akinbostanci/Getty Images As turning points in cosmic history go, the birth of the first stars is…
Category: New Scientist
New Scientist – Space
The sun could capture rogue planets from 3.8 light years away
Artistic illustration of a rogue planet MasPix/Alamy The sun’s gravitational pull may be able to capture…
NASA CADRE moon rovers test autonomous exploration of lunar surface
Inside a cleanroom at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, three moon rovers undergo final…
SpaceX prepares for Starship flight with first ‘chopstick’ landing
A test of the Super Heavy Booster for Starship’s fifth test flight SpaceX SpaceX is making…
Wafer-thin light sail could help us reach another star sooner
A mission to the sun’s closest neighbouring star, Alpha Centauri, could be made faster thanks to…
Dark matter may solve the mystery of how colossal black holes merge
How do enormous black holes merge? Jurik Peter/Shutterstock Supermassive black holes sometimes merge, but for decades,…
Mars rover found a rock with possible signs of ancient life
Features like the leopard spots in the centre of this image could be signs of ancient…
What happens at a black hole’s edge? It depends on your perspective
In a recent column, I wrote about black holes. A curious reader sent in a letter…
Space travel may make muscles age extremely quickly
Muscle cells briefly stayed with astronauts aboard the International Space Station Shutterstock / Artsiom P A…
Lunar samples reveal exactly when the moon’s largest crater formed
Lunar samples collected during NASA’s Apollo missions are still enabling new discoveries NASA/ESA The largest crater…