PBS_SpaceTime

The Andromeda galaxy is heading straight toward our own Milky Way. The two galaxies will inevitably collide. Will that be the very last night sky our solar system witnesses?

The great advances in any science tend to come in sudden leaps. April 25th of 2018 marks the beginning of just such a leap for much of astronomy. In the early hours of the morning, the Gaia mission’s second data release dropped. Our understanding of our own galaxy will never be the same again.

The Sun: an entity worshipped as a god throughout time and across cultures. The source of all life and sustenance for our little blue space rock, and also a force of unthinkable destructive power. But soon humanity will reach out its collective hand and come closer to touching the Sun than we ever have before with the launch of the Parker Solar Probe.

It's easy to take things at face value in video games. But when we take a deeper dive into the physics in The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, it seems that the "MOON" might be one of those things that isn't quite what it seems. Given its size and the way it affects Termina, it actually appears that the moon is really a BLACK HOLE! Is that seriously the only possibility?

We live in an unusual age – the age when the stars still shine. We should count ourselves lucky – nearly all of future history will be dark. But events will still unfold in that long, cooling darkness, and civilizations may endure. So how will the universe and its far-future denizens spend eternity?

You’ve discovered a habitable exoplanet, but so has an an evil interplanetary mining corporation. Can you get to the planet before they strip it bare and leave it unsuitable for life? You’re going to need a ship, the Lorentz Transformation and the Wait Equation. Hang on, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

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Black Holes should have no entropy, but they in fact hold most of the entropy in the universe. Let’s figure this out.

Entropy is surely one of the most intriguing and misunderstood concepts in all of physics. The entropy of the universe must always increase – so says the second law of thermodynamics. It’s a law that seems emergent from deeper laws – it’s statistical in nature – and yet may ultimately be more fundamental and unavoidable than any other law of physics.

Everyone has their own opinion as to whether or not aliens exist. But let’s assume they do for a second and we wanted to let them know we're here!!!! How should we signal our species' existence through the expanse of space? There are a few options, but which is the most effective and the cheapest? Find out in this week’s episode of PBS Space Time!

Find out about the last time and the next time the Earth will be hit by a Gamma-ray Burst.

The telescopes of tomorrow will see in infrared and ultraviolet. They will peer through space and scan across time. They will allow us to find new supernovae, spot potentially hazardous asteroids, better understand dark energy and peer into the earliest moments of space time.

Scientists studying quantum vortices and their impact on superconductivity just won the Nobel Prize.

Get your eclipse glasses ready because the a total solar eclipse is an astronomical event unlike any other.

Find out about China’s current telescope on the moon and what the future plans are for mounting larger telescopes on the lunar surface.

Can we ever achieve absolute cold?

In the world of our mind’s eye, light travels in a straight line. In reality, spacetime is deflected and magnified through the lens of gravity. Find out how this works and what it allows us to learn about our universe in this episode of Space Time.

The days of oil may be numbered, but there’s another natural resource that’s never been touched, Asteroids.

Using geometry we can not only understand, but visualize how causality dictates the order of events in our universe.

Why does the universe seem to be moving in one particular direction?

It turns out that "nothing" is one of the most interesting somethings in all of physics.

Last week, seven earth-like planets were discovered orbiting a Red Dwarf star 39 light years away. Each one could be capable of supporting life.

Aliens! Could humans really be alone in this expansive universe? And if we're not, how come we've never made contact with other intelligent life? Everyone's thought about it; especially members of the scientific community. Join Gabe as he presents some of the most popular theories that scientists use to rationalize their support or skepticism of the existence of aliens.

Throughout history, there has been much speculation about what the fate of the universe would be. Many theorized that the universe would eventually succumb to the pull of gravity, and reverse its expansion in what was being called ‘The Big Crunch.’ However, with the help of mathematical equations from Newton, Einstein, and Alexander Friedmann, we now have an answer.

On this Space Time Journal Club we look at how gravitational waves can be used to search for extra dimensions of space!