This image provided by ispace, inc. shows the Resilience lander circling the moon, Wednesday June 4, 2025. Credit: ispace, inc. via APA Japanese private lunar lander is approaching the moon, targeting a landing in the uncharted far northern region with a small rover onboard.Tokyo-based company ispace is making another attempt at a moon landing...
Credit: DepositphotosFor the first time, scientists have directly observed a key process driving the continuous loss of Mars’ atmosphere.Decade-Long Research Leads to DiscoveryAfter more than nine years of satellite data analysis, a team led by planetary scientist Shannon Curry from the University of Colorado Boulder has identified clear evidence of atmospheric sputtering.According to the...
Credit: DepositphotosTwo decades ago, the U.S. Congress tasked NASA with identifying 90% of near-Earth asteroids that could pose a threat. Since then, the agency has made progress tracking objects that orbit the Sun and pass within 1.3 astronomical units of Earth.A New Threat Emerging Near VenusHowever, a new area of concern is emerging: astronomers...
A pulsar inside a supernova bubble. (NASA/ESA/G. Dubner et al.)One evening in my light-polluted San Diego backyard, I had my telescope set up for astrophotography and aimed it at an incredibly distant galaxy. As the first image appeared on my tablet screen, my wife, Cristina, came over."That’s the Pinwheel Galaxy," I told her—named for its...
An artist's impression of a magnetar. (ESA)On the edge of our galaxy, one of the universe’s rarest stellar objects just became even more puzzling.Using data from the Hubble Space Telescope and the Gaia observatory, astronomers examined the environment around SGR 0501+4516, a magnetar — a highly magnetized type of neutron star. Their findings suggest that...
Something's going on beneath the surface of North AmericaNASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio The Blue Marble Next Generation data is courtesy of Reto Stockli (NASA/GSFC) and NASA's Earth ObservatoryA study published in the journal Nature Geoscience has revealed a subtle yet significant phenomenon beneath the North American continent: its ancient bedrock is...
Credit: NasaWhen we observe the cosmos, a striking pattern emerges: Earth spins, the Sun spins, and even our Milky Way galaxy is rotating. Now, a bold new model proposes that the entire Universe might also be rotating. If proven, this revelation could resolve one of modern cosmology’s most persistent puzzles.We’ve long known that the...
An artist's impression of the Milky Way's hydrogen halo, with the Magellanic Clouds at eight o'clock. (NASA/CXC/M.Weiss; NASA/CXC/Ohio State/A. Gupta et al)A new sky survey has revealed the long-sought whereabouts of half of the Universe’s visible matter—solving a mystery that had puzzled scientists for decades.The Hidden Clouds Around GalaxiesThis elusive matter turns out to be...
Credit: DepositphotosPlanetary scientists have long believed that Earth's water came from external sources, such as hydrogen-rich rocks and comets, which arrived after the planet formed, given the apparent lack of moisture in the early building blocks of Earth.New Research Challenges the Conventional TheoryHowever, a recent study by researchers from the University of Oxford and...
Artist's impression of an exoplanet near a red star. (A. Smith, N. Madhusudhan/University of Cambridge)Astronomers announced last Thursday the detection of the most promising signs yet of possible life on a planet outside our Solar System — though some in the scientific community responded with caution.The planet in question is K2-18b, located 124 light-years away...
