Space, features and articles | Educational Science

Mar 31, 2020

Apollo 13 at 50: How NASA turned near disaster at the moon into a 'successful failure' in space

Fifty years ago today (April 11), three astronauts launched to space, poised to be the next humans to walk on the moon. But things didn't exactly go according to plan. Famously described as a successful failure, the Apollo 13 mission almost ended in complete and utter disaster. However, while the...

Mar 31, 2020

New origin story of 'Oumuamua interstellar visitor does not involve aliens

Our solar system's first known interstellar visitor may have a very violent origin story. The mysterious object 'Oumuamua, which was spotted zooming through the inner solar system in October 2017, is probably a fragment of a larger body that was torn apart by gravitational forces during a close flyby of...

Mar 31, 2020

China wants a piece of the moon. Here's how it plans to handle lunar samples.

A glimpse into China's readiness to handle samples from the moon reveals steps to be taken for storage, processing and preparation of the specimens. China's Chang'e 5 robotic moon mission is scheduled to launch later this year. That venture represents the third phase of China's Chang'e lunar exploration program: returning...

Mar 31, 2020

NASA reveals stunning 'Cosmic Reef' blasting to life in nearby galaxy

Young stars blaze to life in a nearby galaxy, repainting their cosmic neighborhood with fiery blooms of gas and radiation. This new Hubble Space Telescope image captures just another day in the life of two young nebulas (one red, one blue) in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of...

Mar 31, 2020

Big asteroid shows itself ahead of Earth flyby on April 29

We've now got a good visual on the big space rock that's going to fly by Earth next week. On Saturday (April 18), the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico captured a radar image of the asteroid 1998 OR2, which will zoom within 3.9 million miles (6.3 million kilometers) of our...

Feb 29, 2020

What's that in the sky? It's a SpaceX rocket, but it sure doesn't look like it

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Planetary nebula? Supernova remnant? No, this incredible image is actually a photo of a rocket launch. The rocket's exhaust combined with atmospheric effects emulates an image of a deep-space object. A photographer captured the shot during the launch of SpaceX's 20th cargo resupply mission on March...

Jan 31, 2020

Super Bowl 2020: All the space-themed commercials

This year's Super Bowl commercials promise to be out of this world. This upcoming Sunday (Feb. 2), a number of cosmic commercials are scheduled to run during the 2020 Super Bowl. From SodaStream to Olay and even Walmart, companies are turning to the stars to promote their products during one...

Jan 31, 2020

'Vampire' star sparks brilliant 'super-outburst' while gorging on its neighbor

A vampire dwarf star is sucking the life force from its partner star, and their entanglement produced a rare superoutburst. NASA detailed this previously unknown dwarf nova, a brief eruption from dwarf stars, in a statement on Jan. 24. The system brightened by a factor of 1,600 over less than...

Jan 31, 2020

'Mad Mike' wasn't trying to prove 'flat Earth' theory on ill-fated rocket launch

Following the tragic death of 'Mad' Mike Hughes, we revisit the real reasons why he launched himself into the air aboard his homemade steam rocket, knowing how risky the stunt was. This past weekend (Feb. 22), Hughes, 64, a daredevil and amateur rocketeer, tragically died during the launch while filming...

Jan 31, 2020

Possible new 'minimoon' discovered orbiting Earth

Tumbling through Earth's increasingly crowded orbit are about 5,000 satellites, half a million pieces of human-made debris and only one confirmed natural object: the moon. Now, astronomers working out of the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory think they may have discovered a second natural satellite — or at least a...

Dec 31, 2019

Will Bright Star Betelgeuse Finally Explode?

One of the brightest stars in the sky has been dimming. But, while it might be signaling that it's ready to explode, it's probably just fading because of strange, stellar physics. Betelgeuse, a reddish star that's one of the brightest in the night sky, has been noticeably fainting, or getting...

Dec 31, 2019

Satellite Spots Iran Missile Attack Aftermath from Space

You don't have to be on the ground in Iraq to see the damage done by Iran's recent missile attack. Satellites operated by San Francisco-based company Planet have captured photos of Iraq's al-Asad airbase, one of the sites hit in last night's (Jan. 7) bombardment. The sharp images clearly show...

Dec 31, 2019

A TV satellite is about to explode following 'irreversible' battery damage

Following an unexplained accident, a satellite built by Boeing and operated by DirecTV is at risk of exploding in the coming weeks. To mitigate potential damage to other satellites, the U.S. government will allow the satellite TV provider to move the doomed craft to a higher orbit ahead of schedule....

Nov 30, 2021

Rare total solar eclipse over Antarctica dazzles ... the penguins

Anyone in Antarctica today would have experienced the only total solar eclipse of the year, suggesting one of the largest groups of individuals to observe the gorgeous show would have been the southern continent's penguins. And that's a huge population of spectators. During a solar eclipse, the moon moves between...

Nov 30, 2021

What is the Fermi Paradox?

The Fermi Paradox refers to the dichotomy between the high probability that extraterrestrial intelligence exists and the fact that we have no evidence for such aliens. This paradox was described by the late British science-fiction author, Sir Arthur C. Clarke, who said: Two possibilities exist: Either we are alone in...