Pons–Brooks visible from Utah, March 9 2024.
James Peirce/Flickr
If you look carefully at the night sky, you may spot this fuzzy visitor with the naked eye – but binoculars will help.
Buradaki / Shutterstock
Textbooks often show Earth’s orbit around the Sun as an almost egg-shaped ellipse. The real story is very different.
The Cosmic Cliffs region of the universe is considered to be a hotbed of new star formation.
(NASA/James Webb Space Telescope)
Analysis of fragments of the first solids that emerged out of the birth of the sun date our supernova as being 4.6 billion years old.
Earth’s North Sea coastline, including the Stacks of Duncansby in Caithness.
David Rothery
The Solar System could be awash with oceans, not on the surface but hidden inside the most surprising bodies
Intouchable / Openverse
The largest study yet of ‘twin stars’ shows planetary orbits may be less stable than we thought.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/USGS
Mars has been a popular destination since space exploration began – and there are plenty of people who’d love to go there.
Nearby planets can affect how one planet ‘wobbles’ on its spin axis, which contributes to seasons.
Mark Garlick/Science Photo Library via Getty Images
You might hate winter, but at least you know what to expect every year. Other planets have wobbly axes that lead to wild, unpredictable seasons.
This is how we are used to seeing Uranus and Neptune, respectively. But the colours aren’t accurate.
NASA/ JPL/ PlanetS
It turns out Uranus actually changes colour throughout the year.
NASA
A Japanese spacecraft is expected to reach Martian orbit in 2025 to collect material from the surface of the moon Phobos before returning to Earth by 2029.
NASA
Sixty years ago, philosopher Hannah Arendt argued an interplanetary perspective may be bad news for humanity as we know it.
Uranus is the coldest planet in the solar system.
NASA/JPL
Five of the Uranus moons might be ocean worlds − and if there’s water, there might be life.
The pieces of Libyan desert glass that formed the basis of the study.
Libyan desert glass originated from the impact of a meteorite on the Earth’s surface.
Artist’s impression of Theia colliding with the Earth billions of years ago.
Hernán Cañellas
The Moon was formed when it collided with Earth billions of years ago.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Viral headlines would have you think Saturn’s rings will vanish in just 18 months. Here’s what that really means and why you don’t need to worry.
Mining an asteroid probably won’t look exactly like mining does on Earth, but some principles will stay the same.
posteriori/iStock via Getty Images
Upcoming NASA missions will help scientists understand the composition of asteroids – which could inform companies one day hoping to commercially mine asteroids.
NASA / JPL-Caltech / ASU
A distant lump of space rock may have a surprising amount in common with the core of our own planet.
The “coal-like” material from Bennu.
Nasa / Erika Blumenfeld & Joseph Aebers
Studying the sample could help answer how water arrived on Earth and how life started.
Falcon Heavy rocket with Psyche.
Nasa
The asteroid is interesting from a scientific perspective as well as a commercial one.
Telescopes at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory near La Serena, Chile.
Guillaume Doyen/CTIO/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA
Controlled experiments are impossible in astronomy, as are direct measurements of physical properties of objects outside our solar system. So how do astronomers know so much about them?
NASA
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission has delivered pieces of asteroid Bennu, which scientists hope will offer a window into the early era of the Solar System billions of years ago.