The International Space Station, as photographed by astronauts in October 2018. Credit: NASA Although it may seem hard to believe, the International Space Station (ISS) is nearing the end of its operational lifespan. Some readers might’ve even been born after the first section of the ISS was launched in 1998 and have never lived in…

The Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico detected radio signals similar to the Wow! signal NAIC/Arecibo Observatory/NSF An unexplained radio signal detected in 1977 known as the Wow! signal, which some have interpreted as an alien message, may have been the result of a natural galactic laser-like beam. On 15 August 1977, the Big Ear radio…

Researchers may have discovered the secret ingredient of planet growth, which causes some worlds to grow rapidly in disks of gas and dust around infant stars. The model could be of specific value in understanding the growth of the solar system’s giant planets. Scientists have a fairly good understanding of how the rocky inner planets…

Considering regulation for the space industry now could prevent the proliferation of colonial practices later. Credit: NASA The past decade has seen a rapid expansion of the commercial space industry. Rival nations are competing for prime military and economic positions beyond the Earth. Public and private entities are clamoring to mine the Moon, and a growing halo of…

Astronomers Disprove Long-Held Belief About Galaxy Density by Simon Mansfield Sydney, Australia (SPX) Aug 20, 2024 An international team of astronomers has overturned a longstanding belief that stars and dark matter interact in a mysterious way to create uniform density structures across different galaxies. This finding, published in ‘Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society…

Ceridwen Dovey was working on the final instalment of her new short story collection, Only the Astronauts, when she was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. The story is about NASA’s Voyager 1 and 2, twin spacecraft launched in 1977 and still exploring space to this day. During the stressful time of her diagnosis, she found pondering…

What it is: The Serpens Nebula Where it is: 1,300 light-years away, in the constellation Serpens When it was shared: Aug. 12, 2024 Why it’s so special: This is a new image of an old favorite, the Serpens Nebula, where a cloud of gas and dust is lit up by starlight. Using its infrared capabilities,…

NASA doesn’t say the Boeing Starliner astronauts are ‘stranded’ on the space station, but it’s a word that a lot of people are using. If you go somewhere expecting an eight-day trip and end up not being able to leave for eight months, most people would consider that “stranded.” That is what has happened to…

Astronomers have succeeded in forecasting the meal timings of a colossal black hole after watching it devour a nearby star in bits and pieces, they announced earlier this week, marking a step forward in understanding the elusive eating behavior of these cosmic voids. The data behind the forecasts was beamed home in 2018, when an…

A sample location from the Sampling Quadrangle Assemblages Research Experiment (SQuARE), Square 03 in the starboard Maintenance Work Area of the International Space Station. An open crew berth is visible at right. The yellow dotted line indicates the boundaries of the sample area. Credit: NASA/ISSAP/Walsh et al., 2024, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0 New results from…