The aptly named ‘Fireworks galaxy’ just had its tenth supernova in the past century, setting a record. Learn how to see it! “When a massive star explodes at the end of […]

Could there be a massive, giant planet beyond Neptune? Here’s what the science says… for now. “Finding out that something you have just discovered is considered all but impossible is one […]

A live-blog event happened a week ago, but you can catch the entire thing anew here, right now! “We have never observed infinity in nature. Whenever you have infinities in […]

Sometimes, designing a careful experiment and measuring absolutely no effect can be the most important result of all. “It appears, from all that precedes, reasonably certain that if there be any […]

Wanting there to be something beyond the standard model may be influencing what we actually investigate. “In recent years several new particles have been discovered which are currently assumed to […]

You lose whether you use protons or electrons in your collider, for different reasons. Could the unstable muon solve both problems? “It does not matter how slowly you go as […]

And how if you try this with someone shorter than you are, you’ll find it extra convincing! “I drive from Florida to California all the time, and it’s flat to […]

What would energy without a particle to attach itself to even look like? “It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on […]

The answer lies billions of years in the past. “Dark matter or invisible element?You decide.” –Toba Beta When we look out at the luminous matter in the Universe — stars, galaxies, clusters of […]

If you heard about time crystals, be aware that they do exist. But learn what they mean. “Every particular in nature, a leaf, a drop, a crystal, a moment of time […]

Space is getting bigger, but atoms, humans, Earth and our Milky Way stay the same size. How is this possible? “The Universe is expanding the way your mind is expanding. […]

We take for granted how much the Moon does for Earth, but not all of the changes would be bad. “If we get rid of the moon, women, those menstrual cycles […]

And England almost burned themselves down as a result. “When Benjamin Franklin inveted the lightning rod, the clergy, both in England and America, with enthusiastic support of George III, condemned it […]

Hydrogen is #1, Helium is #2. Who’s number 3? Hint: it’s not #3 in the periodic table! “It is the function of science to discover the existence of a general reign […]

Sometimes science is stranger than fiction. “To morrow, I believe, is to be an eclipse of the sun, and I think it perfectly meet and proper that the sun in the […]

It’s the most fundamental fabric of the Universe itself. But how does it work? “‘Space-time’ — that hideous hybrid whose very hyphen looks phoney.” –Vladimir Nabokov When it comes to understanding the Universe, there […]

Why weightlessness is possible, even if there’s no place you can hide from the Universe’s longest-range force. “It was a strange lightness, a drifting feeling. Zero gravity. I understood that […]

And when you demand ‘perfectly identical,’ just how high of a bar are you setting? “Lives are snowflakes — unique in detail, forming patterns we have seen before, but as like one another […]

Just because we know it’s real doesn’t mean it’s easy to create in a lab. “For me the best answer is not in words but in measurements.” –Elena Aprile Atoms, molecules, […]

You don’t have to detect a particle to know that dark matter is real. “You may hate gravity, but gravity doesn’t care.” –Clayton Christensen In the 1970s, Vera Rubin’s observations showed […]

If we left on New Years Day, how close could we get if we kept accelerating every second of every day? “The very closest stars would require many years to visit, […]

The laws of physics are symmetric, but the Universe isn’t. Something’s gotta give. “If antimatter and matter make contact, both are destroyed instantly. Physicists call the process ‘annihilation.” –Dan Brown When […]

Three simple questions; an amazing story that goes way beyond Einstein! “Each ray of light moves in the coordinate system ‘at rest’ with the definite, constant velocity V independent of […]

Even if the Universe grows to infinity, there might not be enough space to hold all the possibilities. “We are actually living in a million parallel realities every single minute.” –Marina […]

Something isn’t right about the Universe without something extra. So why can’t scientists agree on what that “extra” thing is? “All we know so far is what doesn’t work.” –Richard Feynman […]

We see them change in wavelength, energy and in their electric and magnetic fields over time. So how do they experience it? “Everyone has his dream; I would like to […]

A correlation between normal matter and the observed rotation suggests that maybe dark matter isn’t a certainty, after all. “Nothing in the standard cosmological model predicts this, and it is almost […]

What’s the difference between “point-like” and what we can actually state? “When we think about the present, we veer wildly between the belief in chance and the evidence in favour of […]

“Eureka!” is not always as powerful as “that’s what I thought!” “Reality is what kicks back when you kick it. This is just what physicists do with their particle accelerators. […]

The force of empty space isn’t always zero. Here’s how an electromagnetic experiment might be the key to dark energy. “Another very good test some readers may want to look up… […]