NASA’s recently launched asteroid hunter, Psyche, is designed to give us a look at a body that could resemble depths far within the Earth, where we can never go. But one instrument tagging along for a ride is exciting scientists who specialize in a completely different field — that of space communications. Since the dawn of the Space Age, they have depended on radio waves, just a sliver of the electromagnetic spectrum. But scientists hope to soon expand into another part of the spectrum. Th ...read more
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has been sending images of the Red Planet home since 2006. In that time, it sent back spectacular photos of various rovers crawling across the surface, the Mars Phoenix lander parachuting towards the surface and numerous images of curious surface features that planetary geologists are keen to explain.The spacecraft’s main camera, the High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE), is capable of producing images with a resolution of 30 centimeters per pixel. ...read more
It’s been nearly three decades since Bill Nye the Science Guy first aired on PBS in September of 1993. In the years that followed, Nye, a former mechanical engineer and the show’s titular host, would become America’s most well-loved science teacher, educating millions of children (and plenty of adults) about basic scientific principles like biodiversity and the forces of gravity.In a recent interview with Discover, Nye reflects on more than just the series that made him famous, sharing tho ...read more
This story was originally published in our Sept/Oct 2023 issue as "Sherlock of Sleep." Click here to subscribe to read more stories like this one.The elderly man woke up one night to find himself in a bed soaked with blood. His wife, lying next to him, was dead, stabbed with a letter opener.The man was charged with murder, though he claimed to have no memory of what had happened. The defense attorney was stumped, because there was no plausible motive for his client to have killed his wife.The ...read more
In the Pacific Ocean, between Hawaii and California, at least 79,000 metric tons of plastic has coalesced to create the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The patch, kept together by ocean currents and spanning an area of roughly 1.6 million square kilometers — about twice the size of Texas — is one of the most incriminating examples of human pollution on the planet. It’s also a huge hazard for marine life, killing up to 1 million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals each year via ingestion ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine