Science & Space

webb telescope finds evidence of mars sized planets colliding around young stars Astronomers call it an extreme debris disk: a violent stage that only around 1% of young stars appear to show any trace of, even though theory predicts it should be more common. A new survey using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope doesn't resolve that gap, but it does begin to reveal what happens inside these uncommon, dust-filled systems. Some of them appear to be the wreckage left behind when Mars-sized worlds slammed into one another.

Webb Telescope Finds Evidence of Mars-Sized Planets Colliding Around Young Stars

starships first trip around the earth slips to september 28 spacex says Thirteen launches in, Starship has still never completed a lap of the planet. That is supposed to change on Flight 14, which SpaceX now says it is targeting for Monday, September 28, with a 75-minute launch window that opens at 8:15AM Eastern Time.

Starship’s first trip around the Earth slips to September 28, SpaceX says

an atom made of muons is about to be dropped and einsteins gravity is the target A muon survives for roughly 2.2 microseconds. That sliver of time is the entire window a team at ETH Zurich and the Paul Scherrer Institute has to assemble an atom around one, fire it upward, and record how Earth's gravity bends its path.

An atom made of muons is about to be dropped — and Einstein’s gravity is the target

philadelphias refinery neighbors are fighting ai data centers that havent been proposed yet BloombergNEF now projects that by 2035, natural gas consumption at U.S. data centers will exceed that of Germany and Japan put together. The forecast is nearly twice what the same analysts published only nine months earlier.

Philadelphia’s refinery neighbors are fighting AI data centers that haven’t been proposed yet

rocket lab takes nasa to the gao over the 700 million mars orbiter award A $700 million contract to build, launch and operate a communications spacecraft at Mars has gone to Blue Origin. On Friday, the losing bidder took the decision to the US Government Accountability Office.

Rocket Lab takes NASA to the GAO over the $700 million Mars orbiter award

we asked hundreds of astrobiologists if weve found alien life only 6 6 said yes In a survey taken after the K2-18b announcement, just 6.6% of astrobiologists said they believed scientists had probably detected extraterrestrial life. Close to two-thirds rejected the idea entirely.

We Asked Hundreds of Astrobiologists If We’ve Found Alien Life — Only 6.6% Said Yes

alma confirms 3iatlas is drowning in methanol How unusual is this object? Two separate observing sessions in late 2025 supplied the number: methanol-to-hydrogen-cyanide ratios of roughly 70 and 120.

ALMA Confirms 3I/ATLAS Is Drowning in Methanol

a 2018 meerkat archive just yielded a direct detection of ancient hydrogen Seven years passed with the data sitting on a disk before anybody noticed the signal hiding inside it.

A 2018 MeerKAT Archive Just Yielded a Direct Detection of Ancient Hydrogen

spectrum reaches orbit europe finally has a privately built launcher Isar Aerospace's previous attempt to reach space ended half a minute after liftoff, when the rocket dropped into the sea and blew apart. That was back in March. On this occasion, the German firm's two-stage Spectrum climbed all the way to low Earth orbit.

Spectrum Reaches Orbit: Europe Finally Has a Privately Built Launcher

princetons pacman reads fusion plasma in 20 milliseconds far faster than any operator Even a fully attentive human operator needs roughly a second to respond to anything. PACMAN, a control framework developed at the U.S. Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory and Princeton University, completes an entire pass in about 20 milliseconds, then loops back and does it again for the duration of the shot.

Princeton’s PACMAN reads fusion plasma in 20 milliseconds — far faster than any operator