All Stories by Ron Cowen
- Astronomy
Supermassive black hole rises and shines
Astronomers may have witnessed the activation of a dormant supermassive black hole in a distant galaxy.
- Space
Signs of dark matter from Minnesota mine
An underground experiment in the U.S. bolsters the case that Earth plows through a halo of dark matter particles.
- Space
Rumors of a Higgs discovery are just that
Speculation suggests that a long-sought particle may be at hand, but most physicists remain skeptical.
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- Space
Dry ice, wetter Mars
A previously unknown reservoir of frozen carbon dioxide could periodically vaporize, thickening the atmosphere and allowing liquid water to flow on the Red Planet’s surface.
- Space
NASA pulls out of astrophysics missions
Europe is now on its own for two planned spacecraft to study black holes and gravitational waves.
- Space
NASA picks shuttles’ retirement homes
Museums in New York, California, Florida and Virginia will display the four spacecraft after their final mission in June.
- Space
XENON100 fails to find dark matter
A hundred days of solitude for an experiment designed to rendezvous with the universe's missing mass put new limits on the elusive material's properties.
- Space
Atom & Cosmos
Life in black holes, energy from dark matter and other intriguing possibilities in this week's news
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Pre-Bang branes and bubbles
What happened before the big bang?
- Space
Baffling blowup in distant galaxy
A high-energy blast has gone on for 11 days, puzzling astronomers as to its source.
- Space
Pioneer puzzle pinned on thermodynamics
Waste heat, not exotic physics, is slowing two 1970s-era space probes down more than would be expected, a new study claims.
