Tag Archives | space

NASA’s Spirit Mars rover landed on the Red Planet on Jan. 3, 2004, and operated for more than six Earth years. NASA’s epic and ongoing Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission began its Red Planet operations 13 years ago today (Jan. 3), with the touchdown of a six-wheeled robot named Spirit . Spirit landed on the […]

What is dark matter? New detector results have left physicists in the dark. The early universe may have contained more dark matter than there is today, new research suggests. The findings could help scientists better understand what the universe was like just after the Big Bang, researchers said. Most of the matter in the universe […]

Early each January, the Quadrantid meteor stream provides one of the most intense annual meteor displays, with a brief, sharp maximum lasting only a few hours. And in 2017, viewing circumstances favor North Americans, especially those living west of the Mississippi River. The Quadrantid meteor shower appears to radiate out from the northeast corner of […]

The year of the Great American Total Solar Eclipse is upon us. On Aug. 21, the moon will completely blot out the sun for observers in 12 states, from Oregon to South Carolina, in the first total solar eclipse visible from the United States mainland since 1979. The rest of North America, and parts of […]

This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the distribution of dark matter in the center of the giant galaxy cluster Abell 1689, containing about 1,000 galaxies and trillions of stars. Astronomers from across the U.S. are heading to Texas this week for the 229th meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS). The biannual meeting, which […]

By Joe Rao, Space.com Skywatching Columnist | January 1, 2017 08:02am ET Credit: Rick Fienberg / TravelQuest Int’l. / Wilderness Travel. Don’t Miss These 14 Must-See Skywatching Events of 2017 Another year of skywatching is upon us, and there’s a lot to look forward to in 2017! Here are some of the more noteworthy sky […]

By Joe Rao, Space.com Skywatching Columnist | January 1, 2017 07:00am ET Credit: ESO/Y. Beletsky Look Up in 2017! When can you see the planets at their best during 2017? This guide tells you everything you need to know to catch these astronomical sights in the night sky this year. It also tells you when […]

Expedition 50 crewmembers at the International Space Station pose with their new matching hats — Christmas gifts from NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson. Happy New Year from the International Space Station! Six crewmembers aboard the orbiting laboratory celebrated the start of 2017 after finishing their last few days of 2016 goofing around and working hard. Two […]

Princesses shouldn’t be passive, girls have character & ability to lead.The world needs them to fulfil their potential–thanks @carrieffisher pic.twitter.com/2FLJm317dt — Thomas Pesquet (@Thom_astro) December 28, 2016 This week the world lost an icon of powerful women, Carrie Fisher , and astronaut Thomas Pesquet on the International Space Station took to Twitter to honor her memory […]

Spock, portrayed by Leonard Nimoy in the original “Star Trek” series and films, was half human and half Vulcan. An evolutionary biologist suggests that such interbreeding could happen only if humans were related to Vulcans by a recent ancestor. Human life, seeded to other planets by an extraterrestrial civilization, could explain why so many of […]

Jaspal Chadha took the image from his backyard in London in April 2015. The vivid colors of the Bubble Nebula shine in this green and yellow image. Jaspal Chadha  took the image from his backyard in London in April 2015 and recently shared it with Space.com. To take the image Chadha used a Takahashi 130 […]