10 Years Later, Ridley Scott’s Hard-Sci Fi Movie Feels Like Fantasy
20th Century Fox Martian colonies are a ubiquitous sci-fi image, but the reality of making one actually happen is complicated. It would be ludicrously expensive and extraordinarily dangerous. The logistical headaches are endless — you can’t exactly pop back to Earth if you forget your toothbrush. Navigate all that, and you’re left with big questions […]
NASA’s Lunar Trailblazer Is About To Take One Small Step … To Get Us Back To The Moon
Richard Krawiec / 500px/500px/Getty Images NASA’s upcoming Artemis II mission is slated to return astronauts to the Moon no sooner than April 2026. Astronauts were last on the Moon in 1972 during the Apollo 17 mission. Artemis II will utilize NASA’s Space Launch System, which is an extremely powerful rocket that will enable human space […]
These Are The Most Exciting Space Missions Coming In 2025
CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP/Getty Images In 2024, space exploration dazzled the world. NASA’s Europa Clipper began its journey to study Jupiter’s Moon Europa. SpaceX’s Starship achieved its first successful landing, a critical milestone for future deep space missions. China made headlines with the Chang’e 6 mission, which successfully returned samples from the far side of the Moon. […]
Binary Black Holes Can Tell Us A Lot About The Universe. But First, We Have To Find Them
MARK GARLICK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/Science Photo Library/Getty Images Every galaxy has a supermassive black hole at its center, much like every egg has a yolk. But sometimes, hens lay eggs with two yolks. In a similar way, astrophysicists like us who study supermassive black holes expect to find binary systems — two supermassive black holes orbiting […]
The Webb Telescope Found A Planet Orbiting A Star 35 Light Years Away — Its Data Is Just Plain Odd
Universal History Archive Recent data from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) suggests that a planet orbiting a small, red star 35 light years away may have a thick, sulfurous atmosphere, fueled by constant volcanic eruptions. Other astronomers say it’s too soon to tell. The data, and the debate, shed light on how difficult it […]
Aurora Alert! These 9 Northern States Could See the Aurora Borealis Tonight
OLIVIER MORIN/AFP/Getty Images People in the northernmost states may have a chance to see auroras glowing in the northern sky tonight. A blob of electrically-charged gas burped out by the Sun over the weekend. It will brush past Earth’s magnetic field between 7 PM and 10 PM Eastern Time on Wednesday night, setting off an […]
The Debris From An Ancient Space Catastrophe Will Pelt Earth This Entire Week
Marko Korosec/Solent News/Shutterstock This week is the perfect time to watch the debris from an ancient space catastrophe rain down on Earth’s atmosphere. Two meteor showers, both streams of debris from the same massive object that broke apart 20,000 years ago, are happening at the same time this week. The Northern and Southern Taurid meteor […]
Voyager 1 Spacecraft Just Shut Off Its Main Transmitter And Switched To A Long-Abandoned Signal
Space Frontiers/Archive Photos/Getty Images A software glitch is making NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft act a little bit haunted this Halloween season. On October 17, Voyager 1 switched its main radio transmitter to a different frequency, leaving its flight team at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory confused at the spacecraft’s apparent silence. As soon as the team […]
Six Asteroids — One Considered Potentially Hazardous — Flew Past Earth In Less Than 24 Hours
VICTOR HABBICK VISIONS/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY/Science Photo Library/Getty Images Several asteroids flew near Earth safely on Thursday — and one tiny space rock came in for a close shave. The Solar System is dirty, filled with asteroids that litter the space between planets. Often, asteroids large and small swing near Earth and we are none the […]
Scientists Just Identified A Key Location On Mars Where Life Could Thrive
The white edges along these gullies in Mars’ Terra Sirenum are believed to be dusty water ice. NASA is always searching for life on Mars, and on Thursday, the space agency announced one place it might thrive. The announcement describes a new paper, published Thursday in the journal Nature Communications Earth & Environment, that suggests […]