Nautilus

3 min. di lettura

Caleb Scharf wants to take you on an epic tour. His latest book, The Zoomable Universe, starts from the ends of the observable universe, exploring its biggest structures, like groups of galaxies, and goes all the way down to the Planck length—less th

The Atlantic

4 min. di lettura

"I think at some point you need to provoke people. Science is meant to make people uncomfortable."

All About Space

1 min. di lettura

The cosmic microwave background (CMB) is the furthest that astronomers are able to see from Earth. This ancient light was released when the universe was approximately 380,000 years old, and has been travelling across the cosmos ever since. The furthe

Los Angeles Times

3 min. di lettura

Astronomers using a powerful quasar to study an enormous invisible tendril full of superheated gas say they may have finally discovered the universe's "missing" detectable matter. The findings, published in the journal Nature, solve a decades-old mys

Nautilus

3 min. di lettura

Caleb Scharf wants to take you on an epic tour. His latest book, The Zoomable Universe, starts from the ends of the observable universe, exploring its biggest structures, like groups of galaxies, and goes all the way down to the Planck length—less th

Popular Science

2 min. di lettura

It's hard to imagine the vast nothingness of outer space having a shape, and even harder to sketch what a four-dimensional object looks like in two dimensions—but we tried.

The Atlantic

4 min. di lettura

As an astrophysicist, I am always struck by the fact that even the wildest science-fiction stories tend to be distinctly human in character. No matter how exotic the locale or how unusual the scientific concepts, most science fiction ends up being ab

Nautilus

7 min. di lettura

“Excuse me, but what’s the time?” I’m guessing that you, like me, are guilty of having asked this question, as if it were obvious that there is such a thing as the time. Yet you’ve probably never approached a stranger and asked “Excuse me, but what’s

How It Works

1 min. di lettura

Much like how the universe expanded and cooled after the Big Bang, which led to the formation of the first hydrogen molecules, the universe could carry on expanding until it reaches absolute zero. Absolute zero is theoretically the lowest temperature

Nautilus

7 min. di lettura

Excuse me, but what’s the time?” I’m guessing that you, like me, are guilty of having asked this question, as if it were obvious that there is such a thing as the time. Yet you’ve probably never approached a stranger and asked “Excuse me, but what’s

The Atlantic

2 min. di lettura

Astronomers have known for nearly a century that the universe is expanding, and has been since the moment it exploded into existence in the Big Bang. Everywhere in the universe, galaxies, including our own, are moving away from each other. “Take an u

Los Angeles Times

2 min. di lettura

"Universe: Exploring the Astronomical World," Paul Murdin, consulting editor; Phaidon (352 pages, $59.95) ___ Enclosed in total darkness, save for the soft outline of our own blue planet curving far below, a man in a puffy white space suit free-float

The Atlantic

5 min. di lettura

Astronomers have found evidence of the first stars igniting in cold, dark gas, a detection with huge implications for our understanding of the cosmos.

Los Angeles Times

3 min. di lettura

In a distant galaxy more than 13 billion light-years from Earth, astronomers have discovered traces of the oldest known oxygen in the universe, as well as evidence that ancient stars "turned on" as early as 250 million years after the Big Bang. These

PEARL

2 min. di lettura

Light! The commencement of all being. Wondrous radiant forces flow through the primeval origins of materiality, in a weaving action upon the warm and incubative primal breeding ground of material substance. Shimmering like gold, glittering like soft

Futurity

2 min. di lettura

Scientists have come up with a new theory of how light filled the universe. Soon after the Big Bang, the universe went completely dark. That intense event that created the cosmos churned up so much hot, thick gas that light was completely trapped. Mu

NPR

3 min. di lettura

Scientists have used a NASA probe way out in space, beyond Pluto, to measure visible light that's not connected to any known source like stars or galaxies.

Nautilus

3 min. di lettura

Scientists, on the whole, are a circumspect lot. When faced with a microphone or reporter’s notepad, most of them (excepting a vocal minority) hedge and temper their language, adding provisos and qualifications, burying significant news behind accura

NPR

5 min. di lettura

It may be that to explain where the universe came from is an impossibility for our causally-based, logically-oriented, experientially-functioning minds, but we must keep trying, says Marcelo Gleiser.

BBC Sky at Night

1 min. di lettura

How do scientists think the Universe will end? The theory most currently accepted is ‘heat death’. The Universe is expanding, galaxies are getting farther apart, so over time there will be fewer interactions between galaxies and less gas brought in

BBC Sky at Night

1 min. di lettura

Is there something innately different about the minds of scientists who make giant leaps? I think you need a certain degree of mathematical aptitude because, for some reason we don’t understand, the fundamental laws that orchestrate the Universe a

All About Space

7 min. di lettura

From neutrinos produced just seconds after the Big Bang to the most distant superclusters of galaxies we know of, studying the edge of our universe is an exciting task for astronomers around the world. And thanks to advancements in technology, we kno

BBC Sky at Night

4 min. di lettura

Stuart Clark Guardian Faber £14.99 • HB What is it about the sky at night that has captivated human beings for centuries? This is the central question driving Stuart Clark’s excellent book. While there are many popular science books charting the hist

NZBusiness and Management

1 min. di lettura

The spectacular, unpolluted night skies of Takapo attract people from all over the world, including top astronomers and physicists, according to University of Canterbury astronomer and director of the University of Canterbury Mt John Observatory, ass

The American Scholar

8 min. di lettura

THE APOLLO MOONWALKERS marveled at the golden glow of the lunar mountains, at the green rocks, white crystals, orange soil, brown patina—a palette of colors so surprising that the astronauts kept lifting their sun visors to make sure it was real. Fro

Science Illustrated

1 min. di lettura

Supernovas light up with a known light intensity. A doubling of the distance results in a quartering of light intensity, as it is distributed across a larger area. So the light intensity shows how far away the star is. When a supernova is travelling

All About Space

1 min. di lettura

Despite their name, these early members of our universe are not dark – they would have blazed brilliantly, lighting up their surrounding area with a luminosity about a billion times brighter than our Sun. Dark stars are unlikely to have survived to w

Science Illustrated

2 min. di lettura

Cosmologists, who work with the structure and development of the universe, are not too keen on unique events without an explanation. It’s just not how nature works. Normally, laws of nature describe a framework in which events take place many times–s

Popular Science

3 min. di lettura

Computer simulation of the Universe. Orange shows galaxies, darker blue areas show 'voids.' TNG Collaboration Breathe in. Breathe out. It’s all going to be OK. There are about 25 septillion molecules of air in the cubic meter (one meter = three feet)

Nautilus

4 min. di lettura

Reprinted with permission from Quanta Magazine‘s Abstractions blog. The cosmos plays hide-and-seek. Sometimes, though, even when astronomers have a hunch for where their prey might hide, it can take them decades of searching to confirm it. The case o