Tianwen-2 unravelling the secrets of asteroids

On 27 December 2024, the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) telescope in Rio Hurtado in Chile discovered asteroid 2024 YR4 speeding past Earth. The detection could have been too lat

Where did life on Earth begin? That sounds like a relatively straightforward question. Surely life on Earth began… well, on Earth, right? We know this planet had the right conditions for life to arise

Two contrasting visions of humanity’s future in space

It was 15 years ago this month, on 13 June 2010, that the world watched as a beleaguered traveller finally arrived home, after a long and perilous journey back to land. The trouble began in 2003, as A

New data suggests that dark energy’s pulling power is changing Dark energy’s pull could be weakening over time, according to new results from the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) collaborat

Ten years ago, Pluto emerged from the gloom at the Solar System’s ragged edge – and a new world came in from the cold. Five billion kilometres (3 billion miles) from Earth, on 14 July 2015, NASA’s pia