Tag Archives: space

Some 430 light-years from Earth lies our stalwart cosmic beacon, the North Star. Except this star is actually volatile. It’s pulsating as it constantly grows and shrinks. And a new unprecedented image of the hot ball of gas reveals it’s covered in large spots. In research published by The Astrophysical …

The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. Vacuum decay, a process that could end the universe as we know it, may happen 10,000 times sooner than expected. Fortunately, it still won’t happen for a very, very long time. When physicists speak of “the vacuum,” the term sounds …

Mercury is a little-known, still mysterious world. But one thing is certain. Mercury, the closest planet to the sun, can’t actually travel backward in retrograde, and doesn’t impact us on Earth. The notion of Mercury retrograde, a common reference in astrology wherein communication and travel are temporarily impaired, can, of …

Using images from a NASA telescope, three amateur scientists discovered a star-like object sprinting through space — so fast, in fact, it’ll whiz right out of the Milky Way. This freak of nature, traveling about 1 million mph, will escape the clutch of the galaxy. It’s the first time anyone …

After Butch Wilmore got settled into the commander seat of Starliner earlier this summer, he thanked the people preparing to blast him and his crewmate Suni Williams into space. “Outstanding. Nice job, guys,” the NASA astronaut said before a launch attempt that ultimately scrubbed. “We’ll see you in a couple …

A car-sized NASA rover, weighing over a ton, will scale a crater wall. The space agency announced that its robotic Perseverance mission, now looking for hints of past life on Mars, is embarking on the next phase of Martian exploration. But first, it must climb out of the Jezero Crater, …

This story originally appeared on WIRED en Español and has been translated from Spanish. August has delivered many spectacular sights in the night sky: a supermoon, meteor showers, and supercharged auroras. Mars and Jupiter also currently appear unusually close together in the night sky, in what’s known as a conjunction. …

With no consensus on the safety of the Starliner crew capsule, NASA officials said Wednesday they need another week or two before deciding whether to bring two astronauts back to Earth on Boeing's spacecraft or extend their stay on the International Space Station until next year. Boeing's Starliner spacecraft, stricken …

It’s good to know that our planetary defense systems work. The European Space Agency revealed that on July 6 the automated systems that sleuth the skies for potentially hazardous objects like asteroids sent out a warning. “The object, estimated at around 50 m [164 feet] in diameter, was spotted hurtling …

Mercury retrograde has long permeated our culture in an attempt to explain phenomena like communication issues or travel woes. Here is what is actually happening when Mercury is “in retrograde.”