Scott Alan Johnston
We Could See the Glint off Giant Cities on Alien Worlds
How large would an extraterrestrial city have to be for current telescopes to see it? Would it need to be…
These are the Fastest Stars in the Galaxy
Until recently, there were only ten known stars on trajectories that will allow them to escape the Milky Way Galaxy,…
Artemis V is Going to the Moon With Blue Origin
NASA has announced a second lunar lander provider for its Artemis program, choosing Blue Origin’s National Team to deliver astronauts…
Perseverance Finds an Ancient, Fast Flowing River
In a first for Martian water science, NASA’s Perseverance rover has discovered geological evidence of a large, fast-moving river in…
China Finally Tells us What's Going on With its Mars Rover
The Zhurong Rover has sat unmoving and unresponsive on Mars since May 20th, 2022, when one of the planet’s infamous…
The Milky Way has Trapped the Large Magellanic Cloud With its Gravity. What Comes Next?
Our galaxy’s largest nearby companion is the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a dwarf galaxy visible to the naked eye in…
Hubble Sees Two Quasars Side by Side in the Early Universe
When it comes to the brightest, most powerful objects in the Universe, not much can beat a Quasar. A Gamma…
A Stellar Explosion Mimicked the End of the Death Star
In 1997, George Lucas released the special edition remaster of his Star Wars trilogy, making changes to the special effects…
Asteroid Ryugu Contains Niacin (aka Vitamin B3)
In December 2020, JAXA’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft delivered a pristine sample of otherworldly dust and rock from asteroid Ryugu to Earth.…
Didymos is Spinning So Quickly That Rocks are Detaching at its Equator and Going Into Orbit
Asteroid Didymos is spitting rocks out into space. Last fall, when NASA’s DART mission impacted Didymos’ moon Dimorphos in a…