Little Star Twinkles, Then Vanishes
[/caption] Swift has made another unusual discovery. The orbiting satellite detected a very strange star that "twinkled" with gamma rays,…
The Telescope Has a Birthday Party
[/caption] All sorts of anniversaries going on these days -- yesterday was NASA's 50th birthday, on Saturday, Oct. 4 is…
Best Ground-Based Image of Jupiter — Ever!
[/caption] Everyone loves twinkling stars and moonlit nights—EXCEPT astronomers. But astronomers are crafty people, so they've come up with ways…
Astronaut vs. Earth: The World’s Most Extreme Chess Match Begins
[/caption] In one of the grandest chess challenges ever attempted, a Canadian space station astronaut will contemplate his moves from…
Reflections of NASA at 50
NASA turns 50 years old today. On Oct. 1, 1958 the National Advisory Council on Aeronautics (NACA) officially became the…
Uranus Pictures
So far, only one spacecraft has ever captured an image of Uranus: NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraft. So let's take a…
Mass of Uranus
[/caption] The mass of Uranus is 8.68 x 1025 kg. Want to put that in perspective? That's 14.536 times more…
Tilt of Uranus
[/caption] The Earth's axis is tilted about 23.5 degrees. This is why we have seasons on Earth. But the axis…
Size of Uranus
[/caption] Sure, Uranus is big... but how big is it? There are so many ways we can measure the size…
Gravity on Uranus
[/caption] If you could stand on the surface of Uranus (you can't, for so many reasons), you would experience 89%…