NASA is featuring the first high-resolution images of asteroid Vesta as taken by the DAWN spacecraft during a low-altitude orbit. The images show a very interesting surface, battered with old and…

Galaxies are theorized to have massive black holes at their centers but the one in the Milky Way is the only supermassive black hole  close enough for astronomers to study in detail. A recent…

Type Ia supernovae, the extraordinarily bright "standard candles" astronomers use to measure cosmic growth which led to the theory of dark energy in 1998 and 13 years later to a Nobel Prize  "…

Queue the 'life on other planets' media buzz.  NASA's Kepler Mission has discovered the first super-Earth orbiting in the habitable zone of a star similar to our Sun. The host star lies about…

Cosmic particle accelerators may be more efficient than previously thought, according to a discovery which has revealed the initial stages of acceleration for the first time. In space, large magnetic…

Is the author of 'open notebook astronomy' an idiot?  Over at 365DOA, there is a full article on open notebook astronomy.  What is open notebook?  Making your data and your work…

The last few years have seen a real spike in end-of-the-world conspiracy theories.  Why?  More asteroids, more flares, more earthquakes?  No, just more Internet to talk about them,…

Scientists have found pristine clouds of the primordial gas that formed just after the Big Bang and it matches the composition made by predictions, which adds to direct evidence in support of the…

It is approaching fast. And it is big. The next NEO (Near-Earth Object) encounter that is. This Tuesday, a 400 m (1,300 ft) diameter rock, known as 2005 YU55, will pass by earth at a distance that is…

A total solar eclipse - There are waves above you too It is a scene to watch - the dark shadow move across the land and sea when the moon comes in front of the sun and the earth during a total…