9 October 2023
With the recent launch of the Psyche mission and the return of samples from the asteroid Bennu, asteroids are all the rage – but if they're just big rocks floating in the void, why do scientists care so much about them?
21 September 2023
Dwarf planets aren’t expected to carry liquid water, but hints of surprising geological activity spotted with JWST indicate that some of them might have buried oceans
30 August 2023
The discovery of Homo floresiensis revolutionised the study of human evolution, but it was rocked by accusations of theft. Twenty years on, here's the full story behind the episode
9 August 2023
A “failed star” known as a brown dwarf is orbiting so tightly with a small star that both of them would fit inside our sun, and at least one of them won’t survive
19 July 2023
This is a question of how we define “Earth”, say our readers, but we also need to consider when light from the young sun could have pierced Earth’s atmosphere
27 June 2023
Many planets are thought to be flung away from their stars, but it’s possible that some get trapped on the way out – and one could be lurking at the edge of our own solar system
22 April 2023
An abridged inventory of everything there is in the universe – from rogue planets and exomoons to supernovae, supermassive black holes and the cosmic web.
11 April 2023
Some planets outside our solar system are thought to be tidally locked, with one side always facing their star, creating a world divided into hot and cold. Now, it seems this set-up may not be permanent after all, allowing the two sides to flip
7 April 2023
Philosophers have long debated whether Earth is the best of all worlds. More powerful telescopes are finally giving us a better chance of answering this question, writes astronomer Chris Impey
26 January 2023
The planet 8 Ursae Minoris b should have been destroyed when its star became a red giant, but it continues to orbit strangely close to it
