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Right at the center of this image, there's a dim orange dot. Somewhere around that dot, one of the stars in a binary system once went supernova, creating the vast red gaseous remnant you see all around it. More »
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While the faster-than-light neutrinos are grabbing all the physics-shattering attention, there's another strange, unexplained anomaly that might be about to rewrite our understanding of the cosmos. It's all because the universe isn't as monotonous as it should be. More »
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The 2011 Nobel Prizes have been announced, honoring preeminent achievements in the fields of physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, the promotion of peace, and economics. Here's what you need to know about the three science-related Nobel Prizes. More »
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A basic fact of the universe is that space is a dark, black expanse that's only broken up by the lights of stars and galaxies. But that wasn't always the case — space was once a dense, opaque fog. More »
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The Bolshoi Simulation is a massive, incredibly detailed model of everything, providing a comprehensive simulation of the universe's 14 billion year history. Scientists are now exploring the simulation, and we've got some of the most breathtaking results of their efforts. More »
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Modern physics assumes the universe is the same all over... but that might not be the case. Until recently, physics held that the universe was contracting... now we're stuck with dark energy. But one moderately insane new theory could explain it all. More »
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We still haven't found the Higgs boson, the hypothetical particle that explains why other particles possess mass. But that might not be the only cosmic mystery the Higgs can solve. It could also explain how the universe got its shape. More »
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The cosmological principle holds that the universe has the same structure and basic properties wherever you go. It's been a fundamental part of physics since Copernicus, and all available evidence has supported it...until now. More »
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That green clump might not be much to look at, but it's one of the rarest sights in the cosmos: a Lyman-alpha blob. They're among the universe's biggest structures, and only now are we starting to understand how they work. More »
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At first glance, this looks like just another star field. But almost every source of light in this image is actually one of the 190 galaxies making up the massive Perseus Cluster, one of the nearest such clusters to Earth. More »
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One of the strangest and most exotic theories to come out of theoretical physics is that the entire universe is a projection of a two-dimensional shell. But the latest evidence suggests the cosmic hologram really is just a crazy theory. More »
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Dark energy is perhaps the most mysterious thing in the cosmos, and yet it accounts for 73% of the observable universe. What's more, the amount of dark energy seems to be increasing...and that could ultimately rip apart the entire universe. More »
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Gravity forces galaxies that are relatively close together to form clusters, which in turn form superclusters between vast stretches of cosmic void. But now there's an even bigger level of organization...and we have no idea how to explain it. More »
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This awesome map shows the universe around us in the grandest scale possible, with each tiny dot representing a different galaxy. Thanks to this cosmic atlas, you'll never again mix up the Corona Borealis Supercluster with the Large Magellanic Cloud. More »
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How we see the universe is defined by where we're standing, and that can create some fundamental misconceptions about the cosmos. Case in point: this time-lapse video that reminds us it isn't the stars that are moving...it's the Earth itself. More »
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White holes are the opposite of black holes, objects into which nothing can enter but are constantly spewing out matter. They were thought to be completely hypothetical, more a mathematical oddity than a real thing...but we may have seen one. More »
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This star may not look like much, but in 1923 it changed our understanding of the universe forever. It showed us that the Milky Way wasn't a lonely island universe, but instead just one of billions and billions of galaxies. More »
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One of the problems of living inside our galaxy is that it can be devilishly tricky figuring out exactly what the Milky Way actually looks like. We might have discovered a whole new arm of our galaxy...and it's very strange. More »
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The atomic clocks we've already got are marvels of precision timekeeping, but their successors could be something else altogether, losing less than a second every 80 billion years. That could allow us to probe some of physics's most fundamental questions. More »
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The early cosmos might have been full of giant stars spinning 250 times faster than our own sun rotates. These strange spinstars died out after just 30 million years, but they might well have changed the universe forever. More »
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Once you get past the Milky Way and the handful of galaxies that are right around us, these brilliant, faraway galaxies of the Virgo Cluster are the closest thing we've got to neighbors in this vast, largely empty universe. More »
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This strange purple plume that dwarfs the Moon is what we'd see if our eyes could perceive radio waves. These jets, over a million light-years long, are spewing from the massive black hole in the Centaurus A galaxy. More »
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Everything in this image is so far away that it defies our comprehension. And yet we're also looking at two vastly different scales here, as stars from well within our own galaxy share space with a far distant spiral galaxy. More »
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This is a map of the entire universe, specifically of the cosmic microwave background radiation that formed as a remnant of the Big Bang. And the circled region is where the CMB is so cold that it defies easy explanation. More »
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Until recently, astronomers believed that the first stars were ultra-giants which blew themselves apart long ago. Now a new model of the universe suggests that some the first stars of the universe may still be burning today. More »
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The universe is so unimaginably large that parts of it are literally impossible to see, because their light is too distant to reach us even after 14 billion years. Now we might know just how big the cosmos really is. Turns out everything we can see is less than half a percent of the entire universe. More »
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The Hubble telescope has spotted the oldest galaxy in the universe. It's a frenetic cauldron of hot blue stars, and it's only about 480 million years younger than the Big Bang itself. More »
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The most massive 3D map of the night sky has been released. It contains a trillion pixels and would require 500,000 high-definition TVs to view in its entirety. These images represent just the tiniest fraction of the full map. More »
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The eternal inflation model says that there's an infinite number of universes, with new universes constantly popping into existence and expanding outwards. Every so often, these new universes might collide. Our universe has four "bruises" possibly caused by these collisions. More »
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Large groups of galaxies come together to form clusters, and those clusters are linked together by vast streams of hot gas known as filaments. These intergalactic links reach temperatures well over a million degrees and are almost completely invisible...until now. More »
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The world's most powerful particle accelerator smashed together lead nuclei at the highest energies possible, creating dense sub-atomic particles that reach temperatures of over ten trillion degrees. Beyond being awesome, this achievement shows the early universe was actually a liquid. More »
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The laws of physics only work in a finite universe, but we likely live in an infinite multiverse. Resolving this discrepancy could mean a 50-50 chance time will end in 3.7 billion years. Yeah, this one's going to get weird. More »
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Global warming really isn't just a local problem...universal warming ran through the universe 11 billion years ago, doubling the temperature of intergalactic helium. The cosmic temperature spike was so bad, it stopped galaxies from developing for 500 million years. More »
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This is a full-sky shot of the universe's long wavelength light courtesy of the European Space Association's Planck telescope. This image reveals ancient cosmic microwave background radiation and the dust and gas that are the building blocks of stars. More »
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Nikita's star has been cast... and it's not Maggie Q. The Cape gets a supervillain, and Transformers 3 may lose a key human castmember. Plus tons of details on Doctor Who's season opener and the Planet Of The Apes prequel! More »
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Has the classic Stargate been shuttered forever? You'd think MGM and NBC/Universal would welcome another Stargate direct-to-DVD movie after fans greeted the first two with open wallets. But sadly, Michael Shanks says another SG-1 film might be DOA. More »
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Stargate Universe, what are we going to do with you? After last week's challenging episode, you give us a mind-numbingly dull and frustrating episode, which could have ruled. Instead, we were treated to more pointless sex scenes and stir fry. More »
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We were lucky enough to interview two new Stargate Universe crew members, played by Ming-Na and David Blue. We took the opportunity to grill Blue on his Gater know-how and find out all we could about Eli. More »
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Here's Syfy's "sizzle reel" from their upfront presentation to advertisers. It includes better looks at upcoming shows Warehouse 13, Caprica, Eureka the Tin Man-esque TV movie Alice... and best of all, more Stargate Universe goodness. More »
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Television comes back after its long holiday nap, with the final Stargate Atlantis. We've got clips from the series finale to say goodbye Sheppard, Ronon, and sweet McKay... we'll miss you most of all. More »
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