Science

‘Once-in-a-Lifetime Encounter’ With Rare Octopus Filmed at Great Barrier Reef

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A mesmerizing new video shows a “once-in-a-lifetime encounter” with a bizarre, bright red octopus swimming above the Great Barrier Reef in northeastern Australia.  The encounter, first reported by local Australian news website Bundaberg Now, was a rare sighting of a blanket octopus, named after the blanket-like fleshy cape between its arms. Jacinta Shackleton, a marine biologist and reef guide, filmed and photographed … Read more

Why Was The Volcano Explosion in Tonga So Violent, And What to Expect Now?

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The Kingdom of Tonga doesn’t often attract global attention, but a violent eruption of an underwater volcano on January 15 has spread shock waves, quite literally, around half the world.   The volcano is usually not much to look at. It consists of two small uninhabited islands, Hunga-Ha’apai and Hunga-Tonga, poking about 100 meters (328 … Read more

A Newly Discovered Fossil Could Be The Answer to Darwin’s ‘Abominable’ Mystery

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Scientists in China say they have found the oldest flower bud in the fossil record, finally aligning the fossil evidence with the genetic data suggesting flowering plants, or angiosperms, evolved tens of millions of years earlier than we initially thought.   The team hopes their discovery will help “ease the pain” around a nagging, centuries-old mystery that … Read more

Moon phases 2022: This year’s moon cycles

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Moon phases reveal the passage of time in the night sky. Some nights when we look up at the moon, it is full and bright; sometimes it is just a sliver of silvery light. These changes in appearance are the phases of the moon. As the moon orbits Earth, it cycles through eight distinct phases. … Read more

Huge Tonga underwater volcano eruption captured in stunning satellite video

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A powerful underwater volcano eruption in Tonga on Saturday (Jan. 15) was captured as it happened in stunning images from an Earth-watching satellite, showing the sheer power for the explosive event in the South Pacific.  The volcano eruption on the island of Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai is visible as a spectacular explosion in views from the … Read more

Readers Respond to the September 2021 Issue

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ZERO-SUM SPACE? In “Lifting the Venus Curse,” Robin George Andrews writes about discoveries that expand our understanding of our close planetary neighbor Venus. Enormous sums of money are tossed about in that quest as if they were almost insubstantial. But explorations of outer space do more to satisfy our curiosity than advance the human condition … Read more

Climate scientist and Netflix ‘Don’t Look Up’ director talk comet metaphors and global warming (exclusive)

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The creator of Netflix’s popular satire-comedy movie “Don’t Look Up” recently spoke with a climate scientist about how the movie contributes to the conversation about global warming. The interview, exclusively released to Space.com, is a 24-minute audio conversation between filmmaker Adam McKay and Kate Marvel, an associate research scientist at both Columbia University and the … Read more

China builds ‘artificial moon’ for gravity experiment

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Chinese scientists have built an “artificial moon” research facility that will enable them to simulate low-gravity environments using magnetism.  The facility, slated for official launch this year, will use powerful magnetic fields inside a 2-foot-diameter (60 centimeters) vacuum chamber to make gravity “disappear.” The scientists were inspired by an earlier experiment that used magnets to … Read more

Strange and hidden Jupiter-size exoplanet spotted by astronomers and citizen scientists

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A group of astronomers and citizen scientists has uncovered a hidden planet the size of Jupiter in a distant solar system, and they should get the chance to see it again soon. The planet, designated TOI-2180 b, is relatively close to us here on Earth, at only 379 light-years away. But what makes this world … Read more

What Is The ‘Lunar Effect,’ And What Does It Have to Do With Shark Attacks?

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When the full Moon rises, strange things can happen here on Earth. Oysters snap close. Corals spawn. Zooplankton dive deeper. Seabirds stick to the shore. And lions hunt less.   Several of these behaviors are tied to moonlight; others, to tides. But some have no clear explanation at all. More than 50 years’ worth of shark … Read more