It's hard living in a relativistic Universe, where even the nearest stars are so far away and the speed of light is absolute. It is little wonder then why science fiction franchises routinely employ FTL (Faster-than-Light) as a plot device.

By combing through data collected by NASA's planet-hunting Kepler space telescope, University of British Columbia astronomy PhD candidate Michelle Kunimoto discovered evidence of an impressive 17 new exoplanets - including a roughly Earth-sized wor

When it was very young, the planet Earth looked rather different from the one we know and love today. For one, it had supercontinents - when the landmasses we currently live on were arranged in various configurations as they were pushed around by t

The Milky Way isn't like other barred spiral galaxies. Instead of a nice, tidy flat disc, it has a kink in its spine, a twist in its swagger. As we have long known, and two separate studies recently confirmed, the Milky Way is seriously warped arou

Mars is a pretty wild and wonderful place, and an image posted to the NASA science blog and Astronomy Photo of the Day this week is a brilliant example. It shows what appears to be a mountain... but completely hollowed out.

For the first time, doctors have attempted to cure blindness by gene-hacking a patient with CRISPR technology.

When North America celebrated its Thanksgiving holiday last year, a little rover toiling away on Mars took the opportunity to stop and look around. As humans rested, Curiosity was surveying the vast, lonely Martian landscape from its perch on the s

New analysis of organic molecules found in dried-up Martian mud in the Gale Crater has revealed an intriguing possibility. Scientists have concluded that we can't rule out those molecules actually have a biological origin.

Time, as far as we know, moves only in one direction. But in 2018, researchers found events in some gamma-ray burst pulses that seemed to repeat themselves as though they were going backwards in time.

A bacterial species that survives by 'breathing' rock has intrigued scientists for decades, even though the inner workings of its mysterious cellular respiration technique have remained far from clear.

Amidst the spread of the current coronavirus epidemic, it can be hard to find science-based advice, as so much of the information out there is either just cautionary, or downright wrong. Thankfully, we're getting more data on a daily basis.

Astronomers have used an algorithm based on the growth patterns of slime mould to map something that's basically impossible to see: the cosmic web of gas and dark matter underpinning the very structure of the Universe.

Human beings grow new brain cells throughout their late adult life, a new study shows, even continuing when people are approaching their 90s.

Uranus is quite the individual. Most of the planets in our Solar System have their poles more or less oriented in the same direction. And most of them are spinning anticlockwise, when viewed from above. But Uranus? Its rotation axis is oriente

If the new coronavirus 2019-nCoV (now also called COVID-19 virus) is anything like its family members, a new study suggests it could survive on inanimate objects for well over a week. 

As concern about coronavirus grows, hand sanitizer is in high demand. Biologist Jeffrey Gardner explains why alcohol is a key ingredient in hand sanitizer, and why he doesn't recommend making your own supply at home.

The COVID-19 pandemic is getting more overwhelming by the day, with increasing lockdowns, a death toll of more than 7,000 people across the world, and a direct hit to the global economy.

Editor's note (19 March 2020): Since the publication of this article, the World Health Organization has updated its advice on the official Twitter account: "Based on currently available information, WHO does not recommend against the use of ibuprof

The four-limbed animals of the world have several things in common. Spines. Bilateral symmetry. And most of us have (or, in the case of birds, had) five digits at the end of each of our four limbs.

Mercury has a reputation, one largely informed by where it exists - closer to the Sun than any other planet in the Solar System. That unforgiving proximity means Mercury gets hot. Really hot.

Every planet in our Solar System, including our own, is enclosed in a bubble of solar wind, emanating from our Sun at supersonic speeds.