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One of the most promising dark matter candidates is light particles, like axions. With JWST, we can rule out many of those options already.
Astronomers see spiral and elliptical nebulae nearly everywhere, except by the Milky Way's plane. We didn't know why until the 20th century.
Perhaps the most well-known equation in all of physics is Einstein's E = mc². Does mass or energy increase, then, near the speed of light?
We've wasted our time and resources ideologically policing and punishing each other for far too long. Here's a better route to prosperity.
“I want to change the way we think about the past altogether,” says Dr. Betül Kaçar, an astrobiologist who studies the origin of life.
From the tiniest subatomic scales to the grandest cosmic structures of all, everything that exists depends on two things: charge and mass.
Groundbreaking invention does not always translate to commercial benefits. The challenges that faced Microsoft Research help explain why.
The CMB gives us critical information about our cosmic past. But it doesn't give us everything, and galaxy mapping can fill in a key gap.
"Gyroscope-on-a-chip" technology could soon enable us to navigate over long distances without GPS.
The full extent of the Andromeda galaxy, the nearest large galaxy to our own, has been entirely imaged with Hubble's exquisite cameras.
“Can we push these cells to do something other than what they normally do?" asks developmental biologist Michael Levin. "Can they build something completely different?”
Dark matter doesn't absorb or emit light, but it gravitates. Instead of something exotic and novel, could it just be dark, normal matter?
We're all entitled to our own opinions, no matter how ill-informed they are. But facts are facts; we can't just choose the ones we prefer.
The more you know, the better you can act.
Asteroid 2024 YR4, which could devastate a city's worth of humans, has gone from 1.2% to 2.3% to 2.6% to 3.1% chances of impact. Here's why.
A brief guide to habits that separate deep understanding from superficial knowledge — and how to cultivate them.
At extremely close distances to their stars, even rocky planets can be completely disintegrated. We've just caught our first one in action.
Ring galaxies are rare, but we think we know how they form. A new, early-stage version, the Bullseye galaxy, provides a new testing ground.
New research challenges old assumptions about the evolution of the human brain.
Here in our Solar System, terrestrial bodies get moons from gravitational capture or collisions. The Pluto-Charon system? It was both.
Only 5% of the Universe is made of normal "stuff" like we are. Could there be dark matter or dark energy life, or even aliens, out there?
Timothy Caulfield, a leading science communicator, discusses the challenges of combatting misinformation in an age of information overload.
Could AI develop true intelligence without sentience? Philosopher Jonathan Birch explores the boundaries of artificial and evolved minds.
When we divide matter into its fundamental, indivisible components, are those particles truly point-like, or is there a finite minimum size?
The ultimate multi-messenger astronomy event would have gravitational waves, particles, and light arriving all at once. Did that just occur?
Retrofitting America's aging dams for hydropower — while removing ecologically harmful ones — may be a productive path forward.
A young, nearby, massive star, whose protoplanetary disk appears perfectly edge-on, was just viewed by JWST, with staggering implications.
A new SETI study shows how far the field of technosignatures has come.
Historically, astronomers have often named things creatively, bizarrely, and often inaccurately. But which terms are the most egregious?
The artistic and the mathematical mind are not so far apart.