And the Macho King, Randy Savage! Over this coming week, things will be quiet here at Starts With A Bang, as I’ll be taking the next week off. But to help […]

If we want our conclusions to be meaningful, our data had better be robust. When it comes to the Universe, there’s a whole lot that doesn’t add up. All the matter […]

If there’s no phosphine, there’s no indirect evidence for biological activity there. In one of the biggest surprises in the history of planetary science, a September 2020 study announced the presence […]

Halley’s comet only visits every ~76 years, but its meteors arrive twice each year. The most famous comet of all — Halley’s comet — returns to our inner Solar System every ~76 years. Halley’s comet […]

Sure, we’re warming now. But will this continue, or will natural factors change things? According to our best understanding of Earth’s climate, the global average temperature has increased significantly over the […]

Yes, we’d all die. But for 21 minutes, we’d have the ride of a lifetime. One of the most remarkable facts about the Universe is this: in the absence of […]

From galaxies with no dark matter to ones with hundreds of times more dark matter than normal, our Universe needs it more than ever. One of the most mysterious substances in […]

It’s last “hard” test is over. Now, we wait for its launch. Despite numerous delays, funding crises, and technical challenges, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is almost ready. The science instruments […]

Congratulations to Penrose, Ghez and Genzel, and to black hole enthusiasts everywhere. On October 6, 2020, the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded towards research in black holes. 50% of […]

At its biggest for the next 15 years, it’s still much smaller than the Moon. On October 6, 2020, Mars makes its closest approach to Earth until 2035. Earth orbits in […]

Why does dark matter, if it doesn’t dissipate energy, become gravitationally bound at all? One of the most puzzling components of the Universe has to be dark matter. Although we have […]

The anthropic principle has some fascinating scientific uses. And abuses, too. For thousands of years, humans have pondered the meaning of our existence. From philosophers who debated whether their minds could […]

The Twin Jet nebula, shown here, is a stunning example of a bipolar preplanetary nebula. At the center, a dying star is in the final stages of life where it […]

We just found a system that we can’t explain. Here’s what’s going on. One of the most fascinating facts about the Universe is that there’s so much of it out there. […]

Telescopes from the ground are bigger, but have to fight the atmosphere. Here’s how to win. In astronomy, seeing farther and fainter than ever before requires three simultaneous approaches. First light, […]

A far-ranging conversation about telescopes, what they do, and who they impact. When most of us think of astronomy, we think about two types of scientists: the observers who point their […]

California’s Bobcat Fire has reached Mount Wilson Observatory’s doorstep. 100 years ago, our understanding of the Universe was very different from what it is today. Einstein’s General Relativity, our theory […]

We may be different in many ways, but the cosmic story is the same for each of us. In all the Universe, you won’t find another planet identical to Earth. Planet […]

There are only 3 populations of stars, but “generations” is a more complex question. When we look out at the stars in the Universe, we classify them into three different […]

Just because you have “star” in your name doesn’t mean you are one. When we think about the objects in our Universe, they fall into two categories: self-luminous objects, like stars, […]

Have any of the stars we can see burned themselves out completely? When we look out across the Universe, we’re also peering back in time. In the early 21st-century, we’ve […]

Black holes are the darkest objects of all. But are they made of dark matter? When it comes to the Universe, few objects are more compelling, fascinating, or extreme than black […]

When two black holes that shouldn’t exist are seen merging, physics has some explaining to do. After years of searching for gravitational waves, it finally happened: LIGO bagged the biggest one […]

In 2006, the IAU demoted Pluto. Here’s what we know today. In 2006, the last planet in our Solar System suffered an unforgettable insult, as Pluto — known for generations as our ninth […]

Forgetting them, at any step, can lead to unscientific conclusions. No one, not even the smartest among us, were competent scientists from the outset. The concept of science is simple […]

The view is different for each of us, but this perspective unites us all. From anywhere on Earth, the entire sky rotates a full 360° every 24 hours. From Earth, star […]

If they have mass, then why don’t we see any slow-moving ones? For decades, the neutrino was among the most puzzling and elusive of cosmic particles. It took more than […]

The largest moon around our last planet didn’t originate with Neptune. When it comes to the moons of our Solar System, there’s only one planet that doesn’t fit in with our […]

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope will truly usher in a new era of astronomy. If you want to find the very first galaxy of all, you have to understand not […]

The pendulum didn’t tick right when they brought it here: the start of a fascinating story. For nearly three full centuries, the most accurate way that humanity kept track of […]