The past few decades have ushered in an amazing era in the science of cosmology. A diverse array of high-precision measurements has allowed us to reconstruct our universe’s history in remarkable detail.
How far beyond Earth will we go to safeguard our species?
Revealing Galactic Secrets
Countless galaxies vie for attention in this monster image of the Fornax Galaxy Cluster, some appearing only as pinpricks of light while others dominate the foreground. One of these is the lenticular galaxy NGC 1316. The turbulent past of this much-studied galaxy has left it with a delicate structure of loops, arcs and rings that astronomers have now imaged in greater detail than ever before with the VLT Survey Telescope. This astonishingly deep image also reveals a myriad of dim objects along with faint intracluster light.
Debris disk around stars could point the way to giant exoplanets
According to current estimates, there could be as many as 100 billion planets in the Milky Way Galaxy alone. Unfortunately, finding evidence of these planets is tough, time-consuming work. For the most part, astronomers are forced to rely on indirect methods that measure dips in a star’s brightness (the Transit Method) of Doppler measurements of the star’s own motion (the Radial Velocity Method).
Monster volcanoes on Mars: how space rocks are helping us solve their mysteries
Mars famously has the largest volcanoes known to science. The largest is Olympus Mons, pictured above, which towers 22km above the surrounding plains – over two and a half times taller than Mount Everest. This extinct volcano is 640km wide even at its narrowest point, greater than the distance between London and Glasgow, or Los Angeles and San Francisco. And Olympus Mons isn’t alone in the Earth-beating stakes – three other Martian volcanoes are more than 10km high.
Bursting with Starbirth
This oddly-shaped galactic spectacle is bursting with brand new stars. The pink fireworks in this image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope are regions of intense star formation, triggered by a cosmic-scale collision. The huge galaxy in this image, NGC 4490, has a smaller galaxy in its gravitational grip and is feeling the strain.
The Strange Structures of the Saturn Nebula
Seeds in space – how well can they survive harsh, non-Earth conditions?
When the world is not enough: how to find another planet to live on
The seafaring explorers of the 16th century famously found many new homes for humanity in faraway, unknown corners of the world. While it may seem that such colonisation has since ground to a halt, some have argued it is only a matter of time before humans start moving to “exoplanets” in foreign star systems. But how close are we to such an expansion?
Supermassive black holes or their galaxies? Which came first
Now we know when stars will be passing through the Oort Cloud
To our Solar System, “close-encounters” with other stars happen regularly – the last occurring some 70,000 years ago and the next likely to take place 240,000 to 470,000 years from now. While this might sound like a “few and far between” kind of thing, it is quite regular in cosmological terms. Understanding when these encounters will happen is also important since they are known to cause disturbances in the Oort Cloud, sending comets towards Earth.
How ancient cultures explained eclipses
On August 21, a total solar eclipse was visible across parts of the United States.As the Earth and moon sweep through space in their annual journey around the sun, the three bodies align in such a way that the Earth passes into the shadow of the moon. Observers then witness a sun that is gradually covered and uncovered by the moon’s disk – a spectacular celestial event.
The sun’s core rotates four times faster than its surface – here’s why it matters
My favourite science news is the stuff that changes the way I think about the world and our place in the universe. Many dinosaurs were covered in feathers; there’s a planet in the habitable zone around the nearest star in the night sky; the universe is expanding faster and faster but no one yet knows why.
What is the name of our Galaxy?
Since prehistoric times, human beings have looked up at at the night sky and pondered the mystery of the band of light that stretches across the heavens. And while theories have been advanced since the days of Ancient Greece as to what it could be, it was only with the birth of modern astronomy that scholars have come come to know precisely what it is – i.e. countless stars at considerable distances from Earth.
Galactic David and Goliath
The gravitational dance between two galaxies in our local neighbourhood has led to intriguing visual features in both as witnessed in this new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image. The tiny NGC 1510 and its colossal neighbour NGC 1512 are at the beginning of a lengthy merger, a crucial process in galaxy evolution. Despite its diminutive size, NGC 1510 has had a significant effect on NGC 1512’s structure and amount of star formation.
The Dark Side of the Crater: How Light Looks Different on the Moon and What NASA Is Doing About It
Things look different on the Moon. Literally.Because the Moon isn't big enough to hold a significant atmosphere, there is no air and there are no particles in the air to reflect and scatter sunlight. On Earth, shadows in otherwise bright environments are dimly lit with indirect light from these tiny reflections. That lighting provides enough detail that we get an idea of shapes, holes and other features that could be obstacles to someone – or some robot – trying to maneuver in shadow.
Booze in space: how the universe is absolutely drowning in the hard stuff
Why looking for aliens is good for society (even if there aren’t any)
Messier 51 - The Whirlpool Galaxy
During the 18th century, famed French astronomer Charles Messiernoted the presence of several “nebulous objects” in the night sky. Having originally mistaken them for comets, he began compiling a list of them so that others would not make the same mistake he did. In time, this list (known as the Messier Catalog) would come to include 100 of the most fabulous objects in the night sky.
Advanced civilizations could build a galactic internet with planetary transits
Decades after Enrico Fermi’s uttered his famous words – “Where is everybody?” – the Paradox that bears his name still haunts us. Despite repeated attempts to locate radio signals coming from space and our ongoing efforts to find visible indications of alien civilizations in distant star systems, the search extra-terrestrial intelligence (SETI) has yet to produce anything substantive.