Space & Future
Giant Planets May Be Born in the Shadow of Supermassive Black Holes
Black holes are often imagined as cosmic vacuum cleaners that simply swallow everything nearby.
But new research suggests the environment around supermassive black holes may...
Why Astronauts Get Constipated in Space: Their Blood Offers a Clue
Constipation is a surprisingly common problem for astronauts living in space.
Scientists have long known that digestion can change when people leave Earth, but exactly...
A Dry Martian Meteorite Reveals Where Water Once Hid on Mars
Mars may look like a dry, dusty world today, but billions of years ago, water interacted with its rocky surface.
Now, scientists have found new...
Chemical Fingerprints Reveal the Secret Pasts of Massive Stars
A massive star may look like it has spent its entire life alone, but its chemical makeup can tell a very different story.
Scientists have...
Astronomers Discover a Stellar Stream Beyond the Milky Way for the First Time
Astronomers have discovered a faint stream of stars in another galaxy for the first time, opening a new way to investigate one of the...
Astronomers Find Three Giant Black Holes in One Ancient Galaxy for the First Time
Astronomers have discovered three actively feeding supermassive black holes inside a single distant galaxy, something never before seen so far back in the history...
Astronomers Catch a Dying Star Recycling Its Material Back into Space
Astronomers have captured a remarkable view of a dying star's remains being broken apart and mixed into the space between stars.
The discovery offers a...
A Blazar 1.5 Billion Light-Years Away Is Challenging What Astronomers Thought They Knew
About 1.5 billion light-years from Earth, a galaxy called PKS 2155-304 is giving astronomers more questions than answers.
After studying nearly two decades of observations,...
Astronomers Release the Largest 2D Map of the Universe Ever Made
Astronomers have released the largest two-dimensional color map of the universe ever created, containing an extraordinary 5.6 trillion pixels and nearly 4 billion stars,...
Rare Mars Meteorite Fills a 2-Billion-Year Gap in the Red Planet’s History
A rare meteorite from Mars is giving scientists a new look at a mysterious period in the Red Planet’s history.
Researchers at Boston College have...
Super-Earths May Be Surprisingly Solid Deep Inside, Scientists Find
Massive rocky planets known as super-Earths may be much more solid deep inside than scientists previously understood, according to new research into how minerals...
Uranus’s Magnetic Shield “Breathes” as the Planet Spins
Uranus is one of the strangest planets in our solar system, and new research shows that its unusual orientation causes the planet’s magnetic environment...
Deep Space
Scientists may have just solved the universe’s biggest headache
For years, scientists have puzzled over a strange mismatch in how fast the universe seems to be expanding.
Depending on whether they looked at the...
Webb Telescope spots warm space dust escaping a distant galaxy
In a far-off galaxy named Makani—Hawaiian for “wind”—astronomers have spotted something remarkable.
Tiny dust particles, heated by the light of newborn stars, were carried out...
Astronomers may find a rare ‘black widow’ binary star system
The star system is likely older than the sun and is orbited by a far-off star.
Astronomers have discovered what could be a "black widow"...
Scientists detect atmosphere on distant rocky exoplanet
Researchers using the James Webb Space Telescope have made a significant breakthrough by potentially detecting an atmosphere on 55 Cancri e, a rocky exoplanet...
Frozen Earthlike planets could still support life, says study
Icy planets once thought too cold to support life might have livable land areas above freezing, challenging the typical assumption of what kinds of...