Scott Alan Johnston
Ouch. Canadarm2 Took a Direct Hit From a Micrometeorite
Living in space comes with risks. For astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS), those risks occasionally make themselves intrusively…
Weather in the Solar System Can Teach Us About Weather on Exoplanets
The way astronomers study planets in our own solar system is surprisingly similar to the way they study exoplanets, despite…
OSIRIS-REx Failed to Deploy its Drogue Chute Properly. Now NASA has Figured out Why
On September 24, 2023, NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission returned a precious sample of rocky material from asteroid Bennu to Earth. The…
Dimorphos is Probably a Piece of Didymos
Last September, NASA purposefully smashed a spacecraft into Dimorphos, a 160m-wide space rock orbiting a larger asteroid named Didymos. The…
Earth's Smallest Flowering Plant Can Handle 20X Earth's Gravity
Astronauts need to eat, and they need to breathe. That means, for long-duration missions, they are going to need to…
M87's Jet is Triggering Novae
Everyone loves a good mystery, and astronomers have just uncovered a new one in a nearby supermassive galaxy called M87.…
Can JWST Tell the Difference Between an Exo-Earth and an Exo-Venus?
As of this month, astronomers have discovered 5,506 exoplanets orbiting other stars. That number is growing daily, and astronomers are…
Machine Learning Algorithms Can Find Anomalous Needles in Cosmic Haystacks
The face of astronomy is changing. Though narrow-field point-and-shoot astronomy still matters (JWST anyone?), large wide-field surveys promise to be…
A Collection of New Images Reveal X-Rays Across the Universe
One of the miracles of modern astronomy is the ability to ‘see’ wavelengths of light that human eyes can’t. Last…
A Bizarre Pulsar Switches Between Two Brightness Modes. Astronomers Finally Figured Out Why.
Pulsars are the lighthouses of the universe. These rotating dead stars shoot twin jets of radiation from their poles, usually…