The world of the teensy-tiny, the quantum realm, could have a favorite flavor. We’re not talking about itty-bitty ice cream cones, of course. The world of particles is split into three camps, called “flavors” (don’t ask why). For example, the…
No one really knows what happens inside an atom. But two competing groups of scientists think they’ve figured it out. And both are racing to prove that their own vision is correct. Here’s what we know for sure: Electrons whiz…
This animation shows how a black hole bends nearby light depending on the angle at which it is viewed. As the 2010s come to a close, it’s time to revisit how some of the biggest space science stories shaped the…
A Russian Soyuz rocket carried two NASA astronauts, Nick Hague and Christina Koch, and cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin, toward the International Space Station on March 14, 2019. Three lunar missions, commercial spaceflight milestones, the first all-woman spacewalk — 2019 was a…
The brain tells us what to do, how to act, what to think and what to say. It even remembers the face of strangers on the street and wraps them up in our worries, plops a party hat on them…
Mysterious fast radio bursts (FRBs) dazzle through the sky. Space dominated the headlines in 2019 with stories documenting the first successful image of a black hole, or how a crashed Israeli spacecraft spilled thousands of tardigrades onto the moon. But…
Gravity? What gravity? The Earth is a sphere. This is a simple fact that humans have known for thousands of years; it was incontrovertibly confirmed as soon as the Soviet Union launched the Sputnik 1 satellite in 1957 and it…
Will space aliens become an election issue in 2020? Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders (I-VT) says he’s prepared to disclose any government information about unidentified flying objects (UFOs) — but only if he wins, and mainly because his wife, Jane, asked…
The traditional nativity scene outside the Vatican on Dec. 25, 2011. From the birth of Jesus in a manger to the Star of Bethlehem, the classic details of the Nativity story show up in Christmas pageants and storefront windows everywhere.…
Meteors streak through the sky over Texas in this photo captured by Tony Corso during the Geminid meteor shower in December 2017. When meteor enthusiasts think of the month of December, they immediately conjure up visions of the Geminids. Over…
Leia and R2-D2 in the first “Star Wars” film, “A New Hope.” Movie-goers didn’t know what was waiting for them when “Star Wars” first opened in theaters on May 25, 1977. This Western in space showed dogfighting spacecraft, vehicles traveling…
A NASA illustration of a neutron star surrounded by its accretion disk. A new study suggests that gamma-ray bursts from colliding neutron stars could release deadly radiation at a far wider angle than previously thought. Gamma-ray bursts are among the…