Matthew Williams

Matt Williams is a space journalist, science communicator, and author with several published titles and studies. His work is featured in The Ross 248 Project and Interstellar Travel edited by NASA alumni Les Johnson and Ken Roy. He also hosts the podcast series Stories from Space at ITSP Magazine. He lives in beautiful British Columbia with his wife and family. For more information, check out his website.

Recent Articles

The World Welcomes the Crew of Artemis II Home!

April 15, 2026

After achieving their record-breaking 10-day flight around the Moon, the crew of the Artemis II mission returned home on Friday, April 10th, 2026.
Exploring the Moon's Shadowy Craters With Nuclear-Powered Rovers

April 15, 2026

Rovers equipped with Radioisotope Power Systems (RPSs), aka. nuclear reactors, could effectively explore the craters in the Moon's southern polar region.
A New Study Narrows the Search for Water on the Moon

April 13, 2026

A new study challenges old assumptions by revealing that water on the Moon likely came from multiple sources over billions of years, rather than from a single major deposit long ago.
Student Team Finds One of the Oldest Stars in the Universe that Migrated to the Milky Way

April 10, 2026

A class of undergraduate students at University of Chicago has used data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) to discover one of the oldest stars in the universe, a star that formed in a companion galaxy and migrated to the Milky Way.
Why Does Jupiter Have More Large Moons than Saturn?

April 10, 2026

The two largest planets in our Solar System, Jupiter and Saturn, have the largest systems of moons. However, Jupiter has more large moons than Saturn, which has only one. Since both planets are gas giants, the reasons for the differences in these satellite systems have long puzzled astronomers. This motivated a collaborative team of researchers from Japan and China to develop a physically consistent model that can explain this.
NASA Releases Images of Artemis II's Flight Behind the Moon

April 09, 2026

The first flyby images of the Moon captured by NASA’s Artemis II astronauts during their historic test flight reveal some regions no human has seen, including a rare in-space solar eclipse. Released Tuesday, astronauts captured the images April 6 during the mission’s seven-hour flyby of the lunar far side, showing humanity’s return to the Moon’s […]
Webb's Picture of the Month Features Two Planet-Forming Disks and a Possible Planet

April 08, 2026

Two images of protoplanetary disks side-by-side. The left image shows a dark horizontal band covering the star, with broad, colorful, conical outflows above and below it, and a narrow jet pointing directly up and down from the star. The right image shows the star within a yellow dusty disk, with scattered dust creating purple lobes above and below the disk. Each is on a black background with several galaxies or stars around it.
A Mercury Rover Could Explore the Planet by Sticking to the Terminator

April 08, 2026

A Mercury lander mission would create opportunities to sample unique geological features. However, extreme temperature fluctuations on Mercury’s surface pose challenges for exploration on the planetary surface. In a narrow region near the terminator, temperate conditions would allow a rover to run on solar power and collect data and surface samples without needing to withstand the extreme heat.
SuperCDM Experiment Reaches Critical Temperature, Bringing it One Step Closer to Detecting Dark Matter

April 07, 2026

The Super Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (SuperCDMS) experiment has reached its coldest operating temperature, hundreds of times colder than outer space.
Artemis II Mission Shares New Photo of Earth

April 05, 2026

NASA astronaut and Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman took this picture of Earth from the Orion spacecraft's window after completing the translunar injection burn. There are two auroras (top right and bottom left) and zodiacal light (bottom right) is visible as the Earth eclipses the Sun.
If Life Exists in Venus' Atmosphere, It Could Have Come From Earth

April 04, 2026

A new study presented at the 2026 LPSC suggests that if life does exist in Venus' clouds, there's a chance it came from Earth.
An Aerobot With ISRU Capabilities Could Explore Venus' Atmosphere for Years

April 03, 2026

In a new proposal, a team of scientists explores how aerial robotic platforms (areobots) with in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) capability could operate for years in Venus' atmosphere.
The Artemis Generation Begins! Artemis II Launches for the Moon

April 02, 2026

At 06:25 p.m. EDT (03:25 p.m. PDT) on April 1st, the Artemis II mission lifted off from the historic Launch Pad-39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This mission will send astronauts on a ten-day journey around the Moon and will be the first crewed mission to venture beyond Low Earth Orbit (LEO) since the Apollo Era.
The Largest Survey of Exoplanet Spins Confirms a Long-held Theory

April 01, 2026

For some time, astronomers have theorized that there is a connection between planetary mass and rotation. Using the W.M. Keck Observatory on Maunakea, Hawai'i, a team of astronomers confirmed this relationship by studying dozens of gas giants and brown dwarfs in distant star systems.
To Celebrate the Coming of Spring, NASA Releases Images of "Blossoming" Stellar Nurseries

March 30, 2026

This collection of images from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes contains regions where stars are forming. Often nicknamed “stellar nurseries,” they are cosmic gardens from which stars – not plants – emerge from the interstellar soil of gas and dust.
Exomoons Could Be Habitable for Billions of Years, Provided they have Hydrogen Atmospheres

March 28, 2026

Liquid water is considered essential for life. Surprisingly, however, stable conditions that are conducive to life could exist far from any sun. A research team from the Excellence Cluster ORIGINS at LMU and the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE) has shown that moons around free-floating planets can keep their water oceans liquid for up to 4.3 billion years by virtue of dense hydrogen atmospheres and tidal heating—that is to say, for almost as long as Earth has existed and sufficient time for complex life to develop.
Uncovering the Effects of Microgravity on Liver Metabolism

March 26, 2026

A team led by Professor Mian Long from the Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China, investigated the effects of space microgravity on cultured liver cells aboard the China Space Station.
The Future of Space Stations - Part II: Commercial Space

March 25, 2026

With the ISS set to retire in 2030, several plans are in place to replace it. These include existing space stations, proposals by rising national space agencies, and commercial space stations. In terms of the commercial space sector, the plans are diverse and numerous.
Rubin Alert Leads to First Follow-Up Observations and Detection of Four Supernovae

March 23, 2026

NSF NOIRLab has completed end-to-end runs of its ecosystem for following up on alerts from NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory. The runs demonstrated how multiple NOIRLab-developed software tools, plus a network of telescopes around the globe, will enable quick follow-up observations of the countless transient objects that Rubin will uncover during its ten-year survey.
How Will Martian Gravity Affect Skeletal Muscle?

March 21, 2026

Marie Mortreux, an assistant professor in the University of Rhode Island’s College of Health Sciences, is part of an international team of researchers studying how the Mars’s gravity would affect astronauts’ skeletal muscle.