Space
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Astronomy
Black hole spurts jets of iron and nickel
New observations show that the jets of black hole 4U 1630-47 carry massive particles such as iron and nickel atoms instead of the typical low-mass particles such as electrons.
- Planetary Science
Uninhabitable Earth
A recent estimate of the lifetimes of the habitability zones of Earth and various exoplanets suggests Earth could become unable to support life as soon as 1.75 billion years from now, when the sun brightens before dying out.
- Astronomy
Moon’s craters remeasured
Large craters cover more of the moon’s surface on its nearside than its farside, according to new maps from NASA’s GRAIL spacecrafts.
- Astronomy
Strange six-tailed asteroid makes a scene
In September, scientists used the Hubble Space Telescope to image the object and were shocked to see its cometlike appearance.
- Microbes
Bacteria starved in space grow better
Given limited resources microbes in microgravity make more new cells than their counterparts on Earth.
- Planetary Science
Meteor explosions like this year’s Russian fireball more common than thought
Chelyabinsk-sized rocks may come to Earth every 30 years, on average.
- Science & Society
Feedback
Our redesigned cover and the astronomy stories from the Oct. 19 issue get readers' reviews.
- Science & Society
Replacing paradigms requires open minds
Cosmological crises require creativity, but science enforces conformity.
- Astronomy
Billions and billions of Earth-sized planets call Milky Way home
Using Kepler data, astronomers estimate that a sizeable fraction of the galaxy’s sunlike stars have Earth-sized planets that could support liquid water.
- Astronomy
Giant loner could shift idea of star formation
Observations of WR 102ka suggest it could have been born without any gaseous companions.
- Planetary Science
Moon material on Earth
Scientists now think that tektites are a type of impactite, formed during the rapid heating and cooling of material ejected when a meteorite strikes Earth.
- Astronomy
Astronomers explain planets’ backward motion
Giant planets in distant orbits may be reversing the direction of their closer-in neighbors.
