A short history of the universe since the time of the Big Bang. We can directly observe more than 13 billion years of change, but the beginning itself is an enduring mystery. (Credit: ESA) The Big Bang is the defining narrative of modern cosmology: a bold declaration that our universe had a beginning and has a finite age, just like the humans who live within it. That finite age, in turn, is defined by the evidence that universe is expanding (again, and unfortunately, many of us are familiar […]

A mockup of the Apollo Guidance Computer that navigated Apollo's way to the Moon. MIT Library. Driving, say, to a friend’s house, we usually have directions to follow like “turn left at the light then it’s the third door on the right.” The same isn’t true when going to the Moon; there are no signposts guiding the way. So how exactly did Apollo astronauts know where they were going when they went to the Moon? This one is tough. You can’t just […]

An artist's depiction of space junk. (Credit: ESA) SpaceX’s ambitious Starlink project could eventually launch more than 10,000 satellites into orbit and rewrite the future of the internet. But Elon Musk’s company has been taking heat from the astronomical community after an initial launch in late May released the first 60 satellites. The 500 pound (227 kg) satellites were clearly visible in Earth’s night sky, inspiring concern that they could increase light pollution, […]

Temple 1 at the ancient Maya city of Tikal in Guatemala. (Credit: Rob Crandall/Shutterstock) Two trophy skulls, recently discovered by archaeologists in the jungles of Belize, may help shed light on the little-understood collapse of the once powerful Classic Maya civilization. The defleshed and painted human skulls, meant to be worn around the neck as pendants, were buried with a warrior over a thousand years ago at Pacbitun, a Maya city. They likely represent gruesome symbols of military […]

Astronomers think the galaxy NGC1313 may be home to an intermediate-mass black hole. Credit: Gemini Observatory/AURA) (Inside Science) -- If you have a computer and a few spare moments, you can help search the cosmos for an elusive breed of black hole that astronomers once thought didn't exist. Black holes come in two main types: stellar-mass black holes, which generally have about 10-24 times the mass of our sun, and the much heavier variant known as supermassive black holes, which […]