take you to the cutting edge and into the future, with a live blog (plus commentary) right here! “Hundreds or thousands of years from now, […]

Four billion years ago, the Universe was a different place. What would we have seen? “In such moments, offering up his heart at the hour when the flowers of night […]

Today, anyone who is driven by a dream to solve a problem has the opportunity to change the world. This wasn’t the case in past eras.

But especially for anyone who listened to your “Celebration of Creation” speech. “In science it often happens that scientists say, ‘You know that’s a really good argument; my position is […]

Think not in terms of the bottom line, but the skyline.

Why look for rare, precious metals on Earth when you can find them here? “Well, this is a thing unheard of. An Elf would go underground, where a Dwarf dare […]

The list of 200,000 Mars One hopefuls has been whittled down to 660 lucky people. So, what kind of people would make the final roster? Crazy-intelligent risk takers.

A 29-year-old tutor faces felony charges after allegedly hacking into a California high school’s network to change students’ grades. The maximum sentence is 16 years in prison. 

As NASA researchers strive to create training programs for future Mars missions, the lessons they learn have implications for other forms of training here on Earth.

According to relativity, there’s no universal frame of reference. But the Big Bang gave us one anyway. “The slow philosophy is not about doing everything in tortoise mode. It’s less […]

A series of mysterious white features lurk at the bottom of one of its most massive craters. Here’s what they could be, and how we’ll find out! “One of the […]

On March 4th at 19:30:15 Universal Time, Venus and Uranus will pass within 0.1° of each other. Here’s how to see it. “Since you cannot do good to all, you […]

Another world orbits the Sun once a year at the same distance as our planet. “The moon was like this awesome, romantic, mysterious thing, hanging up there in the sky […]

Throwback Thursday: How Dark Matter’s #1 Competitor Died The only way out is to modify the laws of gravity, and our best observations rule those modifications out. “The discrepancy between […]

And how we’re about to take the amazing scientific leap from “we think” to “we know” when it comes to its history. “Mars once was wet and fertile. It’s now […]

A mysterious burst of methane detected by the Curiosity rover has NASA scientists wondering whether it could be a sign of life.

Portugal is Europe’s face? Only in a Pessoa poem. And on this map.

Now that New Horizons has flown by the Plutonian system, can it be considered a planet after all? “Words are the source of misunderstandings.” –Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Back in 1930, […]

Fifteen college students are refusing to repay the private and public loans they received to attend Everest College, a for-profit institution that closed its doors.

All things being equal, the simplest explanation is usually the best. But we don’t all agree on what “simple” means. “It is always the simple that produces the marvelous.” –Amelia […]

How does one test how the human mind will react to the isolation of space travel? Send them to Antarctica.

The most important lessons about Earth come from looking outward. “We came all this way to explore the Moon, and the most important thing is that we discovered the Earth.” […]

There are three things an idea must do to become a full-fledged scientific theory. How does the Multiverse stack up? “It’s hard to build models of inflation that don’t lead […]

NASA’s High Altitude Venus Operational Concept (HAVOC) program will feature an evolutionary exploration of Venus’ atmosphere that could one day lead to semi-permanent colonies.

NASA represents a full 50% of the world’s expenditures on space science & exploration. What should we expect from it? “This Administration has never really faced up to where we […]