I'm a space archaeologist studying junk strewn across the solar system

From vintage satellites to lunar rovers, space archaeologist Alice Gorman is teasing out a unique history…

Is the universe conscious? It seems impossible until you do the maths

The question of how the brain gives rise to subjective experience is the hardest of all.…

We may have found 19 more interstellar asteroids in our solar system

A bunch of asteroids near Jupiter and Neptune with orbits perpendicular to the plane of the…

Astronomical time can help us put lockdown into perspective

The coronavirus pandemic is making life feel slower than ever, but observing timescales across the universe…

We know the best spots to look for alien life – can we get to them?

Extraterrestrial oceans are an obvious place to search for alien life, but getting there and having…

Weird magnetic threads in sun's corona seen for the first time

New images reveal threads of ultra-hot gas woven throughout the sun’s corona, in the most detailed…

Our nearest star system may have a planet with a colossal set of rings

We know that there is at least one planet orbiting Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to…

Ripples in Earth’s atmosphere make distant galaxies appear to flash

Faraway galaxies have been spotted unexpectedly flashing up to 100 times their usual brightness, and it…

Mysterious ‘Planet Nine’ on the solar system’s edge may not be real

Strange orbits of distant space rocks have been used to infer that the solar system has…

A giant raft of rock may once have floated across Mars’ ancient ocean

Mars could have had an ancient ocean in its northern hemisphere, and a large raft of…