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Cosmology
Almost every large structure in the Universe displays a 5:1 dark matter-to-normal matter ratio. Here's how some galaxies defy that rule.
In the early stages of our Solar System, there were three life-friendly planets: Venus, Earth, and Mars. Only Earth thrived. Here's why.
The $21.5-billion project could involve tunneling hundreds of feet under Lake Geneva.
In 1924, Edwin Hubble found proof that the Milky Way isn't the only galaxy in the Universe.
The Universe didn't begin with a bang, but with an inflationary "whoosh" that came before. Here are the biggest questions that still remain.
As planets with too many volatiles and too little mass orbit their parent stars, their atmospheres photoevaporate, spelling doom for some.
The DUNE project will beam tiny neutrinos across vast distances. But the first step involved moving a heavier material: 1 million tons of rock.
Without wormholes, warp drive, or some type of new matter, energy, or physics, everyone is limited by the speed of light. Or are they?
Early on, only matter and radiation were important for the expanding Universe. After a few billion years, dark energy changed everything.
Stars are born, live, and die within the spiral arms of galaxies like the Milky Way. These 19 JWST spirals deliver unprecedented riches.
If our Milky Way were located in the Virgo cluster instead of the Local Group, chances are we'd already be a "red and dead" galaxy.
Millennia ago, philosophers like Anaximander grasped that nature is the ultimate recycler.
On the largest cosmic scales, galaxies line up along filaments, with great clusters forming at their intersection. Here's how it took shape.
Astronomers claim to have found structures so large, they shouldn't exist. With such biased, incomplete observations, perhaps they don't.
The pattern 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, etc., is the Fibonacci sequence. It shows up all over nature. But what's the full explanation behind it?
Today, supermassive black holes and their host galaxies tell a specific story in terms of mass. But JWST reveals a different story early on.
Observations of an enormous cosmic structure, dubbed the "Big Ring," seem to violate the Copernican principle.
For every proton, there were over a billion others that annihilated away with an antimatter counterpart. So where did all that energy go?
One newly discovered, ancient star has a composition unlike any other. Explaining its existence is already blowing astronomers' minds.
A new measurement offers insights on the density of the mysterious force driving the Universe's expansion.
The cosmic scales governing the Universe are almost unbelievably large. What if we shrunk the Sun down to be just a grain of sand?
Here's why the answer may forever elude scientists.
Today, the star-formation rate across the Universe is a mere trickle: just 3% of what it was at its peak. Here's what it was like back then.
As early as we've been able to identify them, the youngest galaxies seem to have large supermassive black holes. Here's how they were made.
For 550 million years, neutral atoms blocked the light made in stars from traveling freely through the Universe. Here's how it then changed.
Even after the first stars form, those overdense regions gravitationally attract matter and also merge. Here's how they grow into galaxies.
The first stars took tens or even hundreds of millions of years to form, and then died in the cosmic blink of an eye. Here's how.
The Big Bang's hot glow faded away after only a few million years, leaving the Universe dark until the first stars formed. Oh, the changes!
The Universe is an amazing place. Under the incredible, infrared gaze of JWST, it's coming into focus better than ever before.
Physicists have yet to pinpoint the hypothetical matter that keeps galaxies from flying apart. Now they have a new focus.