2+ day, 19+ hour ago   (374+ words) What might happen when the ingredients of life have an entire landscape in which to react? On Titan, NASA hopes to investigate that question by flying from one patch of ground to another. The update also highlighted the name of…...

4+ day, 22+ hour ago   (559+ words) In empty space, light travels at exactly 299,792,458 meters per second. That is about 300,000 kilometers per second, or 186,282 miles per second. It is the fastest speed at which matter, energy, or information can travel through the universe. The number is so…...

1+ week, 1+ day ago   (752+ words) A parsec is a distance defined by parallax. Here is how astronomers use the unit to measure the space between stars and galaxies. What is a parsec? It is a unit of distance used by astronomers to describe the space…...

1+ week, 4+ day ago   (373+ words) Researchers have completed one of the largest computer simulations of cosmic history yet assembled. Called ASTRID, it follows the growth of galaxies and black holes from the universe’s early days to the present, giving astronomers a virtual laboratory for testing…...

1+ week, 4+ day ago   (453+ words) Astronomers often treat the thin streams of stars around the Milky Way as sensitive tracers of dark matter. A new University of Washington simulation shows why that evidence needs to be read carefully: the visible structure of a galaxy can…...

1+ week, 4+ day ago   (447+ words) Two stars once considered promising Dyson sphere candidates have now been removed from the list. Follow-up observations with NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope showed that the infrared glow did not come from enormous artificial structures around the stars. It came…...

1+ week, 4+ day ago   (821+ words) A quasar is a distant galaxy with a brilliant active centre. Here is how a feeding supermassive black hole can outshine every star around it. What is a quasar? The short answer is a distant galaxy with an extraordinarily bright…...

1+ week, 5+ day ago   (804+ words) Why do planets orbit the Sun instead of falling into it? The short answer is that gravity pulls the planets inward while their sideways motion carries them forward. The combination produces a curved path. A planet is always falling toward…...

2+ week, 3+ day ago   (565+ words) Earth’s shadow will cover about 93 percent of the full Moon during the 27–28 August 2026 deep partial eclipse. It will be visible from the Americas, Europe, Africa, and western Asia. The full Moon will pass through Earth’s shadow on the night of…...

2+ week, 4+ day ago   (711+ words) They use a chain of methods rather than one universal measuring tape. Radar can reach planets. Parallax works for nearby stars. Farther out, astronomers compare known brightnesses, stellar pulsations and the stretching of light. Each step is checked against the…...