A bone from the Baishiya Karst cave in Tibet suggests that Denisovans lived there about 40,000 years ago, long after modern humans had spread across much of Asia. Combined with earlier evidence of their presence in the area 190,000 years ago, the find reveals an extraordinary persistence in the face of exceptionally difficult circumstances. It … Read more
A giant NASA radar in the remote Mojave Desert captured images of several impressive asteroids, including a mile-wide behemoth, as they passed near our planet. Fortunately, there are no known asteroids that could potentially hit Earth for more than a century, and the chance of an impact from the largest class of asteroids (like the … Read more
Angle down icon An icon in the shape of a downward pointing corner. The fuselage of SpaceX’s Dragon capsule (left) was designed to burn up upon re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere. Instead, it crashed in North Carolina. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni In May, a large piece of space debris crashed into the mountains of North Carolina. After investigating … Read more
This artist’s rendering shows a night-time view of the Extremely Large Telescope in operation on Cerro Armazones in northern Chile. The telescope is shown using lasers to create artificial stars high in the atmosphere. Credit: ESO/L. Calçada Last segment of world’s largest telescope mirror successfully cast The Extremely Large Telescope in Chile, due for completion … Read more
The Starliner spacecraft docked with the International Space Station on June 13, orbiting 260 miles (420 kilometers) above Egypt’s Mediterranean coast. NASA said additional testing is needed before Starliner can return to Earth. NASA/AP hide caption switch caption NASA/AP When astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in … Read more
NASA has issued a warning about a major celestial event taking place today. A massive asteroid, comparable in size to a towering skyscraper, is hurtling toward Earth at an astonishing speed. The event has caught the attention of astronomers and space enthusiasts around the world, as it highlights the continued need to keep an eye … Read more
The remarkable aurora borealis in early May this year showed just how powerful solar flares can be in the form of radiation. But every now and then the sun does something even more devastating. These proton explosions, known as “solar particle events,” come directly from the sun’s surface and can shoot out into space like … Read more
Plate tectonics, oceans and continents may be the secret ingredients for complex life on Earth. And if these geological features are rare elsewhere in the universe, that may explain why we haven’t yet discovered intelligent alien life. New research from American and Swiss geoscientists suggests that these ingredients represent missing variables in the famous Drake … Read more
Credit: Harrison Haines from Pexels The remarkable aurora in early May of this year showed the power that solar storms can emit as radiation, but every now and then the sun does something much more destructive. These explosions of protons, which come directly from the sun’s surface and are known as “solar particle events,” can … Read more
NASA scientists have just identified mysterious shapes flying above Earth. But don’t worry, this doesn’t mean aliens are about to strike. Using an imaging instrument called Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD), the experts discovered strange X and C shapes, appearing at surprising times in the most surprising places. The researchers found that … Read more