Simple, fuel-efficient rocket engine could enable cheaper, lighter spacecraft
It takes a lot of fuel to launch something into space.
Sending NASA's Space Shuttle into orbit required more than 3.5 million pounds of fuel,...
Earth’s cousins: Upcoming missions to look for ‘biosignatures’ in the atmospheres of nearby exoplanets
Scientists have discovered thousands of exoplanets, including dozens of terrestrial — or rocky — worlds in the habitable zones around their parent stars.
A promising...
Scientists pioneer new way to study exoplanets
A team of scientists using the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) radio telescope in the Netherlands has observed radio waves that carry the distinct signatures...
Arrokoth flyby reveals how planetary building blocks were constructed
The farthest, most primitive object in the solar system ever to be visited by a spacecraft — a bi-lobed Kuiper Belt object known as...
Astronomers will probe exoplanets with Webb telescope
This month marks the third anniversary of the discovery of a remarkable system of seven planets known as TRAPPIST-1.
These rocky, Earth-size worlds orbit an...
Starlight alone can tear asteroids into pieces, says study
The majority of stars in the universe will become luminous enough to blast surrounding asteroids into successively smaller fragments using their light alone, according...
Scientists reveal the secrets of “golf ball asteroid”
Asteroids come in all shapes and sizes, and now astronomers at MIT and elsewhere have observed an asteroid so heavily cratered that they are...
Supercharged light could pulverize asteroids, study finds
The majority of stars in the universe will become luminous enough to blast surrounding asteroids into successively smaller fragments using their light alone, according...
Leftover Big Bang light helps calculate how massive faraway galaxies are
A team of scientists have demonstrated how to “weigh” galaxy clusters using light from the earliest moments of the universe.
This new method could help...
Scientists catch beautiful outcome of stellar fight
Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in which ESO is a partner, have spotted a peculiar gas cloud that resulted from a...