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SpacefarersChristopher WanjekHarvard Univ., $29.95 By 20th century expectations, we are way behind schedule on colonizing the solar system. After the Apollo moon landings, some scientists and NASA officials envisioned launching astronauts to Mars in the 1980s and building cities in space to be habitable by the 2000s. But the only humans in space today are […] More
When giant stars eat giant planets, their starlight may shine a bit less brightly. That dimming could affect how astronomers measure distances across the universe — and possibly even put past measurements in doubt. “You would think the planet would be a small perturbation to the star,” says astrophysicist Licia Verde. “It turns out that […] More
Saturn’s auroras may heat its atmosphere like an electric toaster. Measurements from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft’s final orbits show that Saturn’s upper atmosphere is hottest where its auroras shine, a finding that could help solve a long-standing mystery about the outer planets. Saturn’s upper atmosphere is much hotter than scientists first expected based on the planet’s […] More
