Cosmology704 articles archived since 1845

Violent Asteroid Impacts Shaped Protoplanet Vesta’s Odd Interior

Computer models reveal a pair of 32-kilometer-long asteroids caused Vesta's crust to melt and then re-form, making it thicker than can be explained by typical rock layering

Closest "Alien Earth" May Be 13 Light-Years Away

Astronomers estimate 4.5 billion Earth-like planets are spread throughout the Galaxy

Hungry Black Hole Spawns Bizarre 4-Armed Galaxy

Beneath its pretty pink exterior, Messier 106 harbors a monster black hole that gobbles up matter at the galaxy’s center

Large Hadron Collider Is Set to Halt for Upgrades

Maintenance, improvement work and data analysis will keep scientists busy as the European collider's planned closure begins

Why Hasn't the Whole Universe Collapsed into an Enormous Black Hole? [Video]

Scientific American contributing editor George Musser answers viewer questions submitted to YouTube's Spacelab Channel

Decelerating American Physics: Panel Advises Shutdown of Last U.S. Collider

The Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider is first in line for possible budget cutbacks

A Revolution in Astronomy

Science has progressed from wild ­speculation about Earth's planetary neighbors—including how they formed and whether they are inhabited—to a better ­understanding of our celestial neighborhood...

What the Oldest Meteorites Say about the Early Solar System

Microscopic analyses of chondrites, the oldest rocks in the solar system, are filling in details of what our neighborhood in space was like shortly before the planets formed

Solar System’s Moons May Have Emerged from Long-Gone Rings

The solar system's moons may have emerged from long-gone planetary baubles

Star Near Our Solar System May Be the Oldest Known

The proximity of HD 140283, at 186 light-years from our solar system, made it a target of a highly precise age measurement that put it at 13.2 billion years old

Scientists Extend Einstein’s Relativity to the Universe’s First Moments

New calculations extend Einstein's general theory of relativity into the universe's first few moments

Black Hole Firewalls Confound Theoretical Physicists

If a new hypothesis about black hole firewalls proves correct, at least one of three cherished notions in theoretical physics must be wrong.

40 Years after the Final Apollo Moon Mission

Shifty Sightings: Hubble Images Reveal 7 of the Most Distant Galaxies Ever Seen

The latest finds from Hubble date to just a few hundred million years after the big bang

Exoplanet Discoveries to Date Are Just a Drop in the Bucket [Interactive]

Systematic searches are revealing a plenitude of alien worlds

A "Gem" of a Meteor Shower Is Coming up Next Week

The Geminid Meteor Shower offers stargazers a host of slow, bright fireballs and lasts for two to three days

Galaxy Grande: Milky Way May Be More Massive Than Thought

Hubble observations of a speedy galaxy weigh on the Milky Way and indicate that our galaxy is at least a trillion times as massive as the sun

Exoplanet Discoveries to Date Are Just a Drop in the Bucket

Systematic searches are revealing a plenitude of alien worlds

Ice Confirmed on Mercury Despite Planet's Solar Proximity

NASA's MESSENGER orbiter has found evidence of pure water hiding near the planet's cool north pole

Biggest Black Hole Blast Ever Could Solve Cosmological Mystery

An eruption of matter from a quasar could show how galaxies shed weight