Science
Even If We Cut Greenhouse Gas Emissions Tomorrow, it Would Take Decades for the Earth to Start Cooling Again
If—or hopefully when—we cut our Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, we won't notice much difference in the climate. The Earth's natural…
Betelgeuse Probably Dimmed Because of Enormous Starspots
A few months ago we all watched as Betelgeuse dimmed. Between October 2019 and 22nd of February 2020 the star's…
More Evidence that Europa’s Oceans Could be Habitable
At first glance, Jupiter's moon Europa doesn't seem much like Earth. It's a moon, not a planet, and it's covered…
The Bare Minimum Number of Martian Settlers? 110
So you want to colonize Mars, huh? Well Mars is a long ways away, and in order for a colony…
Do We Now Understand Why the Moon’s Near and Far Sides Look So Dramatically Different?
The Moon is easily the most well-studied object in the Solar System, (other than Earth, of course.) But it still…
How an Advanced Civilization Could Exploit a Black Hole for Nearly Limitless Energy
A black hole as a source of energy? We know black holes as powerful singularities, regions in space time where…
Pluto and Other Kuiper Belt Objects Started Out With Water Oceans, and Have Been Slowly Freezing Solid for Billions of Years
It seems unlikely that an ocean could persist on a world that never gets closer than 30 astronomical units from…
New Simulations Show How Black Holes Grow, Through Mergers and Accretion
One of the most pressing questions in astronomy concerns black holes. We know that massive stars that explode as supernovae…
The Meteor Impact that Wiped Out the Dinosaurs Created a Vast Underground Hydrothermal System
The Chicxulub impact event was an enormous catastrophe that left a huge imprint on the Earth's surface. Not only did…
Black Hole Seen Blasting Out Jets at Close to the Speed of Light
The Chandra X-Ray Observatory has spotted a distant black hole shooting out jets of material, at close to the speed…