Corey S Powell

A rich fossil site in China is filling in the little-known transitional details of life before the Cambrian explosion.

It documents the emergence of bilateral symmetry & pushes back the origin of the ancestors of all modern vertebrates.

https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2026-04-03-spectacular-fossil-treasure-trove-pushes-back-origins-complex-animals #science #nature #history

Among Orbán's many corrosive effects in Hungary, he politically strangled universities and research funding. His defeat offers the possibility of a better, more open future for Hungarian science.

https://www.statnews.com/2025/09/02/hungary-us-science-universities-democracy-protests-freedom-knowledge/ #science #hungary

For the first time, scientists have detected the wind from a black hole.

New images show the supermassive one at the center of our galaxy is puffing away, clearing out a void about 20 trillion miles wide.

https://www.almaobservatory.org/en/press-releases/alma-finally-catches-the-milky-ways-black-hole-breathing/ #space #science #astronomy

We live at an extraordinary moment in science history: We're the first generation able to see a meaningful map of the entire visible universe.

This view across billions of light years is based on JWST data, as part of the COSMOS-Web survey.

https://news.ucr.edu/articles/2026/05/11/astronomers-produce-most-detailed-map-cosmic-web #space #science #nature

Just look at this gorgeous portrait of celestial creation!

JWST trained its infrared vision on one tiny patch in the Orion Nebula. There, it saw a wild collage of collapsing clouds, protostars, jets, shockwaves, and dark disks where new planets are forming.

https://esawebb.org/images/potm2605a/ #space #science #art #nature

The Moon is a major destination, a complex world in its own right. It is larger than any of the dwarf planets of the solar system! (All shown to scale here.)

https://science.nasa.gov/moon/ #space #science #artemis #moon

Somehow, planet WD 1856b survived the death of its star intact, and then migrated into a tight, stable orbit around the star's collapsed remains.

Astronomers have found that planets are remarkably resilient, forming & persisting in the most unlikely places.

https://science.nasa.gov/missions/webb/nasas-webb-studies-how-planet-survived-death-of-its-star/ #space #science #nature

The inner moons of Neptune look like they were turned inside out, with deep-interior minerals spattered across their surfaces.

Probably these moons are the shattered remains of earlier satellites that were shredded when a Pluto-like object came barreling in.

https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/neptunes-inner-moons-may-be-shattered-remains-of-ancient-icy-worlds #space #science #nature

Beautiful shot & beautiful metaphor. The "Man in the Moon" drifting off at right. The lunar farside coming into view at left. (Processing: Damian Peach)

From the evolution of the eye, ~500 million years ago, until October 7, 1959, no creature on Earth had ever seen the far side of the Moon. #space #science #artemis #technology

Thought for the day:

Earth is 10^30 times as dense as an averaged-out sample of the universe. That is, gravity has amplified the density of our planet by a factor of thousand billion billion billion. Without that amplification, we would not be here.

#space #science #nature #history

It is astonishing that humans are able to do these things. This is what happens when we act collectively to solve extremely difficult technical problems. (It works with many other kinds of problems, too, by the way.)

You can follow Artemis II's encounter with the Moon starting at 1pm EDT.

https://plus.nasa.gov/ #space #science #tech #artemis

David Hockney used his art to experiment with our perception of space and time. In 1994 he delivered a beautiful lecture at Caltech describing his process.

[PDF link]

https://calteches.library.caltech.edu/3762/1/Hockney.pdf #science #art #davidhockney