Space & PhysicsNovember 6, 2018
Election Day 2018 Takes Absentee Ballots to the Extreme in Space
Even on the International Space Station, American astronauts manage to vote
Stories by Meghan Bartels
Meghan Bartels is a science journalist based in New York City. She joined Scientific American in 2023 and is now a senior reporter there. Previously, she spent more than four years as a writer and editor at Space.com, as well as nearly a year as a science reporter at Newsweek, where she focused on space and Earth science. Her writing has also appeared in Audubon, Nautilus, Astronomy and Smithsonian, among other publications. She attended Georgetown University and earned a master’s degree in journalism at New York University’s Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program.
Space & PhysicsNovember 3, 2018
NASA's Dawn Mission Ends, but Its Legacy Lives On
After visiting not one but two destinations in the Asteroid Belt, the interplanetary probe at last ran out of fuel
Space & PhysicsOctober 11, 2018
Soyuz Rocket Fails, Forces Emergency Landing for U.S.–Russian Space Station Crew
The accident occurred during the rocket’s ascent from the launch pad, allowing an abort system to jettison the crew to safety
Space & PhysicsOctober 5, 2018
Cassini’s Death Dive into Saturn Reveals Weird Ring “Rain” and More
The spacecraft’s final observations are turning up a wealth of bizarre, unexpected phenomena
Space & PhysicsSeptember 6, 2018
Space Station Leak May Have Been Caused by Human Error, Russian Reports Say
A small hole in a docked Soyuz spacecraft appears to have come from within, perhaps due to drillwork
Space & PhysicsSeptember 6, 2018
To Find Alien Life, NASA Needs Bigger, Bolder Exoplanet-Hunting Telescopes
A new, prestigious report charts an ambitious future for the space agency’s burgeoning search for Earth 2.0
Space & PhysicsAugust 14, 2018
Meteorites May Have Created Some of Earth’s Oldest Rocks
A barrage of impacts more than four billion years ago is linked to ancient stones found in Canada
Space & PhysicsAugust 1, 2018
To Fight Fake News, SETI Researchers Update Alien-Detection Scale
Dubbed Rio 2.0, the scale seeks to measure how important any potential signal from aliens might be