A cosmic puzzle is finally solved, as new observations answer the question of why this galaxy exists at all. For the last couple of years, astronomy has had a tremendous puzzle […]
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It’s 92 billion light-years wide after just 13.8 billion years. And that’s just fine. If there’s one rule that people know about how fast things can move, it’s that there’s a […]
Metal really does sometimes stick to some people’s skin. Here’s the science of why. Every once in a while, a claim comes along that wildly challenges the mainstream scientific narrative. These […]
By the end of the decade, we may discover one million black holes. A large enough mass in a compact volume inevitably forms a black hole. Both inside and outside the […]
Amid such suffering, people need some joy.
It’s been spectacularly confirmed by observation, but theoretically, it couldn’t have been any other way. If the Sun were to spontaneously cease emitting light, we wouldn’t know about it for about […]
An astrophysicist proposes new designs for stellar engines that can move a solar system.
Nothing in the Universe can travel faster than the speed of light. So how does space itself do it? One of the fundamental rules we all learn in physics — set forth by […]
The ‘final parsec problem’ is still a mystery for astronomers. When it comes to black holes in the Universe, we know there are at least two major types. There are […]
It happened more than once, and needed to. Here’s why. If there’s one thing you can be certain about when it comes to outer space, it’s that it’s transparent, not opaque, […]
Already 14 billion miles from the Sun, Voyager 1 is speeding away at 38,000 mph.
If it wasn’t a singularity, how small could it have been? Today, when you look out in any direction as far as the laws of physics allow us to see, the […]
A NASA-sponsored competition asks participants to improve the design of a bucket drum for moon excavation.
Theoretically, we know what happened on the red planet. Here’s how we’ll find out whether we’re right. When it comes to the worlds beyond Earth in our Solar System, it’s only […]
Astronomers release new data to challenge claims about the mysterious Planet Nine.
Astronomers find these five chapters to be a handy way of conceiving the universe’s incredibly long lifespan.
The brightest object in the night sky, our Moon is an unmistakable sight. The brightest object in the night sky, our Moon is an unmistakable sight. The Moon, in a […]
When you hear ‘quantum,’ you probably think of splitting everything into discrete, indivisible chunks. That’s not necessarily right. If you want to learn what the Universe is made out of […]
Scientists put the most mysterious force in the Universe to the ultimate test. When it comes to the Universe, it’s easy to make the incorrect assumption that what we see is […]
It’s last “hard” test is over. Now, we wait for its launch. Despite numerous delays, funding crises, and technical challenges, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is almost ready. The science instruments […]
Has all this happened before, and will all this happen once again? There are only a few questions, when we ask them, that force us to reckon with the fundamental nature […]
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 […]
The anthropic principle has some fascinating scientific uses. And abuses, too. For thousands of years, humans have pondered the meaning of our existence. From philosophers who debated whether their minds could […]
The Sun produces a wide variety of particles and radiation throughout it, but all of its neutrinos are produced in the core: where nuclear reactions take place. The various reactions […]
And, if we have one, how close are we to it? No matter which direction we look in, or how far away our telescopes and instruments are capable of seeing, the […]
Demanding appropriate levels of skepticism and scrutiny isn’t cruelty, but rather demonstrates scientific integrity and intellectual honesty. Every few months, a novel headline will fly across the world, claiming to […]
The combination of charge conjugation, parity, and time-reversal symmetry is known as CPT. And it must never be broken. Ever. The ultimate goal of physics is to accurately describe, as precisely […]
Could this finally be the clue we’ve hoped for in uncovering the truth about dark matter? In the physical sciences, theory and observation are supposed to work hand-in-hand. Theorists work out […]
The strongest tests of curved space are only possible around the lowest-mass black holes of all. One of the most mind-bending concepts about the Universe itself is that gravity isn’t due […]
Leap years will only get us through the next few thousand years before we have to fix it. With every year that passes, we assume that two separate things will both […]