In this excerpt from Five Billion Years of Solitude author Lee Billings chronicles the pioneering scientists who have led the hunt for extraterrestrial intelligence in their quest to answer the haunting question: Is humanity alone in the universe?...
The quest for an absolute temperature scale heats up
Books and recommendations from Scientific American
Books and recommendations from Scientific American
A new study suggests human activity could, in theory, bring about the end of most life on Earth
Precision dating of a single rock resolves lingering uncertainties about the Red Planet’s history
A new measurement of a fundamental physical constant marks a turning point in the quest to craft a perfect temperature scale
Ultrafast, ultrabright radio pulses from sources unknown could help map intergalactic matter, but only if astronomers can figure out their origin
News of possible multiple habitable worlds around the red dwarf star Gliese 667 C may be exciting, but researchers caution that certainty about these exoplanets remains elusive
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