While millions catch a glimpse of a rare lunar event, NASA plans to shut down an orbiter whose purpose is to study the moon.
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No, really. This stuff is getting pushed out as “fact.”
We’re taught that the most massive stars in the Universe all die in supernovae. We were taught wrong. Create a star that’s massive enough, and it won’t go out with a […]
We know that it’s ‘the red planet’ because of the iron in its soil. But why, with such a thin, carbon dioxide atmosphere, is the martian sky so red and bright? […]
And if their conclusions will be different from ours, how can we be certain we’ve got it right? One of the greatest dangers in all of science is jumping to false […]
A single, complete view of half the world was enough to teach us how these distant, frozen bodies work. On July 14, 2015, NASA’s New Horizons flew by Pluto. Pluto’s atmosphere, […]
Even before we have the James Webb Space Telescope, a controversy over when the first stars formed is growing. As far back as our most powerful telescopes have ever looked, we’ve […]
The whole should equal the sum of its parts, but doesn’t. Here’s why. The whole is equal to the sum of its constituent parts. That’s how everything works, from galaxies to […]
Future or extraterrestrial civilizations could create megastructures the size of a solar system.
For the Pluto fans, another sad state of affairs: your favorite world won’t make it. Nothing on Earth lasts forever, and that’s a truth that even extends to all the objects […]
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is encouraging aerospace companies to up their game after successfully launching the most powerful rocket since NASA’s Saturn V.
And thanks to a new technique and set of observations, we think we know exactly where to find them. At the center of practically every galaxy is a supermassive black hole, […]
Both effects could be responsible for a redshift. But only one makes sense for our Universe. In physics, like in life, there are often multiple solutions to a problem that […]
LIGO’s enormous arms contract and expand as gravitational waves pass through them. But, puzzlingly, so does the light within them. For the past three years, humanity has known a new kind […]
Images taken 20 years apart show the rate of evaporation, and they’ll take much more than mere thousands of years to destroy. In 1995, the Hubble Space Telescope snapped one of […]
Humanity has mapped the Milky Way better than ever with ESA’s Gaia. But 1.7 billion stars later, there are still no Dyson spheres. Perhaps the greatest ‘holy grail’ in all of […]
In 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope was launched, leading to a revolution in astronomy. But for many purposes, Earth is still the best place to be. When you think about what’s […]
The answer has nothing at all to do with the Higgs boson. In this Universe, there are very few fundamental properties that cannot be derived from something simpler. The rules governing […]
It’s the fastest orbit found in space so far.
We’ve all heard the number: 4.5 billion years. But how do we know, and how certain are we that the Earth and Sun are the same age? Billions of years ago, […]
It’s time to bust one of the biggest myths about where the night sky’s most spectacular, seasonal shows come from. Meteor showers are one of the night sky’s most spectacular sights […]
NGC 1052-DF2 was said to ‘defy theory,’ incorrectly, by many. Here’s what our current theories actually predict. Last week, astronomers announced the discovery of NGC 1052-DF2: a galaxy without dark matter. […]
Instead of eternal expansion, could we just be part of a universal cosmic cycle? There are few questions that can keep us up at night the way pondering the eventual fate […]
It’s a rare occasion for orbits to align so perfectly. Enjoy the sights this Tuesday. On Tuesday, February 19th, the Moon will reach perigee, its closest point of approach to planet […]
If there’s other intelligent life in the universe, is it very different from us, or is it very similar? First we have to know where our species is headed, says NASA’s Michelle Thaller.
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The next gold rush won’t be in the hills of California. It’ll be in space. There’s gold in them thar skies!
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20 years ago, we discovered that distant galaxies were accelerating away from us. Here’s how the Universe makes it happen. Matter and energy tell spacetime how to curve; curved spacetime tells […]
The world’s greatest clockmaker sent a clock to the new world, and everything went haywire. The reason why will shock you. For millennia, humanity’s one-and-only reliable way to keep time was […]
“I would rather be ashes than dust!rnI would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow,rnthan a sleepy and permanent planet.”rn — Jack London
If you think it expanded faster than light-speed, you need to read this. If the Universe is 13.8 billion years old, and the speed of light is truly our cosmic speed […]