Extraterrestrial Life

If biologically important organic molecules like amino acids could form in interstellar space, the implications would be enormous. On the Earth we find plenty of amino acid species inside certain types of meteorites, so at a minimum these compounds can form during the assembly of a proto-stellar, proto-planetary system (at least this one) and end [...]

The Mangalyaan probe, the country's first mission to another world, has entered the Red Planet's orbit

A couple of years ago, one of my thesis mentors sought visually impaired scientists working at a major space science agency in the United States.

NASA’s MAVEN orbiter arrived at Mars to study how gas escapes from around the planet
 

The leader of the James Webb Space Telescope must have clearance that allows access to the highest level of classified information, according to a NASA want ad

Books and recommendations from Scientific American

This post is one in a series covering, and expanding on, topics in the book The Copernicus Complex (Scientific American/FSG).           The conversation usually goes like this: Do you think we’re alone in the universe?

This week on Virtually Speaking Science, I chatted with astrophysicist Katie Freese, author of a new book, The Cosmic Cocktail: Three Parts Dark Matter.

If intelligent aliens are dumb enough to pollute their atmosphere, NASA’s upcoming James Webb Space Telescope is powerful enough to spot some of the signs on some exoplanets. Clara Moskowitz reports   

 

After a ten year journey, NASA’s New Horizons mission is still 420 million kilometers from the Pluto system – but that’s close enough to begin to see the orbital dance of an icy world and its major moon.

In a month’s time, the end result of two-and-a-half years of research, thinking, writing, re-writing, re-re-writing, editing, mulling, puzzling, coffee-drinking, beer-swilling, swearing, and tweaking will hit the shelves in the form of my new book The Copernicus Complex.

Looking for a few good popular math books? In the latest New York Times Book Review, I look at five terrific recent ones: Jordan Ellenberg's How Not to Be Wrong, David J.