Science

One stormy Monday in March, 1827, the German composer Ludwig van Beethoven passed away after a protracted illness. Bedridden since the previous Christmas, he was attacked by jaundice, his limbs and abdomen swollen, each breath a struggle. As his associates went about the task of sorting through personal belongings, they uncovered a document Beethoven had

A US spaceship attempting a lunar landing lifted off early Thursday from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the second such private-led effort this year after the first ended in failure. Intuitive Machines, the Houston company leading mission “IM-1,” hopes to become the first non-government entity to achieve a soft touchdown on the Moon, and

The Amazon rainforest is facing a barrage of pressures that might tip it into large-scale ecosystem collapse as soon as 2050, according to new research Wednesday warning of dire consequences for the region and the world. The Amazon, which holds more than 10 percent of the world’s biodiversity, helps stabilize the global climate by storing

WASHINGTON — Japan’s H3 rocket successfully reached orbit on its second launch Feb. 16, nearly a year after its inaugural launch failed. The H3 rocket lifted off from the Tanegashima Space Center at 7:22 p.m. Eastern after a two-day delay caused by weather. There were no issues reported during the countdown, with liftoff occurring at

As the world’s population continues to grow, so too does the strain on the environment. Not least among the stressors is food production, especially the vast swathes of land and water required for the cultivation of livestock. It’s still in its infancy, but lab-cultured meat could be one means of easing the pressure – and

For a quiet, dusty lump of a planet we see today, Mars has had a surprisingly violent history, one that could reveal some clues about Earth’s own past. A new survey of the Martian surface suggests that in its younger years, the red planet was littered with volcanoes that might resemble the rumblings of our

A satellite that measures methane leaks from oil and gas companies is set to start circulating the Earth 15 times a day next month. Google plans to have the data mapped by the end of the year for the whole world to see. The partnership between Google and the Environmental Defense Fund, which in March

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — An Intuitive Machines spacecraft is on its way to the moon Feb. 15 in the company’s quest to be the first commercial entity to successfully land on the lunar surface. A SpaceX Falcon 9 lifted off at 1:05 a.m. Eastern from Launch Complex 39A here after a 24-hour delay. The

Really old artifacts are always fascinating, acting almost like time machines in the way that they let us peer back through hundreds or even thousands of years of history – and archaeologists have just discovered a tube-shaped bead in Wyoming that is thought to be some 12,940 years old. The bead is the oldest ever

Of all the questions that remain unanswered, the question of life in the Universe is surely the one that captures our attention the most. In a Universe whose observable edge is 46 billion light years away, is it even conceivable that we are alone, the sole planet among the millions and perhaps billions that are

In a mocking fluke of physics, Greenland – one of the main sources of meltwater flooding Earth’s shores – is actually rising faster than the rising oceans. The elevating bedrock is gradually birthing new land in Greenland’s sea including small islands and skerries, like Uunartoq Qeqertaq. Translating as ‘warming island’, this new 13 kilometer (8

TITUSVILLE, Fla. — BAE Systems will complete its $5.5 billion acquisition of Ball Aerospace in days after securing regulatory approvals for the deal. The companies announced Feb. 14 that they had all the approvals in place from regulators to complete the deal, announced in August. All that remains are the “customary steps at the end

An ancient bone dating back thousands of years is the first solid evidence that humans in Europe were collecting and storing a powerful and dangerous drug. Deliberately hollowed out and plugged with birch tar, the bone – originally from a sheep or goat – was found to contain a large number of seeds of a

Space, it seems, is teeming not with stars and galaxies but with delicious cosmic snacks. A new object in the Milky Way discovered by a team of astronomers led by Ciprian Berghea of the US Naval Observatory has been given the nickname Dracula’s Chivito, after the meat-laden sandwich that is the national dish of Uruguay.

Last year a concerning study suggested one of Earth’s major ocean currents is racing towards collapse. Unfortunately, new data now backs that up. “The temperature, sea level and precipitation changes will severely affect society, and the climate shifts are unstoppable on human time scales,” the authors of the latest study warn in an article for

WASHINGTON — The Department of the Air Force on Feb. 12 unveiled plans to reorganize Air Force and Space Force units, change personnel policy, training, operations and acquisitions.  Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said priorities have to change for the era of “great power competition,” particularly with China. He discussed the planned  changes in a

Beneath the cold, dark waves of the Baltic Sea, a hidden piece of history lurks. In Germany’s Bay of Mecklenburg, 21 meters (69 feet) down, scientists have found an ancient stone megastructure, dating back to the Stone Age, more than 10,000 years ago. Spanning a length of nearly a kilometer (0.62 miles) and consisting of

On January 21st, 2024, a meter-sized asteroid (2024 BX1) entered Earth’s atmosphere and exploded over Berlin at 12:33 am UTC (07:45 pm EST; 04:33 pm PST). Before it reached Earth, 2024 BX1 was a Near-Earth Asteroid (NEA) with an orbit that suggests it was part of the Apollo group. The fragments have since been located

ORLANDO, Fla. — As rumors of a potential sale of United Launch Alliance reach a crescendo, the company’s chief executive argues the successful inaugural launch of its Vulcan rocket is a vindication of both the company’s technology and its transformation. Speaking at the SpaceCom conference here Jan. 31, ULA Chief Executive Tory Bruno said the

The great libraries of the ancient classical world are legendary. From Alexandria to Rome to Athens, Baghdad, and Constantinople, these vast archives of times gone by are said to have contained stacks of texts on religion, politics, philosophy, poetry, literature, and the sciences. Only one’s collection has survived to the present day, and we can

There’s an old trope in science fiction about someone suddenly getting X-ray vision and looking through solid objects. It turns out to be a physical impossibility with our Mark I eyeballs. However, astronomers have found a way around that challenge that lets us study the Universe with X-ray vision. It’s called X-ray astronomy and it’s

WASHINGTON — A private astronaut mission that will feature the first spacewalk from a Crew Dragon spacecraft has suffered another delay, this time to at least the middle of this year. The Polaris Program, a series of private astronaut missions backed by billionaire Jared Isaacman, announced Feb. 8 that its Polaris Dawn mission was now

Sometimes it’s the simplest solutions that get lost in the kerfuffle of scientific progress. Since the advent of vaccines more than two centuries ago, researchers have studied all sorts of ways in which inoculation with a weakened pathogen (or parts thereof) can prepare the immune system for a full attack – exploring different dosages, vaccine

What’s the most important thing you need to live and work on the Moon? Power. For NASA’s upcoming Artemis program, getting power to lunar bases is a top priority. That’s why the agency created its Fission Surface Power Project. The idea is to develop concepts for a small nuclear fission reactor to generate electricity on

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Greece became the latest country to sign the Artemis Accords outlining best practices for sustainable space exploration Feb. 9. In a ceremony at the U.S. State Department, Giorgos Gerapetritis, Greece’s foreign minister, formally signed the Accords. The signing took place as part of a U.S.-Greece Strategic Dialogue meeting. “As humanity embarks

If you feel like the people around you have never appreciated you, the superior colliculus understands. A new study suggests this tiny brain region plays a much more significant role in our vision than previously thought. And the superior colliculus has been diligently doing its duty for a long, long time, preserved through millions of

It’s hard to spot from Earth, but the Moon is shrinking in size as it continues to cool down. At about 45 meters (more than 150 feet) every few hundred million years, it’s hardly a rapid change, though a new study by researchers in the US suggests it might be enough to be responsible for

In a stark example of how everything on our living planet is interconnected, one species of tiny, invasive insects has reduced lions’ abilities to feast on zebras. As we humans are causing so many different changes to our environment all at once, it’s not always easy to pin the consequence on the disturbance that produced

Since the first detonation of an atomic bomb in 1945, more than 2,000 nuclear weapons tests have been conducted by eight countries: the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan and North Korea. Groups such as the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization are constantly on the lookout for new tests. However,

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Small launch vehicle developers are working to carve out niches in a market for smallsat launches that is increasingly dominated by SpaceX’s Transporter rideshare missions. The Transporter missions, which fill a Falcon 9 often with more than 100 smallsats, offer per-kilogram prices significantly below dedicated small launch vehicles. SpaceX has seen