Science & Technology News

In 2017, a massive new region of magnetic field erupted on the sun's surface next to an existing sunspot. The powerful collision of magnetic energy produced a series of solar flares, causing turbulent space weather conditions at Earth. Scientists have now pinpointed for the first time exactly when and where the explosion released the energy that heated spewing plasma to energies equivalent to 1 billion degrees in temperature.

The most distant dying galaxy discovered so far, more massive than our Milky Way -- with more than a trillion stars -- has revealed that the 'cores' of these systems had formed already 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang, about 1 billion years earlier than previous measurements revealed. The discovery will add to our knowledge on the formation of the Universe more generally, and may cause the computer models astronomers use, one of the most fundamental tools, to be revised.

Astronomers at the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) have analyzed the paths of two objects heading out of the Solar System forever and determined that they also most likely originated from outside of the Solar System. These results improve our understanding of the outer Solar System and beyond.

A new study finds that average temperatures have dropped over the past century and a half

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A new paper suggests that the agency broke U.S. environmental law in its approval of the satellites and that if it was sued in court, it would likely lose

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It may open the door to new treatments and explain why previous ones failed

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The first research center of its kind in the country is bringing renewed rigor to the investigation of the drugs’ therapeutic uses

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The microorganisms transform sand and gelatin into a living construction material

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Warm, cold, just right? Physicists are using gravitational lensing to take the temperature of dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up about a quarter of our universe.

Astronomers continue to gather evidence for a second world around the sun’s nearest neighboring star

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Astronomers have discovered a new class of bizarre objects at the center of our galaxy, not far from the supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A*.

A single star has provided information about the collision of the Milky Way with the dwarf galaxy Gaia-Enceladus. The event likely took place approximately 11.5 billion years ago.

Swirling around our galaxy’s central supermassive black hole, these objects share properties with both stars and gas clouds

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Phosphorus is an essential element for life as we know it. But how it arrived on the early Earth is something of a mystery. Astronomers have now traced the journey of phosphorus from star-forming regions to comets using the combined powers of ALMA and the European Space Agency's probe Rosetta. Their research shows where molecules containing phosphorus form, how this element is carried in comets, and how a particular molecule may have played a crucial role in starting life on Earth.

The seismic rumblings of the Philippines’ second most active volcano hold clues to what it might do

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A new study has found that collisions of supermassive black holes may be simultaneously observable in both gravitational waves and X-rays at the beginning of the next decade.

A 'cold Neptune' and two potentially habitable worlds are part of a cache of five newly discovered exoplanets and eight exoplanet candidates found orbiting nearby red dwarf stars. The two potentially habitable planets are among the nearest stars to our own Sun, making them prime targets for observations by next-generation space- and land-based telescopes.

Astrophysicists have come a step closer to understanding the origin of a faint glow of gamma rays covering the night sky. They found that this light is brighter in regions that contain a lot of matter and dimmer where matter is sparser -- a correlation that could help them narrow down the properties of exotic astrophysical objects and invisible dark matter.

Scientists have discovered the oldest solid material on Earth: 7-billion-year-old stardust trapped inside a meteorite. This stardust provides evidence for a 'baby boom' of new stars that formed 7 billion years ago, contrary to thinking that star formation happens at a steady, constant rate.

Scientists have finally scaled the solar system's equivalent of the Rocky Mountain range.