Earth's Place in the Universe
- Physics
Explainer: Stars and their families
Most pinpoints that light the night sky are raging infernos we call stars. As adults, many will create new elements that they later cast off into the cosmos.
- Planets
Saturn’s moon Titan may host lots of dried lakes
Suspicious spots around the moon’s middle could be the beds of ancient lakes. If so, this might solve a 20-year-old mystery.
- Physics
Spotted: Milky Way’s giant gas bubbles in visible light
The bubbles have different colors, based on how the gas inside them moves. That could give clues to how the bubbles developed.
- Life
Planets with hydrogen skies could harbor life
Microbes can live in a hydrogen atmosphere. This points to new space worlds that host alien life.
- Climate
A rainforest once grew near the South Pole
A forest flourished within 1,000 kilometers of the South Pole. That was a while ago, as in millions of years ago.
- Space
Rover finds ‘layer cake’ below ground on moon’s farside
China’s rover finds the moon’s farside is more rugged and cratered than the nearside. Now scientists want to know why.
- Space
Black hole mega-burp was truly explosive
Long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, a black hole blasted out 100 billion times as much energy as our sun ever will. One word for that: Wow!
- Earth
Newfound ‘dunes’ is among weirdest of northern lights
There’s a new aurora dubbed the 'dunes.' It’s weird and joins the ranks of black auroras, STEVE and other odd natural light shows.
- Climate
Study appears to rule out volcanic burps as causing dino die-offs
New data on when massive volcanic eruptions happened do not match when the dinosaur mass extinction took place.
- Space
See the sun in dazzling detail
These images show the sun as it has never been seen before. They come from the new Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope.
- Space
Our sun is neighbor to a giant wave of gas
The Earth and sun sit relatively close to a newfound thread of star-forming gas. That gas is being called the Radcliffe Wave.
- Space
This ‘Sombrero’ stole a big galaxy
The Sombrero Galaxy is an odd spiral galaxy that outshines all others within 35 million light-years of Earth. Its bright, iron-rich halo suggests it consumed one or more large galaxies.
