Scientists find evidence of a giant impact that occurred in a nearby star system
Young planetary systems generally experience extreme growing pains, as infant bodies collide and fuse to form progressively larger planets.
In our own solar system, the...
47 lunar fragments help fill gap of two billion years in lunar history
China's Chang'E-5 lunar sampling mission returned the first lunar samples since the Apollo and Luna missions, the last of which was in 1976.
The 3.8...
Astronomers see white dwarf switch on and off for the first time
Astronomers have used a planet-hunting satellite to see a white dwarf abruptly switching on and off for the first time.
The researchers led by Durham...
Scientists propose new way to defend the Earth against cosmic impacts
In February of 2013, skywatchers around the world turned their attention toward asteroid 2012 DA14, a cosmic rock about 150 feet (50 meters) in...
China’s FAST telescope could detect self-replicating alien probes
One of the most challenging questions to answer when confronting the Fermi Paradox is why exponentially scaling technologies haven’t taken over the universe by...
Early solar system had a gap between its inner and outer regions, shows study
In the early solar system, a “protoplanetary disk” of dust and gas rotated around the sun and eventually coalesced into the planets we know...
How do ice giants like Neptune maintain their magnetic fields?
A layer of “hot,” electrically conductive ice could be responsible for generating the magnetic fields of ice giant planets like Uranus and Neptune.
New work...
Scientists detect 1652 radio bursts from 3 billion light-years away
What seemed a cosmic trickle almost a decade ago now appears as a rapid-fire barrage from across the universe.
An international team of astronomers including...
Did Venus, Earth’s twin sister, ever have oceans?
The planet Venus can be seen as the Earth’s evil twin.
At first sight, it is of comparable mass and size as our home planet,...
Scientists detect strange radio waves from the direction of the galactic center
Astronomers have discovered unusual signals coming from the direction of the Milky Way’s center.
The radio waves fit no currently understood pattern of variable radio...