Starts With A Bang

A dense starfield, with various colored stars shimmering through a dark cloud-like formation, lies against a deep black background in the mysterious zone of avoidance.
The Universe is out there, waiting to be discovered

Our mission is to answer the biggest questions of all, scientifically.

What is the Universe made of? How did it become the way it is today? Where did everything come from? What is the ultimate fate of the cosmos?

For most of human history, these questions had no clear answers. Today, they do. Starts With a Bang, written by Dr. Ethan Siegel, explores what we know about the universe and how we came to know it, bringing the latest discoveries in cosmology and astrophysics directly to you.

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Ethan Siegel is an award-winning PhD astrophysicist and the author of four books, including The Grand Cosmic Story, published by National Geographic.

Full Profile
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SARS-CoV-2 first emerged in humans in 2019. Despite much noise generated by lab leak proponents, the evidence indicates a natural origin.
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On June 20, 2024, the summer solstice occurs at its earliest moment since 1796: when George Washington was President of the USA. Here's why.
Two breathtaking pictures of a galaxy and a star taken by the Hubble telescope, highlighting the beauty and cosmic magnitude that fuels the Hubble tension.
There are two different ways to measure the expansion rate of the Universe, and they don't agree. And no, new measurements don't help.
A new all-time record! JWST's discovery of JADES-GS-z14-0 pushes the earliest galaxy ever seen to just 290 million years after the Big Bang.
Abstract representation of a cosmic event with a burst of particles emanating from a central point, blending astrophysical imagery with geometric designs.
If you bring too much mass or energy together in one location, you'll inevitably create a black hole. So why didn't the Big Bang become one?
A deep space image showing numerous galaxies of different shapes and sizes scattered across a dark background, with many stars and cosmic objects, including the ancient Methuselah star, also visible throughout.
The Universe is precisely dated at 13.8 billion years old, but astronomers claim the Methuselah star is 14.5 billion years old. What gives?
proton internal structure
It's 2024, and we still only know of the fundamental particles of the Standard Model: nothing more. But these 8 unanswered questions remain.
standard model color
Predicted way back in the 1960s, the discovery of the Higgs boson in 2012 completed the Standard Model. Here's why it remains fascinating.
Stellar explosion
The expanding Universe, in many ways, is the ultimate out-of-equilibrium system. After enough time passes, will we eventually get there?
A diagram of the solar system illustrates the heliosphere, detailing the termination shock, heliopause, and bow shock, along with the paths of Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, Voyager 1, and Voyager 2. This visual representation underscores key aspects of fundamental science in our cosmic neighborhood.
Some think the reason fundamental scientific revolutions are so rare is because of groupthink. It's not; it's hard to mess with success.
big crunch
For nearly 25 years, we thought we knew how the Universe would end. Now, new measurements point to a profoundly different conclusion.
LHC insides
CERN's Large Hadron Collider is the most powerful particle accelerator ever. To go even further, we'll have to overcome something big.
planetary nebulae infrared spitzer
In ~7 billion years, our Sun will run out of fuel and die. So will every star, eventually. Here are the different fates they'll encounter.
hubble tension
The mutual distance between well-separated galaxies increases with time as the Universe expands. What else expands, and what doesn't?
pulse polio day india
It’s not a gambit. It’s not fraud. It’s not driven by opinion, prejudice, or bias. It's not unchallengeable. And it's more than facts alone.
CERN_ATLAS_Detector The standard model in physics
With new W-boson, top quark, and Higgs boson measurements, the LHC contradicts earlier Fermilab results. The Standard Model still holds.
A vibrant aurora borealis with green and purple hues in a starry sky, viewed over the silhouette of a tree, reminiscent of the "aurora hubble" phenomenon.
The most iconic, longest-lived space telescope of all, NASA's Hubble, is experiencing orbital decay as the solar cycle peaks. Here's why.
The galactic center is home to the most powerful engine in the Milky Way: a supermassive black hole. How does its energy ultimately escape?
Astronomical image showing a galaxy cluster with multiple bright glowing sources and smaller points against a deep blue and purple space background.
We normally think of dark matter as the "glue" that holds galaxies and larger structures together. But it's so much more than that.
separation normal matter dark matter galaxy cluster
There are many theories of gravity out there, and many interpretations of wide binary star data. What have we really learned from it all?