The now-waning Moon is passing through Pisces in the early-morning sky. Our satellite slides 3° north of Neptune at 6 A.M. EDT, then passes 4° north of Saturn at 7 A.M. EDT. It’s a lovely view for early risers, who can catch the scene in the few hours before dawn. Two hours before sunrise, theContinue reading "The Sky Today on Wednesday, July 16: The Moon hangs with Neptune and Saturn"

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Sotheby’s in New York will be auctioning the largest martian meteorite ever found on Earth on Wednesday as part of a natural history-themed sale. Known as NWA 16788, it was found in Niger in November 2023 by a meteorite hunter. The meteorite, which is red, brown, and gray in color, measures 15 by 11 byContinue reading "The biggest piece of Mars on Earth is up for auction tomorrow"

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Ron Brecher from Guelph, Ontario, Canada The dwarf galaxy IC 2574 is also known as Coddington’s Nebula, having been discovered by American astronomer Edwin Foster Coddington in 1898, when the nature of galaxies was not yet known. In Hydrogen-alpha light, bright knotty clumps indicate prodigious amounts of star formation. This image comprises just over 17Continue reading "A knotty galaxy"

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Author(s): Jingcheng Zhou and Chunhui (Rita) Du

Two independent groups optimize diamond-based quantum sensing by using more than 100 such sensors in parallel.

[Physics 18, 132] Published Mon Jul 14, 2025

Born July 15, 1943, Jocelyn Bell Burnell is a British astrophysicist best known for her discovery of pulsars. In 1967, when she was a graduate student in radio astronomy at the University of Cambridge, Bell Burnell noticed “scruff” in the data she was reviewing from the Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory. Bell Burnell jokingly called thisContinue reading "July 15, 1943: Birth of Jocelyn Bell Burnell"

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The center of the Milky Way is on display during summer evenings, arcing slowly through the southern sky. The galactic center is located near the magnitude 4.5 star 3 Sagittarii, which sits just 4.7° northwest (to the upper right, late this evening if you’re facing south) of Gamma (γ) Sgr, the star at the tipContinue reading "The Sky Today on Tuesday, July 15: Great views of the galactic center"

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Massimo Tamajo from Syracuse, Sicily, Italy The effects of atmospheric refraction can distort the appearance of the Sun near the horizon — especially when atmospheric inversions are created above an ocean that is cooler than the air above it.

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In a universe governed by turbulence and chaos, perfection is rarely more than a mathematical ideal. Yet astronomers are puzzling over a newfound object that seems to defy that rule: a glowing, nearly flawless circular shell of gas and dust, likely the remnant of a long-dead star, that has remarkably preserved its shape in aContinue reading "Astronomers discover a perfectly spherical supernova remnant"

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Mission Highlight: Gilmour Eris Testflight 1 After weeks of delays, Australia is finally poised to join the orbital launch club. Gilmour Space Technologies is expected to debut its Eris rocket with a test launch from Queensland’s Bowen Orbital Spaceport no earlier than (NET) July 16. The three-stage rocket, powered by hybrid engines fueled by aContinue reading "Gilmour aims for orbit again as Starlink surges continue"

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In this episode, Astronomy magazine Editor Dave Eicher invites you to head out and observe M4, the wonderful globular cluster in the constellation Scorpius the Scorpion. You can use the Scorpion’s brightest star, 1st-magnitude Antares, as your guide. Although sharp-eyed observers may pick this up with their naked eyes, its swarms of stars look best through aContinue reading "This Week in Astronomy with Dave Eicher: Globular cluster M4"

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In a July 10 markup meeting, the Senate Appropriations Committee, responsible for crafting the specific spending bills that allocate federal funds across the government, pushed back against President Trump’s proposed FY2026 budget. The comments signaled bipartisan resistance in the Senate to steep cuts in federal science funding. The president’s proposed budget, released in May, aimedContinue reading "Senate appropriations committee pushes back on 2026 NASA budget cuts"

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Why will our Sun expel its outer layers as it dies? Daniel StanyerAugusta, Kansas First, let’s discriminate between expansion and expulsion. Expansion happens because the thermal pressure from the increased energy production in the Sun’s interior exceeds the gravitational force keeping the Sun’s matter close to its core. The Sun will expand until a newContinue reading "Why will our Sun expel its outer layers as it dies? "

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New Horizons launched in January 2006, and by July 14, 2015, it had reached its primary goal: Pluto. The first spacecraft to study Pluto up close, it conducted measurements of Pluto’s atmosphere, mapped the surface geology, observed Pluto’s moons. New Horizons also investigated the dwarf planet’s interior structure, adding support to the theory that PlutoContinue reading "July 14, 2015: New Horizon arrives at Pluto"

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Saturn stands stationary amid the stars of Pisces at 4 A.M. EDT. It is followed two hours later by asteroid 3 Juno, which reaches its stationary point in Libra at 6 A.M. EDT.  Only Saturn is visible in the morning sky, while Juno is up after sunset. Starting in the morning, look for magnitude 0.9Continue reading "The Sky Today on Monday, July 14: Saturn and Juno are stationary"

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On July 13, 1969, the Soviet Union launched Luna 15, an unmanned spacecraft seen as a rival to the American Apollo 11 mission, which launched just three days later. Luna 15’s goal was to land on the Moon, collect rock samples, and return to Earth before the Apollo astronauts. But the heightened moment of competitionContinue reading "July 13, 1969: Luna 15 launches"

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Venus passes 3° north of Aldebaran in Taurus at midnight EDT; the pair is visible in the early-morning sky, well positioned in the east for two hours before sunrise.  Venus is notably brighter — magnitude –4.1, far outshining magnitude 0.9 Aldebaran, the brightest star in the Taurus and cataloged as Alpha (α) Tauri. Together, theContinue reading "The Sky Today on Sunday, July 13: The Bull has two eyes"

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Author(s): Michael Schirber

A detailed analysis of a stellar cluster has led to a possible explanation for several fast-moving runaway stars around the cluster.

[Physics 18, 134] Published Fri Jul 11, 2025

Author(s): Charles Day

An arrangement of spins known as a meron turns out to be easier to make in momentum space than in real space.

[Physics 18, s91] Published Thu Jul 10, 2025

The Soviet Union launched Phobos 2 on July 12, 1988, the second of two uncrewed probes designed to study Mars, moons Phobos and Deimos, the Sun, and the interplanetary environment. Each probe was equipped with 25 instruments including high-energy detectors; X-ray and solar photometers; infrared, ultrasound, and gamma-ray spectrometers; and more. Phobos 1 was lostContinue reading "July 12, 1988: Phobos 2 launches"

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Already high in the east an hour after sunset is the constellation Lyra the Lyre, easy to locate thanks to its brightest star, magnitude 0 Vega. Tonight, we’re looking southeast of this star at M56, an 8th-magnitude globular cluster in near the border of Lyra and Cygnus. In fact, one of the easiest ways toContinue reading "The Sky Today on Saturday, July 12: M56 in Lyra"

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Xiaofeng Qu, taken from Lijiang, Yunnan, China The Geminid meteor shower appears to rain down upon the Gaomeigu Astronomical Observatory (altitude: 10,500 feet [3,200 meters]) in this carefully composed 10-panel panorama. Also visible are numerous Hα features glowing across the sky, like the Orion Loop just above the observatory dome. The imager used 4 NikonContinue reading "High-altitude shower"

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I thought I’d write a bit about several eye-related topics. First up is resolution, which is the ability to see details in objects. We have decreased resolution at night, and little color vision as well, for multiple reasons: reduced numbers of retinal cells firing, the color shift in sensitivity vs. the focus ability of theContinue reading "Michael’s Miscellany: The Eyes Have It"

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There is a battle brewing over ownership of a retired NASA space shuttle. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law by President Donald Trump at the White House last week, sets aside $85 million to relocate the space shuttle Discovery from its current home at the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in northernContinue reading "Smithsonian pushing back on plans to relocate space shuttle"

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On July 11, 1801, French astronomer Jean-Louis Pons made his first comet discovery, c/1801 N1. When he’d began his career in 1789 as a doorkeeper (essentially, a concierge) at Marseille Observatory, the directors had recognized his talents and taught him more about astronomy. That background, combined with his exceptional observational skills and the ability toContinue reading "July 11, 1801: Jean-Louis Pons finds his first comet"

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There’s a demon in the early-morning sky, amid the stars of Perseus the Hero. Second-magnitude Algol (Beta Persei) is also famously known as the Demon Star, and you can spot it two hours before sunrise, standing 30° high in the east, to the upper left of the Pleiades.  Algol is dubbed a demon because everyContinue reading "The Sky Today on Friday, July 11: The demon in the morning sky"

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Sky This Week is brought to you in part by Celestron. Friday, July 11The Moon passes just 0.02° north of the dim, distant dwarf planet Pluto at 7 P.M. EDT. However, the bright light from our satellite will make Pluto — already a challenging object requiring the largest amateur instruments — even more difficult toContinue reading "The Sky This Week from July 11 to 18: The Moon hangs with Saturn and Neptune"

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President Donald Trump announced Wednesday evening that U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy would serve as an “interim administrator” of NASA. “He will be a fantastic leader of the ever more important Space Agency, even if only for a short period of time,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social, his social media platform.Continue reading "Trump taps Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy as ‘interim’ NASA head"

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Chuck Ayoub from Redford, MI Globular cluster M53 in Coma Berenices (at right) is accompanied by fainter NGC 5053 (at left). Astronomers have reported evidence for a tidal tail, suggesting the pair have interacted in the past. The imager took 2.5 hours of exposure with a Celestron RASA 8-inch f/2 scope and a one-shot colorContinue reading "An ancient pair"

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Quasars were a mystery when first discovered in the early 1960s. They are extremely distant, starlike objects that emit enormous amounts of energy. Years later, astronomers understood that quasars are the extremely energetic centers of young galaxies, powered by supermassive black holes. The fact that they are mostly young (the black holes generally quiet downContinue reading "Deep-Sky Dreams: NGC 3079 and Quasar 0957+561   "

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Few authors have had as big an impact on space journalism as Jeffrey Kluger. His 1994 book Lost Moon, co-authored with Astronaut James Lovell, was the basis for the 1995 film Apollo 13, which starred Tom Hanks and was directed by Ron Howard. Other books by Kluger have focused on the flight of Apollo 8 and NASA’s unmannedContinue reading "Behind the scenes of NASA’s Project Gemini: Astronomy chats with Jeffrey Kluger"

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Inventor Nikola Tesla was born July 10, 1856, in what is now Croatia (then part of the Austrian Empire). In 1899, Tesla recorded cosmic radio waves in his Colorado Springs, Colorado, laboratory. Though he believed the waves were extraterrestrial signals from another planet, today we know that they are part of the spectrum of anContinue reading "July 10, 1856: The birth of Nicola Tesla"

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Author(s): Charles Day

A mechanism for accelerating charged particles in astrophysical plasmas has been reproduced with cold atoms in an optical trap.

[Physics 18, 131] Published Wed Jul 09, 2025

Author(s): Ryan Wilkinson

A new algorithm efficiently ranks competitors in settings ranging from sports tournaments to food-preference surveys.

[Physics 18, s80] Published Wed Jul 09, 2025

Author(s): Susan Curtis

Experiments with turbulent waves show that energy spreads from small to large scales, producing a steady-state regime that can be described using classical thermodynamics.

[Physics 18, 129] Published Tue Jul 08, 2025

Author(s): Ryan Wilkinson

A fluid made of light can simulate a black hole’s boundary, providing insights into the mysterious quantum phenomena that occur at such a boundary.

[Physics 18, s92] Published Tue Jul 08, 2025

Full Moon occurs at 4:37 P.M. EDT this afternoon and will rise in the southeast around the time the Sun is setting in the northwest. The July Full Moon is also called the Buck Moon, and this month our satellite also rises at its farthest point south in 18.6 years: some 7° more southerly thanContinue reading "The Sky Today on Thursday, July 10: The Full Buck Moon swings low"

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When President Donald Trump signed the “One Big Beautiful Bill” into law on July 4, an amendment to the legislation introduced by Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) provided NASA with additional funding beyond the standard fiscal year 2025 budget. This extra money — around $9.9 billion — is intended to support key programs like Artemis, theContinue reading "Congress adds Artemis funding to Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” backing NASA’s Moon return plans"

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On July 9, 1979, NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft came within 404,003 miles (650,180 kilometers) of Jupiter. Launched in August 1977, the Voyager probes were originally planned to study Jupiter and Saturn. Voyager 1 arrived at Jupiter in March 1979, and Voyager 2 followed a few months later. Equipped with narrow- and wide-angle cameras, an interferometer,Continue reading "July 9, 1979: Voyager 2’s Jupiter visit"

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Adriano Anfuso/Vikas Chander The elliptical galaxy NGC 474 (lower right) contains multiple shell-like structures and tidal tails as a result of past interactions with other galaxies. The galaxy is currently interacting with a neighboring spiral galaxy, NGC 470 (just to its left). The lenticular galaxy NGC 467 (at left) is a background galaxy, more thanContinue reading "Shells of its former self"

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Venus hangs below the Pleiades in the early-morning sky today. The bright planet is quickly closing in on Taurus’ brightest star, Aldebaran, which it will pass closely next week. Step outside 90 minutes before sunrise to spot blazing Venus (magnitude –4.1) about 8.4° below the Pleiades open cluster (M45) in the east. The planet isContinue reading "The Sky Today on Wednesday, July 9: Venus and the Pleiades"

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In July 1992, Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 made its closest approach to Jupiter, skimming 25,000 miles (40,000 km) above Jupiter’s cloud tops. That put Shoemaker-Levy 9 within the gas giant’s Roche limit; the planet’s tidal forces broke the comet into more than 20 pieces, giving it a “string of pearls” appearance and setting the stage forContinue reading "July 8, 1992: Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 breaks up"

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Steve Leonard from Markham, Ontario, Canada The Spider Nebula (Sharpless 2–234, at right) weaves a tangled web next to the Fly, also known as NGC 1931 (at left). The imager used a dynamic Foraax palette on 20¼ hours of SHORGB data to bring out detail across the wide dynamic range of the scene, yielding detailContinue reading "Cosmic predation"

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Climbing to 60° high in the east two hours before sunrise, the constellation Andromeda lies just to the upper right of the easy-to-spot W-shaped constellation Cassiopeia. This morning, let’s enjoy a view of the star cluster NGC 7686 in northwestern Andromeda, about 3° northwest of 4th-magnitude Lambda (λ) Andromedae.  This bright group of stars shinesContinue reading "The Sky Today on Tuesday, July 8: Catch NGC 7686 in Andromeda"

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NGC 2685, often called the Helix Galaxy, is quite an unusual object. It is a lenticular (lens-shaped) galaxy that is also a polar ring galaxy, showing a ring of material at 90° orientation to its main axis, resulting from an interaction with a nearby galaxy. It is also a Seyfert Galaxy, its active nucleus powered byContinue reading "Deep-Sky Dreams: The Helix Galaxy   "

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Gilmour Space Technologies has officially announced that the earliest available launch window for its Eris rocket is no earlier than (NET) July 16. The launch was postponed on July 2 due to adverse weather conditions. The company confirmed the updated launch window on July 3, citing Australia’s regulatory requirement for a two-week notice to theContinue reading "Gilmour delays debut launch, Starlink flies into the week solo"

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Greg Meyer from Phoenix, Arizona Three objects fill this vista on the border of Cepheus and Cygnus: the Seahorse Nebula (Barnard 150) at left and the Fireworks Galaxy (NGC 6956) and open cluster NGC 6939 at right. The imager captured over 17 hours of exposure in LRGB filters with a 3.2-inch scope.

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In this episode, Astronomy magazine Editor Dave Eicher invites you to head out during the evening of July 7 and observe the pretty bright Moon passing Antares, also known as Alpha Scorpii. Look sharp, because the Moon’s light may hinder your view of the star, especially if your location has high clouds or smoke overhead. Good luck!

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How did a Cepheid variable star help Edwin Hubble prove the Andromeda Nebula was a galaxy?  Roger BradySan Quentin, California Cepheids are rare variable stars with periods ranging from about 1 to 120 days. Their light curve — a chart showing brightness over time — is characterized by rapid brightening followed by slow dimming inContinue reading "How did Edwin Hubble prove Andromeda was a galaxy?"

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Astronomers have spotted a rare cosmic duo: a neutron star that rotates nearly a hundred times every second locked in an ultra-tight orbit with a semi-shredded star. The scientists who found the pair say one of these stars swallowed the other whole and then spat it back out. It’s the first discovery of a millisecondContinue reading "‘Strange binary’: Astronomers discover a pulsar and a helium star orbiting each other"

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Author(s): Qihang Liu

A new symmetry-breaking scenario provides a comprehensive description of magnetic behavior associated with the anomalous Hall effect.

[Physics 18, 127] Published Mon Jul 07, 2025

Author(s): Sachin Rawat

A structural phenomenon traditionally confined to inanimate systems has now been observed in biology.

[Physics 18, 128] Published Mon Jul 07, 2025

Author(s): Rachel Berkowitz

Evidence builds against the long-held notion that water ice can be truly glassy.

[Physics 18, s86] Published Mon Jul 07, 2025