All Stories

Seventy-three seconds after launch, Challenger was destroyed on live TV. We did not understand what we saw: Our teachers could not explain it, our parents were unlikely to have better answers, and few of us probably spent time paying attention to what transpired afterwards in terms of the official investigation. The Challenger disaster symbolizes a moment in our personal and shared memories when we felt great sorrow together.

After the 1950s, fictional depictions of space travel needed to suggest conceivable ways to cross interstellar distances to seem plausible. Some authors suggested faster-than-light drives, hyper drives, jump drives, worm holes, and black holes.

The search for life is a pillar of Mars exploration. But our search isn’t only confined to the planets of our solar system. Radio telescopes search for signals of intelligent life from far away planets, orbiting other stars. In his story, “The Great Silence,” science fiction author Ted Chiang features the Arecibo telescope as he considers the significance of the animal life that surrounds it.

Based on my research, which include image composites of two flyby views of Mercury from the MESSENGER spacecraft, I conclude that Mercury has not cooled and shrunken as much as previously thought.

Satellites from NASA and private companies are making headlines. What’s their history and how might their future affect space and life here on Earth?

Astronautical engineer and astronomer George Robert Carruthers, a name well-known and dearly regarded in the space science community, and a good friend of the National Air and Space Museum, passed away on Saturday, December 26 after a long illness.

Interplanetary road trips take a WHILE. So for this episode of Voyages to Mars, while we cruise onward towards the Red Planet, we’re listening to some poetry that pays tribute to long duration space travel.

This month, gas giants Jupiter and Saturn are coming together in the sky for a once-in-a-lifetime event called a great conjunction. It will peak on December 21, 2020.

Moments after ignition on December 12, 1965, one of Gemini VI's engine suddenly shut down. Astronauts Wally Schirra and Thomas Stafford waited tensely in the cockpit for a plan to get them out of the life threatening situation. What happened over the next three days is nothing short of remarkable.

Four Puerto Rican scientists share their reflections on the Arecibo Observatory, its importance to PR, and its legacy. Cuatro científicos puertorriqueños compartan sus reflexiones sobre Arecibo, su importancia para PR y su legado.