Space

Neutron Star Collision Just Settled a Decades-Old Cosmology Debate: The Hubble Constant Featured image: Artist’s impression of two neutron stars colliding, with jets and gravitational waves; credit: Carl Knox/OzGrav/Swinburne University A team of astronomers has used the collision of two neutron stars to produce one of the most consequential measurements of the universe’s expansion rate, […]

Vantablack Goes to Space: Ultra-Black Coating Could Dim Satellites and Save the Night Sky Featured image: The Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile, whose survey could have up to 40% of its images degraded by satellite streaks. Credit: Rubin Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/H. The number of active satellites in low Earth orbit is approaching 20,000, with proposals for […]

Supreme Court Ruling Ensures Astronauts Can Vote From Space: Mail-In Ballot Decision Protects Absentee Rights Featured image: An American flag visible through the cupola window of the International Space Station. Credit: NASA When NASA astronaut David Wolf cast his ballot from the Russian space station Mir in 1997, it took a special act of the […]

Ancient Astronomers Were Right: Theta Eridani Really Was 12 Times Brighter for a Thousand Years Featured image: Digitized Sky Survey image of Theta Eridani in the constellation Eridanus. Credit: STScI/DSS For more than a century, astronomers assumed the ancient stargazers had made a mistake. Three independent observers over nearly a thousand years listed the star […]

Wally Funk, Mercury 13 Pioneer Who Finally Reached Space at 82, Dies at 87 Featured image: Wally Funk in a blue flight suit at a Blue Origin press conference, July 2021. Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images Mary Wallace “Wally” Funk, the trailblazing aviator who was denied a NASA astronaut seat in the 1960s because she was […]

Two ‘Super-Puff’ Planets Defy Physics: These Gas Giants Are Lighter Than Candy Floss Featured image: Artist’s illustration of the TOI-791 system showing two super-puff planets orbiting their star. Credit: NASA/Daniel Rutter Astronomers have confirmed a pair of planets so outrageously low in density that they make cotton candy look dense by comparison. The two gas […]

Satellites Measured 60 Centimeters of Ground Shift: NISAR Reveals the Full Force of Venezuela’s Twin Earthquakes Featured image: NISAR interferogram showing ground displacement from the June 24 Venezuela earthquakes. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/Lauren Dauphin, data from Eric Fielding/NISAR science team at JPL When twin earthquakes struck northern Venezuela on June 24, the ground moved. How […]

China Becomes Second Nation to Recover an Orbital Rocket Booster With Long March 10B Date: 2026-07-10 Featured image: Long March 10B lifting off from the Hainan Commercial Space Launch Site on July 10, 2026. Credit: Xinhua/Pu Xiaoxu China joined the United States as the only nation to recover an orbital-class rocket booster on Friday, when […]

Permanent Magnets Could Shield Astronauts From Solar Storms Without Power or Cryogenics Featured image: Artist’s concept of an Orion spacecraft with a protective magnetic field. Credit: NASA Radiation shielding is the single biggest unresolved problem for sending humans to Mars. Current options fall into two camps, both with serious drawbacks: passive shielding (water, polyethylene, aluminum) […]

Six Astronauts Is the Magic Number: New Study Reveals Optimal Crew Size for NASA’s Moon Base Featured image: NASA concept art of a future moon base near the lunar south pole. Credit: NASA As NASA formalizes plans for a permanent base near the Moon’s south pole under the newly renamed Moon Base Program, a fundamental […]