New Scientist Space - Space Headlines
How lab-grown lichen could help us to build habitations on Mars
Scientists cultivating partnerships of fungi and algae believe their invention has far-out implications for how we create the buildings of the future
Categories: Astronomy
Gene therapy for Huntington’s disease showed great promise in 2025
An experimental gene therapy seems to slow the progression of Huntington’s disease by about 75 per cent, and researchers are working to make its complicated delivery much more practical
Categories: Astronomy
Europa's thick ice may hinder the search for life in its oceans
The liquid ocean on Jupiter’s moon Europa appears to be completely sealed off from the planet’s surface, which may reduce the chances of finding life there
Categories: Astronomy
IVF success may depend on how long men abstain from ejaculation
Ejaculating within 48 hours of providing a sperm sample for IVF seems to lead to greater success rates than abstaining from ejaculation for longer
Categories: Astronomy
New Scientist changed the UK's freedom of information laws in 2025
By requesting copies of the then-UK technology secretary's ChatGPT logs, New Scientist set a precedent for how freedom of information laws apply to chatbot interactions, helping to hold governments to account
Categories: Astronomy
The essential guide to proving we’ve found alien life
From mudstones on Mars to strange gases in exoplanet atmospheres, tentative evidence for extraterrestrial life is starting to come thick and fast. But when we've found it, how will we know for sure?
Categories: Astronomy
You can upgrade your immune system, but not in the way you think
From vitamin C to your microbiome and mindset, the latest science of immunity is often counterintuitive. Here's how to give your system a fighting chance to overcome infection
Categories: Astronomy
Hopes of finding aliens were raised in 2025 – but quickly faded
Astronomers thought they had seen the "first hints of life on an alien world" this year, but they disappeared under closer scrutiny
Categories: Astronomy
Black hole stars really do exist in the early universe
Mysterious ‘little red dots’ seen by the James Webb Space Telescope can be explained by a new kind of black hole enshrouded in an enormous ball of glowing gas
Categories: Astronomy
What I’ll be doing to help detox my brain in the new year
We have only just started to understand how our brains clean themselves, but columnist Helen Thomson finds promising evidence for how to boost this process
Categories: Astronomy
Putting data centres in space isn't going to happen any time soon
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
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
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
2025 was the year of online safety laws – but do they work?
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
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
Roman soldiers defending Hadrian’s Wall had intestinal parasites
Excavations of sewer drains at a Roman fort in northern England have revealed the presence of several parasites that can cause debilitating illness in humans
Categories: Astronomy
Two asteroids crashed around a nearby star, solving a cosmic mystery
A pair of nascent planets have been caught smashing together around the nearby star Fomalhaut, and in doing so have solved the puzzle of its famous ‘planet’
Categories: Astronomy
Closure of US institute will do immense harm to climate research
The National Center for Atmospheric Research has played a leading role in providing data, modelling and supercomputing to researchers around the world – but the Trump administration is set to shut it down
Categories: Astronomy
Sitting by a window may improve blood sugar levels for type 2 diabetes
Our cells follow 24-hour circadian rhythms that regulate our blood sugar levels and are heavily influenced by light exposure. Scientists have harnessed this to show that just sitting by a window improves blood sugar control in people with type 2 diabetes
Categories: Astronomy
Strange lemon-shaped exoplanet defies the rules of planet formation
A distant world with carbon in its atmosphere and extraordinarily high temperatures is unlike any other planet we’ve seen, and it’s unclear how it could have formed
Categories: Astronomy

