In a remarkably similar way, conspiracy theories around the world cast doubt on the existence of real places.
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On Earth, microbial growth is common in lava tubes no matter the location and climate, whether it’s ice-volcano interactions in Iceland or hot, sand-floored lava tubes in Saudi Arabia.
The way to understand the earliest moments of creation is to recreate those conditions and study them. Why would we stop now?
Shooting star or piece of space dust?
Some of them have survived the wilds of space for billions of years.
If you go young, blue, and massive, you top out at 50,000 K. That’s peanuts! Surprise! The biggest, most massive stars aren’t always the hottest. Although its neighbor, Messier 42, […]
One image can give over 100 times the data we now get from Hubble. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, launched in 1990, revealed the previously unseen Universe. The most distant galaxy ever […]
On December 19 1972, astronauts Eugene Cernan, Harrison Schmitt and Ronald Evans splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean, ending the Apollo 17 lunar mission. They were the last people to travel […]
With radio and X-ray data combined, we’re understanding how energy flows like never before. When we look out at the Universe on the largest cosmic scales of all, gravity is the […]
New tech is a double-edged sword. Integration can be expensive and perilous: Mess up the adoption and jobs are on the line.
Mass determines a star’s fate… except when it doesn’t. Supernova events are common, visually spectacular astronomical cataclysms. In 1987, a supernova just ~168,000 light-years away was observed in the Large Magellanic […]
Astronomers possibly solve the mystery of how the enormous Oort cloud, with over 100 billion comet-like objects, was formed.
There will always be “wolf-criers” whose claims wither under scrutiny. But aliens are certainly out there, if science dares to find them.
Both views are equally spectacular, but unequally informative. Every so often, a creative amateur project highlights our professional achievements. This mosaic shows the region between the constellations of Cygnus and […]
Whether they’re gas giants or rocky planets makes all the difference for life. Over the past 30 years, we went from not knowing if there were planets like ours around other […]
NASA astronomer Michelle Thaller is coming back to Big Think’s studio soon to answer YOUR questions! Here’s all you need to know to submit your science-related inquiries.
Every December, the Geminid meteor shower reaches its peak. Its 2021 show will be spectacular, but only if you do it right.
The “overview effect,” experienced by astronauts when they view the Earth from outer space, irrevocably changes your perspective as a human.
“Once quantum mechanics is applied to the entire cosmos, it uncovers a three-thousand-year-old idea.”
NASA’s SOFIA mission is upgraded and back in action, and the Cigar Galaxy makes a perfect target. In theory, cold, neutral gas is the key to stars and galaxies. A visualization […]
There are an estimated two trillion galaxies within the observable Universe. Most are already unreachable, and the situation only gets worse.
We can describe what we see happening, but we don’t understand why. Despite our vast cosmic knowledge, enormous unknowns remain. The quantum fluctuations inherent to space, stretched across the Universe […]
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 […]
Chemical energy, where electrons transition in atoms, powers the reactions we see. But two other types hold more promise than all the rest.
Introducing the Deep Space Food Challenge.
If our nearest star has an Earth-like planet, here’s how we’ll see it. As seen from up close, the signs of not only life, but our intelligent, technologically advanced human civilization […]
‘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, […]
Since 1957, the world’s space agencies have been polluting the space above us with countless pieces of junk, threatening our technological infrastructure and ability to venture deeper into space.
Scientists have long puzzled over how Mars, a cold and dry planet, was once warm enough to support liquid water.
Which is good, because if they do, they violate the cosmological principle. In theory, the Universe should be the same, on average, everywhere. A simulation of the large-scale structure of […]