Space
The Other Red Planet: Soviet Union Scored an Interplanetary First at Venus 45 Years Ago
The U.S.S.R.'s Venera 4 was the first spacecraft to return data from inside another planet's atmosphere
Features1825 articles archived since 1845
Space
Live Chat: The 2012 Transit of Venus, with SA Editor George Musser
Musser, who covers space for SA, will help us prepare to watch Tuesday's transit and explain the science behind this rare astronomical event
Space
Iron in the Fire: The Little-Star Supernovae That Could
Exploding white dwarf stars and an unexpected abundance of iron explain the chemistry of a unique star cluster
Space
Flying Bridges: The Day the World Discovered the Sun [Excerpt]
A French astronomer traveled to Siberia to observe the 1761 transit of Venus, assisting in a worldwide effort to determine the scale of the solar system for the first time
The Sciences
Live Chat with SA Blogs Editor Bora Zivkovic on Clocks, Metabolism and Evolution
Zivkovic, a chronobiologist, biology teacher, organizer of ScienceOnline conferences and editor of Open Laboratory, will answer your questions about a recent flurry of papers in the circadian rhythms field...
The Sciences
The Man Who Knew Venus Would Transit the Sun [Excerpt]
Amateur astronomer Jeremiah Horrox was the only person in England, and possibly the entire world, convinced that a Venus solar transit would occur in 1639, an event that Johannes Kepler himself had failed to predict...
Space
Crossing the Sun: The Last Transit of Venus until 2117
Next week will be the last opportunity this century to see the planet Venus as a little black dot moving across the solar disk--a rare event with a long, important history in astronomy
Sustainability
Climate Armageddon: How the World's Weather Could Quickly Run Amok [Excerpt]
Climate scientists think a perfect storm of climate "flips" could cause massive upheavals in a matter of years
Mind
Mind-Pops: Psychologists Begin to Study an Unusual form of Proustian Memory
Sudden, unannounced memories might help people make connections between disparate ideas more quickly—but they might also be the building blocks of hallucinations
Space
Shadow Fire: 10 Fantastic Photos of Sunday's Annular Solar Eclipse
Professional astronomers and amateurs tapped their creativity to capture the first annular eclipse visible in the U.S. since 1994
Tech
A Fine Brine: New Desalination Technique Yields More Drinkable Water
A new, more energy-efficient seawater distillation membrane is designed to yield greater amounts of potable water, and less briny discharge
Health
Improved but Not Always Safe: Despite Global Efforts, More Than 1 Billion People Likely at Risk for Lack of Clean Water
U.N. Development Goals for better drinking water have already been reached, but a closer look shows that the measures fail to truly account for the lack of access to safe water
Sustainability
How Can We Ensure Clean Water for All? [Slide Show]
An exhibition of inventions, artwork and artifacts explores our relationship with water and how the world might cope with future scarcity of this invaluable resource
Mind
Better Safe Than Sorry: Why We Believe In Tempting Fate [Excerpt]
Switching grocery lines, carrying an umbrella, talking out loud about a possible no-hitter in baseball—a sense of jinxing things arises because when negative possibilities come to mind, they seem more likely...
Tech
Spy-High: Amateur Astronomers Scour the Sky for Government Secrets
As consumer telescopes and techniques improve, will there be implications for national security?
