Space, features and articles | Educational Science

Nov 30, 2021

Dazzling photos of the solar eclipse from Antarctica

On Dec. 4, 2021, a total solar eclipse dazzled a few thousand lucky people in Antarctica and countless penguins, who got to witness nearly two minutes of totality as the moon blotted out the sun's light. During a total solar eclipse, the sun, moon and Earth line up (in that...

Nov 30, 2021

Black hole jet ejected by supermassive black hole is shaped like a helix

An extraordinary galactic jet ejected from a supermassive black hole boasts a corkscrew-like helical structure, new ground-based telescope views reveal. The black hole lies at the center of an elliptical galaxy called Messier 87 (M87), which is located roughly 55 million light-years from Earth. The black hole — the first,...

Nov 30, 2021

Why NASA's James Webb Space Telescope will orbit nearly 1 million miles from Earth

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope will be more extreme than its famous predecessor in a variety of ways, including its cosmic locale. The $10 billion Webb is considerably bigger, more complex and more powerful than the Hubble Space Telescope, which has been studying the heavens from Earth orbit for more...

Nov 30, 2021

In a historic launch, the Webb Telescope blasts off into space

Heads up, Hubble — another massive space telescope just launched on a historic mission to observe the faintest, oldest objects in the universe in unprecedented detail. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), a school-bus-size satellite observatory weighing about 14,000 pounds (6,350 kilograms), lifted off the launch pad on Saturday (Dec....

Nov 30, 2021

'29 days on the edge:' What's next for NASA's newly launched James Webb Space Telescope

NASA's next big space observatory is finally aloft, but it'll be a while before it starts its highly anticipated science mission. The $10 billion James Webb Space Telescope launched atop an Ariane 5 rocket from French Guiana yesterday (Dec. 25), kicking off a long-delayed, potentially transformative mission to study the...

Oct 31, 2021

NASA needs a new telescope, ASAP, to find Earth's twin

If Earth has a twin somewhere out there, NASA should find it. That's the takeaway from a once-in-a-decade report that sets the priorities for astronomy over the next decade. In order to find such Earth-like exoplanets, NASA should build a big, fancy new space telescope, the report states. Every 10...

Oct 31, 2021

Astronomers discover enormous 'barrier' separating the center of the Milky Way from the cosmic ray sea

The center of the Milky Way may be even more bizarre than astronomers thought, according to a new study. For the study, a team of researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Nanjing investigated a map of radioactive gamma-rays — the highest-energy form of light in the universe, which...

Oct 31, 2021

Russian anti-satellite missile test draws condemnation from space companies and countries

Across the globe, nations and space companies alike are speaking out about Russia's anti-satellite (ASAT) test that forced astronauts in space to take cover. On Monday (Nov. 15), the seven astronauts and cosmonauts living on board the International Space Station were forced to take shelter in the spacecraft they flew...

Oct 31, 2021

Hubble telescope captures stunning image of the star-forming Prawn Nebula

The Hubble Space Telescope has captured a stunning view of the Prawn Nebula floating through deep space. The Prawn Nebula, formally known as IC 4628, is an emission nebula located 6,000 light-years from Earth, in the constellation Scorpius. Nebulas, or clouds of interstellar gas and dust, form following massive stellar...

Oct 31, 2021

Watch a black hole rip 4 stars to shreds in epic new NASA simulation

In a high-stakes game of cosmic putt-putt golf, NASA researchers knocked eight simulated stars into the path of a monstrous black hole. Four stars survived the encounter intact — a little bent out of shape, maybe, but still held together by the strength of their own gravity. And as for...

Sep 30, 2021

Stinky 'mushball' hailstones on Uranus may explain an atmospheric anomaly there

A recent discovery of giant ammonia-rich hailstones, dubbed mushballs, on Jupiter might explain why Uranus and Neptune seem to have no ammonia in their atmospheres. Scientists have puzzled for years over the apparent absence of ammonia in the atmospheres of Uranus and Neptune. Known for its unpleasant smell, ammonia is...

Sep 30, 2021

What happened when the dinosaur-killing asteroid slammed into Earth?

Hidden below the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, the Chicxulub crater marks the impact site of an asteroid that struck Earth 66 million years ago. The most consequential outcome of this cataclysmic event was the fifth mass extinction, which wiped out about 80% of all animal species, including the...

Sep 30, 2021

Massive solar flare barreling toward Earth this Halloween

The sun belched up a large flare of charged particles on Oct. 28, and now that electric wind is barreling toward Earth as a strong geomagnetic storm. The storm — which ranks as a category G3 on the Space Weather Prediction Center's (SWPC) 5-tier scale — is expected to reach...

Sep 30, 2021

Was the 'War of the Worlds' radio broadcast an early deepfake?

How close was the infamous War of the Worlds radio broadcast of 1938 to a modern-day deepfake? A new podcast episode argues the Orson Welles-narrated recast of a classic science fiction tale was a very early example of synthetic media, also known as a deepfake. Deepfakes are images or video...

Aug 31, 2021

Strange, repeating radio signal near the center of the Milky Way has scientists stumped

Astronomers have detected a strange, repeating radio signal near the center of the Milky Way, and it's unlike any other energy signature ever studied. According to a new paper accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal and posted on the preprint server arXiv, the energy source is extremely finicky, appearing...