Astronomers Searching for Exoplanets Hope to Find Earth 2.0
The galaxy is teeming with planets. Scientists are straining to peer into their atmospheres to seek signs of extraterrestrial life
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A New Space Mission Could Track Down the Sun's Lost Siblings
The sun was born in a family of stars. What became of them?
Investigating the Lives and Deaths of Star Clusters
All stars are born in groups but then slowly disperse into space. A new theory seeks to explain how these groups form and fall apart or, in rare cases, persist for hundreds of millions of years...
Could Life Survive in the Universe's Far-Distant Future?
Some say its glory days are long gone, but the universe has life in it yet. Brand-new types of celestial phenomena will unfold over the coming billions and trillions of years
Astronomers Are on the Hunt for Mid-Size Black Holes
Tipping the scales at less than about a million suns in mass, middleweight black holes may hold clues to how their much larger siblings, and galaxies, first formed
Could Dark Matter Make Invisible, Parallel Universes?
A shadow cosmos, woven silently into our own, may have its own rich inner life
Billions of Galaxies are Missing from the Cosmos
By the latest estimate, the observable universe contains 200 billion galaxies. Astronomers wonder: Why so few?
Cosmologists Review the Evidence for an Accelerating Universe
Dark energy does more than hurry along the expansion of the universe. It also has a stranglehold on the shape and spacing of galaxies
Paul Steinhardt Disowns Inflation, the Theory He Helped Create
Is the theory at the heart of modern cosmology deeply flawed?
Why the Multiverse May Be the Most Dangerous Idea in Physics
Proof of parallel universes radically different from our own may still lie beyond the domain of science
What Came before the Big Bang?
Our universe may have started not with a big bang but with a big bounce—an implosion that triggered an explosion, all driven by exotic quantum-gravitational effects
Does the Universe Violate the Laws of Thermodynamics?
Total energy must be conserved. Every student of physics learns this fundamental law. The trouble is, it does not apply to the universe as a whole
Garrett Lisi Explains His Grand Unified Theory
Deep down, the particles and forces of the universe are a manifestation of exquisite geometry
Do We Live in a Holographic Universe?
An experiment going up outside of Chicago will attempt to measure the intimate connections among information, matter and spacetime. If it works, it could rewrite the rules for 21st-century physics...
Astronomers Use Gravitational Lenses to Push Hubble Past Its Limits
To learn how the universe evolved over time, a space telescope gazes back to the earliest galaxies ever observed
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