Latest The Universe Stories

As of July 2nd, movie theaters across the nation are offering something new in their lobbies. It's not a new popcorn topping or a bigger box of candy. Instead, theaters are serving up a little Earth science knowledge from NASA.NASA has released two short videos that will play on television screens in almost 300 movie theater lobbies across 41 states. The videos, which will play throughout the month of July, emphasize that while NASA's well known for space exploration, it also studies our home...

"Future Science: The Frontiers of 21st Century Astronomy" will address grand challenge topicsEyes on the Sky tells the story of NSF's role in supporting ground-based astronomy and together with NSF's science communicators' conference, "Future Science: The Frontiers of 21st Century Astronomy," will help prime reporters on grand challenge topics in astronomy today.The National Science Foundation (NSF) invites science communicators to visit www.nsf.gov/eyesonthesky and to...

SILVER SPRING, Md., May 11 /PRNewswire/ -- Majestic and mystifying, the universe holds mankind's imagination like nothing else. For thousands of years humans have struggled with and sought answers to its biggest mysteries. Now, exclusively with Academy Award®-winning actor Morgan Freeman, Science Channel is introducing exciting, mind-blowing new ideas about who we are, where we come from and what lies beyond Earth in the provocative, all-new series THROUGH THE WORMHOLE WITH MORGAN...

As Prepared for Delivery - Space Exploration in the 21st CenturyI want to thank Senator Bill Nelson and NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden for their leadership. And I want to recognize Doctor Buzz Aldrin as well. Four decades ago, Buzz became a legend. But in the four decades since he has also been one of America's leading visionaries and authorities on human space flight.Few people "“ present company excluded "“ can claim the expertise of Buzz, Bill, and Charlie when it comes to space...

Astronomers investigating why the cosmic background radiation is much brighter at radio wavelengths than expected have identified a potential culprit: fast spinning black holes early in the galaxy formation process. The results will be presented by Professor Andy Lawrence at the RAS National Astronomy Meeting in Glasgow on Wednesday April 14th.Last July, US astronomers announced surprising results from a high-altitude balloon experiment called ARCADE-2, which had made careful measurements of...

Discovery may be in front of your home computer. As technology increases the amount of new information available in various fields of science such as oceanography, astronomy and ecology, researchers are turning to citizen scientists to unlock the data.In a study funded by the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Directorate for Education & Human Resources, researchers are studying an online suite of citizen-science projects called Zooniverse to determine the implications of public...

About 23% of the Universe is made up of mysterious "˜dark matter', invisible material only detected through its gravitational influence on its surroundings. Now two astronomers based at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) have found a hint of the way it behaves near black holes. Their results appear in a letter in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.In the early Universe clumps of dark matter are thought to have attracted gas, which then coalesced...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 27 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Astronomers studying two exploding stars, or supernovae, have found evidence the blasts received an extra boost from newborn black holes. The supernovae were found to emit jets of particles traveling at more than half the speed of light. (Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO ) Previously, the only catastrophic events known to produce such high-speed jets were gamma-ray bursts, the universe's most luminous explosions....

A massive old star is about to die a spectacular death. As its nuclear fuel runs out, it begins to collapse under its own tremendous weight. The crushing pressure inside the star skyrockets, triggering new nuclear reactions, setting the stage for a terrifying blast. And then... nothing happens.At least that's what supercomputers have been telling astrophysicists for decades. Many of the best computer models of supernova explosions fail to produce an explosion. Instead, according to the...

NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission launched successfully at 9:09am EST today.After a one-month checkout, the mission will spend the next nine months mapping the cosmos in infrared light. It will cover the whole sky one-and-a-half times, snapping millions of pictures of everything from near-Earth asteroids to faraway galaxies bursting with new stars."The last time we mapped the whole sky at these particular infrared wavelengths was 26 years ago," said Edward...