New NASA Official Took Her Oath of Office on Carl Sagan’s ‘Pale Blue Dot’
When Dr. Makenzie Lystrup was sworn in as the new director of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center last week, she didn’t take her oath of office on the Bible or…
See How Different This Supernova Looks to Webb Versus Hubble
About 340 years ago, a brilliant light appeared in Earth’s night sky—a distant star had died in an enormous explosion. That light, which we now know is from the supernova…
Bent Light in Deep Space Reveals One of the Biggest Black Holes Ever Detected
Holy smokes. A group of astronomers have found a black hole containing (checks notes) 30 billion times the mass of our Sun. That’s more than seven times the size of…
Webb Telescope Reveals Nearby Exoplanet Has No Atmosphere
TRAPPIST-1b is a superhot rocky world just 40 light-years away. Astronomers recently trained the Webb Space Telescope this exoplanet, a world in the TRAPPIST-1 star system, and found that it’s…
Webb Telescope Spots a Planet With ‘Gritty’ Clouds Just 40 Light-Years Away
The Webb Space Telescope just turned its infrared gaze at an exoplanet and found dense clouds swirling in the atmosphere of this quirky world. CC Off English The planet—VHS 1256b—has…
Astronomers increasingly troubled by satellite constellations
Astronomers are becoming increasingly concerned about light pollution in the night sky caused by the growing number of satellites, and also space junk, in low-Earth orbit. Sunlight reflecting off the…
A NASA Telescope on the Moon’s Far Side Would Explore the Universe’s ‘Dark Ages’
In a bid to understand even more about our mysterious and massive universe, NASA is partnering with the Department of Energy on an ambitious lunar project. The two agencies announced…
Newest Webb Image Is a Stunning View of a Star’s Penultimate Stage
The Webb Space Telescope has produced a stupendous view of a Wolf-Rayet star, an extraordinarily bright object in the sky that (you may want to sit down) will soon die.…
Suck It, Saturn: Jupiter Now Officially Has Most Moons in the Solar System
Jupiter, the reigning moon king.Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS Jupiter is a superstar in our solar system. It’s the biggest, it’s wonderfully gassy, and it now has the most documented moons, clocking in…
Webb Finds the ‘Deepest, Coldest Ices to Date’ in Distant Molecular Cloud
The Webb telescope team has detected water ice and frozen complex molecules in a molecular cloud about 630 light-years from Earth. By the scientists’ measure, the frigid findings are the…