Ethan Siegel

Ethan Siegel

A theoretical astrophysicist and science writer, host of popular podcast “Starts with a Bang!”

Ethan Siegel Starts with a Bang!

Ethan Siegel is a Ph.D. astrophysicist and author of "Starts with a Bang!" He is a science communicator, who professes physics and astronomy at various colleges. He has won numerous awards for science writing since 2008 for his blog, including the award for best science blog by the Institute of Physics. His two books "Treknology: The Science of Star Trek from Tricorders to Warp Drive" and "Beyond the Galaxy: How humanity looked beyond our Milky Way and discovered the entire Universe" are available for purchase at Amazon. Follow him on Twitter @startswithabang.

two particles different wavelength speed of light
Contrary to common experience, not everything needs a medium to travel through. Overcoming that assumption removes the need for an aether.
life beyond earth
Back in 1990, we hadn't discovered a single planet outside of our Solar System. Here are 10 facts that would've surprised every astronomer.
composite JWST ALMA HST Fomalhaut
The nearby, bright star Fomalhaut had the first optically imaged planetary candidate. Using JWST's eyes, astronomers found so much more.
four exoplanets super-earth mini-neptune
They're the most common type of exoplanet known today, and many astronomers have called them "super-habitable." None of that is true.
perseverance ingenuity mars
Mars, the red planet, was a world we knew almost nothing about until our first spacecraft visited it. In just ~50 years, how far we've come!
universe temperature
Before there were planets, stars, and galaxies, before even neutral atoms or stable protons, there was the Big Bang. How did we prove it?
black hole
Einstein's relativity overthrew the notion of absolute space and time, replacing them with a spacetime fabric. But is spacetime truly real?