"The large-scale homogeneity of the universe makes it very difficult to believe that the structure of the universe is determined by anything so peripheral as some complicated molecular structure on a minor planet orbiting a very average star in the outer suburbs of a fairly typical galaxy."

— Steven Hawking

Astronomy

Jupiter and the Meteors from Gemini

APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

Jupiter and the Meteors from Gemini


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

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APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

Stars are forming in the Soul of the Queen of


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

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APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

What’s happening over that tree?


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

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APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

Where are all of these meteors coming from?


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

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APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

What would it be like to fly over the


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

Orion and the Ocean of Storms

APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

On December 5, 2022,


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

Long Shadows of the Montes Caucasus

APOD - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00pm

Long Shadows of the Montes Caucasus


Categories: Astronomy, NASA

Do You Know What Time It Is? If You're On Mars, Now You Do.

Universe Today - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 10:15am

Ask someone on Earth for the time and they can give you an exact answer, thanks to our planet's intricate timekeeping system, built with atomic clocks, GPS satellites and high-speed telecommunications networks. Ask for the time on Mars and the answer gets much more complicated.

Categories: Astronomy

This Week's Sky at a Glance, December 19 – 28

Sky & Telescope Magazine - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 10:11am

We greet the winter solstice. Jupiter nears opposition. Will the two Dog Stars balance for you? And meet the House in the Hyades.

The post This Week's Sky at a Glance, December 19 – 28 appeared first on Sky & Telescope.

Categories: Astronomy

Putting data centres in space isn't going to happen any time soon

New Scientist Space - Cosmology - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 9:42am
From massive solar panels to the difficulty of staying cool - not to mention high-energy radiation - there are a lot of engineering problems that need to be solved before we can build data centres in space
Categories: Astronomy

Putting data centres in space isn't going to happen any time soon

New Scientist Space - Space Headlines - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 9:42am
From massive solar panels to the difficulty of staying cool - not to mention high-energy radiation - there are a lot of engineering problems that need to be solved before we can build data centres in space
Categories: Astronomy

The US beat back bird flu in 2025 – but the battle isn’t over

New Scientist Space - Cosmology - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 9:00am
After starting the year with its first known bird flu death, the US expanded its efforts to contain the virus, which enabled it to end its public health emergency response months later
Categories: Astronomy

The US beat back bird flu in 2025 – but the battle isn’t over

New Scientist Space - Space Headlines - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 9:00am
After starting the year with its first known bird flu death, the US expanded its efforts to contain the virus, which enabled it to end its public health emergency response months later
Categories: Astronomy

Quantum computers turned out to be more useful than expected in 2025

New Scientist Space - Cosmology - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00am
Rapid advances in the kind of problems that quantum computers can tackle suggest that they are closer than ever to becoming useful tools of scientific discovery
Categories: Astronomy

Quantum computers turned out to be more useful than expected in 2025

New Scientist Space - Space Headlines - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 8:00am
Rapid advances in the kind of problems that quantum computers can tackle suggest that they are closer than ever to becoming useful tools of scientific discovery
Categories: Astronomy

It’s Raining Magnetic 'Tadpoles' on the Sun

Universe Today - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 7:27am

Getting close to things is one way for scientists to collect better data about them. But that's been hard to do for the Sun, since getting close to it typically entails getting burnt to a crisp. Just ask Icarus. But if Icarus had survived his close encounter with the Sun, he might have been able to see massive magnetic “tadpoles” tens of thousands of kilometers wide reconnecting back down to the surface of our star. Or maybe not, because he had human eyes, not the exceptionally sensitive Wide-Field imagers the Parker Solar Probe used to look at the Sun while it made its closest ever pass to our closest star. A new paper in The Astrophysical Journal Letters from Angelos Vourlidas of Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory and his co-authors describes what they say on humanity’s closest brush with the Sun so far.

Categories: Astronomy

2025 was the year of online safety laws – but do they work?

New Scientist Space - Cosmology - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 6:00am
New laws in the UK, Australia and France were brought in during 2025 with the aim of protecting children from harmful content online, but experts remain divided on whether they will achieve this goal
Categories: Astronomy

2025 was the year of online safety laws – but do they work?

New Scientist Space - Space Headlines - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 6:00am
New laws in the UK, Australia and France were brought in during 2025 with the aim of protecting children from harmful content online, but experts remain divided on whether they will achieve this goal
Categories: Astronomy

High-achieving adults rarely began as child prodigies

New Scientist Space - Cosmology - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 6:00am
It's easy to assume that the most talented adults among us were once gifted children, but it turns out that talent during childhood is no guide to later success
Categories: Astronomy

High-achieving adults rarely began as child prodigies

New Scientist Space - Space Headlines - Fri, 12/19/2025 - 6:00am
It's easy to assume that the most talented adults among us were once gifted children, but it turns out that talent during childhood is no guide to later success
Categories: Astronomy