Space News & Blog Articles

We have been spoiled over recent years with first the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and then the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST.) Both have opened our eyes on the Universe and made amazing discoveries. One subject that has received attention from both is the derivation of the Hubble Constant – a constant relating the velocity of remote galaxies and their distances. A recent paper announces that JWST has just validated the results of previous studies by the Hubble Space Telescope to accurately measure its value. 

The Breakthrough Starshot program aims to cross the immense distances to the nearest star in just decades. Using a high-powered laser to propel a reflective sail technology to relativistic speeds is their mission. The selection of sail material is key to its success as it must be lightweight while being able to withstand acceleration and radiation from the laser. A recent study explores various materials and proposes that core-shell structures—spherical particles composed of two different materials—could be a promising solution.

The Earth has always been bombarded with rocks from space. It’s true to say though that there were more rocks flying around the Solar System during earlier periods of its history. A team of researchers have been studying a meteorite impact from 3.26 billion years ago. They have calculated this rock was 200 times bigger than the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. The event would have triggered tsunamis mixing up the oceans and flushing debris from the land. The newly available organic material allowed organisms to thrive. 

RALEIGH, N.C. — Particle physicist Hitoshi Murayama admits that he used to worry about being known as the “most hated man” in his field of science. But the good news is that now he can joke about it.

We are all familiar with the atmosphere of the Earth and part of this, the ionosphere, is a layer of weakly ionized plasma. It extends from 50 to 1,500 km above the planet. It’s a diffuse layer but sufficient to interfere with satellite communications and navigation systems too. A team of researchers have come up with an intriguing idea to utilise millions of mobile phones to help map the ionosphere by relying on their GPS antennas.

Imagine a black hole with the mass of the asteroid Ceres. It would be no larger than a bacterium and practically undetectable. But if such black holes are common in the Universe, they would affect the motions of stars and galaxies, just as we observe. Perhaps they are the source of dark matter.

The seasonal variations of methane in the Martian atmosphere is an intriguing clue that there might be life hiding under the surface of the red planet. But we won’t know for sure until we go digging for it.