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Carbon in our bodies likely left galaxy and came back on cosmic ‘conveyer belt’

Life on Earth could not exist without carbon. But carbon itself could not exist without stars. Nearly all elements except hydrogen and helium—including carbon, oxygen and iron—only exist because they were forged in stellar furnaces and later flung into the cosmos when their stars died. In an ultimate act of galactic recycling, planets like ours […]

NASA’s LEXI will provide X-ray vision of Earth’s magnetosphere

A NASA X-ray imager is heading to the moon as part of NASA’s Artemis campaign, where it will capture the first global images of the magnetic field that shields Earth from solar radiation.

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Hubble captures a pale blue supernova in galaxy LEDA 22057

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope Picture of the Week features the galaxy LEDA 22057, which is located about 650 million light-years away in the constellation Gemini. Like the subject of a previous Picture of the Week, LEDA 22057 is the site of a supernova explosion.

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Using an oil industry framework to map space resources

Cracking the chicken-and-egg problem of utilizing resources in space has been a difficult challenge for over half a century. Getting enough infrastructure built up is necessary to collect those resources effectively, but doing so is too expensive without using the resources themselves.

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Could habitable planets orbiting white dwarfs retain their oceans? Maybe

Potentially habitable exoplanets are so incredibly common that astronomers have started to consider more unusual situations where life might arise. Perhaps life can be found on the moon of a hot Jupiter or lingering in the warm ocean of a rogue planet. Recently, there has even been the idea that habitable worlds might orbit white […]

Scientists detect mysterious suppression in cosmic structure growth

A new study in published in Physical Review Letters analyzes the most complete set of galaxy clustering data to test the ΛCDM model, revealing discrepancies in the formation of cosmic structures in the universe, hinting at a new physics.

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SpaceX launch on final day of 2024 raises Space Coast tally to 93 for the year

SpaceX put the final countdown in the books for the Space Coast early Tuesday, adding one more to the record pace of launches for the year.

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NASA anticipates lunar findings from next-generation retroreflector

Apollo astronauts set up mirror arrays, or “retroreflectors,” on the moon to accurately reflect laser light beamed at them from Earth with minimal scattering or diffusion. Retroreflectors are mirrors that reflect the incoming light back in the same incoming direction.

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A new mission watches meteoroids hit the far side of the moon

Sometimes, it’s hard to remember that Earth is constantly being bombarded by literally tons of space debris daily. The larger bits form what we know as shooting stars, and most burn up in the atmosphere. Still, throughout our planet’s history, giant versions have caused devastation unlike anything else seen on this planet. Tracking these types […]

Humans will soon be able to mine on the moon—but should we? Four questions to consider

By the end of this decade, nations and private companies may well be mining the surface of the moon.

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HYPSO-2 satellite monitors harmful algae from space

It’s slightly larger than a 5-liter water bottle, and is whizzing around the Earth at a speed of 7.5 kilometers per second. The satellite has two cameras built into its body, and can be controlled quickly and turned smoothly in all directions.

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A long-term lunar infrastructure hub named after the object that created the moon

Getting back to the moon is the primary goal of NASA’s Artemis program, but what do we do once we get there? That is the challenge tackled by a group of students at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, who wrote a proposal for a lunar infrastructure module they call the Trans-lunar Hub for Exploration, ISRU, […]

New Glenn NG-1 rocket completes a hotfire test

Blue Origin has achieved an important milestone with its New Glenn NG-1 rocket, successfully completing a 24-second hotfire of the rocket’s BE-4 engines in preparation for an expected test flight in the coming days.

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Dark energy camera captures the glittering galaxies of the Antlia Cluster

NSF NOIRLab rings in the New Year with a glittering galaxyscape captured with the Department of Energy-fabricated Dark Energy Camera, mounted on the U.S. National Science Foundation Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile, a Program of NSF NOIRLab. This ultra-deep view of the Antlia Cluster reveals a spectacular array […]

How to catch the Quadrantids, the first meteor shower of 2025

When the Quadrantid meteor shower peaks on Friday, it will be the year’s first chance to see fireballs in the sky.

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