All Stories by Ron Cowen
- Astronomy
Supernova dealt deaths on Earth? Stellar blasts may have killed ancient marine life
The explosion of nearby supernova may have caused the widespread extinction of marine life on Earth 2 million years ago.
- Astronomy
Some new stars in the neighborhood
As part of an ongoing survey of faint stars in the southern skies, astronomers have discovered 12 previously unknown stars that lie within a mere 33 light-years of Earth.
- Astronomy
Seeing green: Color of the cosmos
We live in a pale-green universe, according to astronomers who analyzed the colors of some 200,000 galaxies as part of the largest galaxy survey completed to date.
- Astronomy
Are pictures of extrasolar planets in the offing?
The first image of a planet orbiting a star other than the sun may be only a year away.
- Astronomy
Some gamma-ray bursts may occur nearby
A sizable minority of gamma-ray bursts may originate relatively nearby, in galaxies within 325 million light-years of our own.
- Planetary Science
Exploring the Red Planet
Searching for signs of subsurface water on the Red Planet and analyzing the elemental and mineral composition of surface rock, NASA's Mars Odyssey spacecraft begins its main mapping mission next month and may shed light on several enduring puzzles about the planet.
- Astronomy
Milky Way galaxy: Cloaked in a hot shroud?
Spacecraft observations indicate that a vast, unseen halo of hot gas envelopes our home galaxy, the Milky Way, and could literally be brushing up against its nearest neighbors.
- Astronomy
Sampling the sun
A spacecraft has begun a 30-month mission in which it will collect samples of the solar wind and bring them back to Earth.
- Astronomy
Watching a dying star transform
Astronomers have for the first time caught a dying star at the very beginning of a brief, shining period, when it's known as a planetary nebula.
- Astronomy
Galaxy survey sheds light on dark matter
Astronomers are examining some of the brightest objects in the universe to learn about the darkest stuff.
- Astronomy
Galileo catches Io in a slump
Galileo spacecraft images show for the first time that material has slid downward along a cliff on Jupiter's moon Io.
- Astronomy
Observing the sun’s magnetic pull
A spacecraft studying the sun has spotted clouds of gas that seem to be headed the wrong way, falling back toward the solar surface instead of continuing to move outward with the stream of charged particles known as the solar wind.
