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Â鶹´«Ã½. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Lost in Space-Time

Each month, we hand over the keyboard to a physicist or mathematician to tell you about fascinating ideas from their corner of the universe. You can sign up to the Lost in Space-Time newsletter here.
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Astronauts on Mars might trip up less if they can hear their footsteps

Space

Astronauts on Mars might trip up less if they can hear their footsteps

Spacesuits tend to muffle sounds, but hearing our footsteps may provide useful cues about our environment and reduce the risk of tripping

News

rat contemplating time

Life

Rats can track the passage of time and judge their accuracy

News

Anna Menon, Scott Poteet, Jared Isaacman and Sarah Gillis

Space

SpaceX is planning its highest Dragon flight yet, with a private crew

no-section

DON'T LOOK UP (L to R) Cate Blanchett as Brie Evantee and Tyler Perry as Jack Bremmer, Leonardo DiCaprio as Dr. Randall Mindy, and Jennifer Lawrence as Kate Dibiasky. Cr. Niko Tavernise / Netflix ?? 2021

Space

Don’t Look Up: Could we save Earth from a comet in just six months?

News

New Chandra observations have been used to make the first detection of X-ray emission from young stars with masses similar to our Sun outside our Milky Way galaxy. The Chandra observations of these low-mass stars were made of the region known as the

Space

Rare intergalactic supernova may have been seen outside the Milky Way

News

Artist's illustration of the Local Bubble

Space

Huge gas bubble that contains the solar system mapped for first time

News

simulation of star formation

Space

Watch the best ever simulation of stars being born in a cosmic cloud

News

What the thermodynamics of clocks tell us about the mysteries of time

Physics

What the thermodynamics of clocks tell us about the mysteries of time

Features

A major component of NASA?s Psyche spacecraft has been delivered to NASA?s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, where the phase known as assembly, test, and launch operations (ATLO) is now underway. This photo, shot March 28, 2021 shows engineers and technicians preparing to move the Solar Electric Propulsion (SEP) Chassis from its shipping container to a dolly in High Bay 1 of JPL?s Spacecraft Assembly Facility. The photo was captured just after the chassis was delivered to JPL by Maxar Technologies. Maxar?s team in Palo Alto, California, designed and built the SEP Chassis, which includes all the primary and secondary structure and the hardware components needed for the high-power electrical system, the propulsion system, the thermal system, guidance and navigation sensors and actuators, and the high-gain antenna. Over the next year, additional hardware will be added to the spacecraft including the command and data handling system, a power distribution assembly, the X-band telecommunications hardware suite, three science instruments (two imagers, two magnetometers, and a gamma ray neutron Spectrometer), and a deep space optical communications technology demonstrator. The spacecraft will finish assembly and then undergo rigorous checkout and testing before being shipped to NASA?s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, for an August 2022 launch to the main asteroid belt. Psyche will arrive at the metal-rich asteroid of the same name in 2026, orbiting for 21 months to investigate its composition. Scientists think that Psyche is made up of mostly iron and nickel ? similar to Earth?s core. Exploring the asteroid could give valuable insight into how our own planet and others formed. Arizona State University in Tempe leads the mission. JPL is responsible for the mission?s overall management, system engineering, integration and test, and mission operations. For more information about NASA?s Psyche mission, go to: http://www.nasa.gov/psyche or https://psyche.asu.edu/ Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Space

2022 preview: A round-up of the year's most exciting space missions

News

Hayabusa 2 near Ryugu

Space

Sample of asteroid Ryugu brought to Earth is a strange dark colour

Last year, Japan’s Hayabusa 2 asteroid explorer returned samples from the asteroid Ryugu, and now the first analysis of the rock shows it has a primitive composition and a curiously dark colour

News

Space

2021 in review: Space tourism begins – for billionaires, anyway

News

Space

Monster cloud of plasma spotted spewing out of a distant star

News

Space

High-tech space sleeping bag could stop vision problems in astronauts

News

Space

NASA is launching X-ray telescope to study the science of black holes

News

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