The facility is without question one of the most secretive in the world, and no one on the outside truly knows what goes on there. Area 51 is the unofficial name of a United States Air Force military base located in Lincoln County in the state of Nevada, situated on the dried lakebed of Groom […]
According to general relativity, black holes are regions of space where mass is concentrated so intensely that gravity becomes so strong that nothing — not even light — can escape. Any matter or light that crosses a black hole’s event horizon remains trapped and can never return, except possibly extremely slowly in the form of […]
For most of us, outer space is, in a way, a little scary — and for several reasons. It can feel frightening because we know so little about it and don’t fully understand how it works. Or it might be unsettling simply because it’s dark. There are many reasons why people find outer space to […]
Saturn is the sixth planet from our Sun and the second-largest in the solar system. It is a gas giant composed primarily of hydrogen and helium, first observed through a telescope by Galileo Galilei in 1610. When he viewed the planet, the angle of the rings made Saturn appear as though it were three bodies […]
Neptune is the eighth planet from the Sun — a so-called gas giant — and is named after Neptune, the Roman god of the sea. Since Pluto is now classified as a dwarf planet, Neptune is the outermost of the major planets in our solar system. With that said, here are ten facts you probably […]
If you’d like to visit a place where summers last more than 20 years, the winds hit harder than a hurricane, and the temperature makes the Arctic feel like a sauna, then Uranus is the destination for you — at least in theory. This strange and often overlooked planet in our solar system has more […]
Pluto is no longer classified as a planet, as you may know, but is today considered a dwarf planet of the plutoid type, located in the outer regions of our solar system. At times, this dwarf planet — which follows a highly elliptical orbit — actually moves closer to the Sun than Neptune does. If […]
Mercury is the innermost and smallest planet in the solar system, making it the world closest to the Sun. It completes an orbit around the Sun in about 88 days. Because of its proximity to the Sun, it is very difficult to observe from Earth and can only be seen around dawn or dusk with […]
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the largest of the so-called rocky planets in our solar system. It is also our home — and the home of all known living organisms. Its Latin name, Tellus or Terra, is still used occasionally, and astronomers sometimes represent it with the symbols ⊕ (the sun […]
Venus, our closest neighbor in the solar system, is a planet full of fascinating secrets and surprises. Although it’s roughly the same size as Earth and often referred to as our planet’s twin, Venus has a climate and surface that are completely different from our own. This planet, symbolized by the sign ♀ and named […]
