We just arrived at an asteroid: OSIRIS-REx has reached Bennu!
The spacecraft OSIRIS-REx has spent the last 2 years traversing about 2 billion kilometers, to arrive today at the asteroid Bennu.
The universe and your morning coffee
In a closed system, like the universe, entropy can only stay the same or increase over time. And yet we see rich complexity emerge, both here on Earth (including life itself!) and across the cosmos. How does this apparent order emerge in a system with increasing entropy? The answer lies in your morning coffee.
You will be missed, Stephen Hawking
Physicists are born in two ways–either lured in by the mysteries of particle physics or the wonder of the vast cosmos. For myself and many others, Stephen Hawking offered us one of our first glimpses of both worlds.
A subtle misconception about how LIGO works
If a gravitational wave contracts and expands space, shouldn’t the light wavelength be affected in the same way as the interferometer arm distance? If so, how is the wave detected at all?