Astronomy

A major milestone with the Vera C. Rubin Observatory has been reached with the installation of the telescope's enormous eye — the world's largest digital camera.

Helium-3 (He-3) on the Moon's surface has drawn attention for decades. In 1939, a paper first noted the presence of Helium-3 on the Moon. Still, it really came into the collective consciousness of space resource enthusiasts during the 1980s when they realized just how valuable a resource it was and how much the Moon had of it. Now, a new paper from a company called Interlune, a relatively new start-up based out of Seattle, presented a paper at the recent Lunar and Planetary Science Conference that discusses plans to try to mine some of that wealth of material economically.

Even tipped over onto its side, the Odysseus Lunar Lander was able to do some science. Though a broken leg means it's doomed to spend eternity in an awkward position, its solar panels were able to gather some energy. Enough for its radiotelescope to take observations for about 80 minutes.

Inaudible ultrasonic beams steered around obstacles can create pockets of sound in an otherwise quiet room, acoustics experts report

Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost moon lander went dark in the lunar night on Sunday (March 16) as expected, bringing an end to its historic mission.

After a long wait and a bunch of disappointing straight-to-DVD sequels, Starship Troopers is still trying to live forever with a theatrical reboot now in development.

We are so familiar with our solar system that we often presume it is generally how star systems are built. Four little planets close to the star, four large gas planets farther away, and all with roughly circular orbits. But as we have found ever more exoplanets, we've come to understand just how unusual the solar system is. Large planets often orbit close to their star, small planets are much more common than larger ones, and as a new study shows, orbits aren't always circular.

The stunning comet C/2024 G3 lights up the sunset sky over Chile's Very Large Telescope in this spectacular photo.

NASA’s InSight lander recorded surprisingly large quakes that indicate Mars is more seismically active than we first thought. Mysteriously, they only happen during Martian summers

NASA’s InSight lander recorded surprisingly large quakes that indicate Mars is more seismically active than we first thought. Mysteriously, they only happen during Martian summers

Celebrate St. Patrick's Day with a spirited selection of sci-fi films born from the Emerald Isle.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has directly imaged four planets orbiting the host star HR 8799 about 130 light-years from Earth in the constellation Pegasus.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company's Dragon spacecraft is launched on NASA’s SpaceX Crew-10 mission to the International Space Station with NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov onboard, Friday, March 14, 2025, from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. NASA’s SpaceX Crew-10 mission is the tenth crew rotation mission of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket to the International Space Station as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program. McClain, Ayers, Onishi, and Peskov launched at 7:03 p.m. EDT from Launch Complex 39A at NASA Kennedy to begin a six-month mission aboard the orbital outpost.

Analysing the aftermath of particle collisions has revealed two new instances of “CP violation”, a process that explains why our universe contains more matter than antimatter

Analysing the aftermath of particle collisions has revealed two new instances of “CP violation”, a process that explains why our universe contains more matter than antimatter

They may tell us they hate chores, but kids who help around the house report feeling accomplished and competent, not to mention happy

Birds do it, chimps do it, even monarch butterflies do it – and by paying more attention to how animals self-medicate, we can find new treatments for ourselves

Birds do it, chimps do it, even monarch butterflies do it – and by paying more attention to how animals self-medicate, we can find new treatments for ourselves

Gravitational slingshots are now a common part of space missions where the trajectory of a spacecraft is altered using the gravity of another body. These often bring fabulous opportunities for an extra bit of bonus science such as that demonstrated by ESA’s Hera mission on its way to asteroid Dimorphos. It’s following up on the DART 2022 impact but to get there, it’s used the gravity of Mars. It came within 5,000 km of the red planet and on its way, was able to take a look at Mars’ smaller moon Deimos from its far side.