Latest articles by Keith Cooper
Water ice buried at Mars' equator is over 2 miles thick
The Mars Express orbiter has detected enough water ice buried beneath the Red Planet's equator to cover the entire planet in a shallow ocean if melted.
What is the Large Magellanic Cloud?
Reference Learn all about the Large Magellanic Cloud, including what it is, what it features and its relation to the Milky Way.
No alien life needed: Dark streaks in Venus' atmosphere can be explained by iron minerals
The dark streaks in Venus' atmosphere — a potential sign of life, according to some researchers — can be explained by Iron-bearing sulfate minerals, a new study reports.
SETI scientists begin huge new hunt for intelligent aliens
The search for alien technosignatures has dramatically expanded, thanks to a new experiment called COSMIC.
What does space smell like?
Space mysteries From carbon molecules and ozone on spacesuits to the nauseating odor of comets and the sweet tang of gas clouds, the universe is a natural laboratory for aromatic chemistry.
Hubble Space Telescope sees wild weather raging on distant hot Jupiter world
The new weather forecasting method could one day be used on more Earth-like exoplanets.
Alien technosignatures more likely to be found on oxygen-rich exoplanets. Here's why
To stand the best chance of detecting technosignatures, SETI should survey exoplanets with atmospheres that are at least 18% oxygen.
30 years ago, astronauts saved the Hubble Space Telescope
Launched with faulty vision, the Hubble Space Telescope and NASA were a laughing stock – until seven astronauts performed a series of daring spacewalks to fix it.
13 record-breaking space discoveries of 2023
Some of the strongest, longest, smallest, biggest and best reasons to celebrate space as the year comes to a close. There are a handful of awesome firsts in here too.
Warped supernova spotted by James Webb Space Telescope could settle a longstanding debate
Gravitationally lensed images of two different supernovas in the same galaxy can be used to measure the expansion rate of the universe.
Johannes Kepler: Everything you need to know
A biography of Johannes Kepler, from his troubled childhood to his mission to mathematically formalize Copernicus' heliocentric model by finding divine reasoning within the orbits of the planets.
The rings of Uranus look positively festive in epic James Webb Space Telescope holiday photo
The observations are vital for piecing together the science objectives for a future mission to Uranus.
Scientists find record-breaking collection of molecules in 2 extremely ancient galaxies
"We knew these galaxies were prodigious star factories, perhaps among the biggest the universe has ever seen."
Tiny 14-inch satellite studies 'hot Jupiter' exoplanets evaporating into space
Hot Jupiters are gas giants so close to their star that the star's heat and radiation can blow the planets' atmosphere away.
Over 100 galaxies seen spewing powerful winds that can halt star formation
The winds extend tens of thousands of light years above and below galaxies.
Could a 'supervoid' solve an unrelenting debate over the universe's expansion rate?
Measurements of how fast the universe is expanding differ depending on how you measure the rate. Could a huge under-density of galaxies, including the Milky Way, be to blame?
Why are there no gas moons?
Space mysteries We have rocky moons, ocean moons and ice moons, but where are all the gas moons?
James Webb Space Telescope gazes into 'The Brick,' a dark nebula near the Milky Way's heart
A dark nebula, also known as "The Brick," was imaged by the James Webb Space Telescope.
Mighty morphin' Centaur rings — a distant icy object's rings are transforming
What is causing the structure of the dust to evolve, and where exactly the dust comes from, is still a mystery.
Life as we know it may have its roots in an old, cold cosmic cloud
The discovery is another step along the road to showing that the stuff of life originally came to Earth from space.
Dark matter may be hiding in the Large Hadron Collider's particle jets
A new study helped scientists better constrain the possible properties of dark matter particles.
'The Making of JUICE' film documents how scientists built a Jupiter-bound spacecraft against the odds
JUICE blasted off in April 2023 on a mission to explore Jupiter’s ocean moons and learn more about whether they could support life.
Our universe's smallest galaxies hold the largest star factories. Here's why
Conditions within dwarf galaxies initially produce more stellar-mass black holes than supernova explosions.
