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Universe Expansion
From LIGO, there weren't enough neutron star-neutron star mergers to account for our heavy elements. With a JWST surprise, maybe they can.
Life might be more common across the Universe than the "Hard Steps Model" suggests.
Matter is made up largely of atoms, where atomic nuclei can contain up to 100 protons or more. But how were the heaviest elements made?
Cosmic inflation, proposed back in 1980, is a theory that precedes and sets up the hot Big Bang. After thorough testing, is it still valid?
Scientists just viewed one of the tiniest, most isolated, lowest-mass galaxies ever found with JWST. Despite all odds, it's still growing.
The Ring Nebula, a bright, circular planetary nebula, is created by a dying Sun-like star. After centuries, we finally know its true shape.
Since mid-2022, JWST has been showing us how the Universe grows up, from planets to galaxies and more. So, what's its biggest find of all?
The discovery of ultra-bright, ultra-distant galaxies was JWST's first big surprise. They didn't "break the Universe," and now we know why.
Seven years ago, an outburst in a distant galaxy brightened and faded away. Afterward, a new supermassive black hole jet emerged, but how?
Here in our Universe, stars shine brightly, providing light and heat to planets, moons, and more. But some objects get even hotter, by far.
Most stars shine with properties, like brightness, that barely change at all with time. The ones that do vary help us unlock the Universe.
The electromagnetic force can be attractive, repulsive, or "bendy," but is always mediated by the photon. How does one particle do it all?
Many of us look at black holes as cosmic vacuum cleaners: sucking in everything in their vicinity. But it turns out they don't suck at all.
There's no upper limit to how massive galaxies or black holes can be, but the most massive known star is only ~260 solar masses. Here's why.
In the year 2000, physicists created a list of the ten most important unsolved problems in their field. 25 years later, here's where we are.
We see objects whose light only arrives just now. But we see them as they were in the past: when that now-arriving light was first emitted.
Our Universe isn't just expanding, the expansion is accelerating. Instead of dark energy, could a "lumpy" Universe be at fault?
Despite the Sun's high core temperatures, atomic nuclei repel each other too strongly to fuse together. Good thing for quantum physics!
On larger and larger scales, many of the same structures we see at small ones repeat themselves. Do we live in a fractal Universe?
It's not only the gravity from galaxies in a cluster that reveals dark matter, but the ejected, intracluster stars actually trace it out.
Earth is actively broadcasting and actively searching for intelligent civilizations. But could our technology even detect ourselves?
Did the Milky Way form by slowly accreting matter or by devouring its neighboring galaxies? At last, we're uncovering our own history.
Known as orphaned planets, rogue planets, or planets without parent stars, these "outliers" might be the most common type of planet overall.
Our galactic home in the cosmos — the Milky Way — is only one of trillions of galaxies within our Universe. Is one of them truly our "twin?"
Electromagnetism, both nuclear forces, and even the Higgs force are mediated by known bosons. What about gravity? Does it require gravitons?
When three wise men gifted baby Jesus with gold, frankincense, and myrrh, they had no idea one was made from colliding neutron stars.
Carl Sagan was far from the first to declare we are the children of ancient stars.
There was a lot of hype and a lot of nonsense, but also some profoundly major advances. Here are the biggest ones you may have missed.
The Firefly Sparkle galaxy was only spotted because of gravitational lensing's effects. Yet galaxies like these brought us a visible cosmos.
From a hot, dense, uniform state in its earliest moments, our entire known Universe arose. These unavoidable steps made it all possible.