https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Multi-billion-dollar space telescope programs aren't only feats of aerospace engineering. They also feature "lies, damn lies, and statistics." Or at least statistics. They definitely feature those, as does all good observational astronomy. The problem with statistics is, in order to get a clear definitive answer, you need lots of samples. And, to put it mildly, it's hard to find lots of samples of planets with alien life on them. And even harder to prove that the signals we think are caused by alien life aren't caused by some other non-biological process. Or at least that's the theory underpinning a new paper available on the arXiv preprint server from David Kipping of Columbia University (and Cool Worlds YouTube fame). https://phys.org/news/2026-06-astrobiology-looming-statistical-crisis.html Astrobiology Tue, 02 Jun 2026 08:20:03 EDT news699602221 Mars holds a special place in the solar system. It represents marginal habitability. This means it transitioned from warm and wet and potentially hospitable, to cold and dry and inhospitable. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-mars-marginal-exoplanets.html Astrobiology Tue, 26 May 2026 07:00:04 EDT news698993041 Preliminary results of a study presented at the recent European Geosciences Union General Assembly in Vienna indicate that hellish Venus-type planets may be about twice as common as habitable planets that form with oceans. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-hellish-venus-planets-prevalent-true.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 21 May 2026 11:50:49 EDT news698582931 The Haystack 37m Telescope has been a landmark in radio astronomy and radar studies of the solar system since its first light in 1964. Over the following four decades, it supported NASA's Apollo landings on the moon, made planetary radar maps of the surface of Venus, contributed to experimental tests of Einstein's general relativity, supported the development of VLBI, and conducted foundational studies of quasars and star-forming regions. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-years-legendary-telescope-black-holes.html Astronomy Wed, 20 May 2026 10:00:01 EDT news698489714 In December 2023, scientists looking at Mars data stumbled across something completely unexpected—observations of an atmospheric effect never before seen in the Red Planet's atmosphere. Using instruments aboard NASA's MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) mission, scientists identified a phenomenon known to occur in Earth's magnetosphere, where charged particles are squeezed like toothpaste coming out of a tube along magnetic structures called flux tubes. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-mars-reveals-zwan-wolf-effect.html Planetary Sciences Mon, 18 May 2026 18:20:01 EDT news698339461 Bizarre Venus surface formations (or coronae) are likely key to understanding our twin planet's heretofore inscrutable interior. Using NASA Magellan spacecraft data from decades past, Anna Gulcher, an Earth and planetary scientist at Germany's University of Freiburg, has created innovative new 3D models of the largest coronae to better understand Venus' puzzling geodynamics. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-bizarre-venus-surface-formations-puzzle.html Planetary Sciences Mon, 18 May 2026 16:20:01 EDT news698331247 Rice plants and Venus flytraps share something in common that was not scientifically documented until recently. Using a faint smell to lure caterpillars into a trap, rice plants killed early-stage fall armyworm larvae by trapping them in a spikelet, the part at the end of a rice panicle where individual grains develop. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-rice-fall-armyworm-caterpillars.html Ecology Wed, 13 May 2026 16:18:22 EDT news697907881 Researchers at MIT have suggested that rice seeds can hear the sound of rain, according to a new study. MIT calls it "the first direct evidence that plant seeds and seedlings can sense sounds in nature." Perhaps surprisingly, the effects reported in this new study are not as radical as they may appear. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-latest-insights.html Plants & Animals Mon, 11 May 2026 17:20:07 EDT news697719962 A new study, published in Science Advances, has refined some important details about the moon's largest and oldest impact crater, which stretches more than 1,200 miles (2,000 km) on the far side of the moon. The new details can help guide some of the planning for NASA's upcoming Artemis mission to the moon, which is planned for 2028. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-moon-largest-impact-crater-priceless.html Space Exploration Fri, 08 May 2026 13:50:01 EDT news697463270 The mysterious origin of an impressive cloud disturbance on Venus has now been revealed by a team including the University of Tokyo. Researchers used numerical models to show that an enormous 6,000-kilometer-wide atmospheric wave front, which circumnavigates the planet for days at a time, is caused by a large "hydraulic jump." This is when a fluid abruptly slows down, changing from shallow and fast to deep and slow. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-vast-atmospheric-venus-largest-hydraulic.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 08 May 2026 13:20:01 EDT news697462381 New research reveals that Dante Alighieri's Inferno wasn't just a masterpiece of literature: it was a gedankenexperiment in impact physics. From multi-ring craters to shockwaves that reshaped the globe, discover how a 14th-century poet modeled a planetary impact 500 years before the birth of modern meteoritics. https://phys.org/news/2026-05-dante-inferno-planetary-impact-years.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 08 May 2026 08:00:04 EDT news697362601 A stick-on gel for plants could one day offer a simple, safe and targeted way to treat diseases and pests. Engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed an adhesive gel that can be loaded with substances, such as small molecule drugs or nanoparticles, and applied directly onto a plant to deliver those materials into its tissues. In tests, a gel loaded with antibiotics cleared a bacterial infection in a plant within about 48 hours. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-gel-drugs-infections-quickly.html Plants & Animals Tue, 28 Apr 2026 13:40:08 EDT news696600061 Under a microscope, a bouquet of lollipop-like structures, each smaller than a grain of sand, waves gently in a Petri dish of liquid. Suddenly, they snap together, like the jaws of a Venus flytrap, as a scientist waves a small magnet over the dish. What was previously an assemblage of tiny passive structures has transformed instantly into an active robotic gripper. The lollipop gripper is one demonstration of a new type of soft magnetic hydrogel developed by engineers at MIT and their collaborators at EPFL and the University of Cincinnati. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-swipe-magnet-microscopic-magno-bots.html Nanophysics Tue, 28 Apr 2026 11:00:03 EDT news696587647 When Mauna Loa erupted in 2022, the largest lava flow headed on a path headed directly toward Daniel K. Inouye State Highway 200, also known as Saddle Road, a critical route that carries many residents from their homes on one side to their jobs on the other. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-volcano-eruption-earth-venus-mauna.html Planetary Sciences Mon, 27 Apr 2026 14:20:08 EDT news696508381 Astronomers can use telescopes to find specific molecules in the atmospheres of neighboring planets, in nebulae—clouds of interstellar dust and gas—hundreds or thousands of light-years away, or in galaxies beyond the far reaches of the Milky Way. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-potential-life-distant-planets-years.html Astronomy Mon, 27 Apr 2026 13:40:01 EDT news696509641 Plants are often seen as passive organisms, rooted in one place and largely unable to react to the world around them. But a new field of research is challenging these assumptions and showing that plants are as sophisticated as animals in detecting and adjusting to environmental signals. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-secret-sensory-life.html Plants & Animals Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:00:01 EDT news695558103 On a calm day, a light breeze might barely ripple the surface of a lake on Earth. But on Saturn's largest moon, Titan, a similar mild wind would kick up 10-foot-tall waves. This otherworldly behavior is one prediction from a new wave model developed by scientists at MIT. The model is the first to capture the full dynamics of waves and what it takes to whip them up under different planetary conditions. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-titan-lakes-spawn-foot-gentle.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 16 Apr 2026 10:00:06 EDT news695550271 Unfortunately for science fiction fans, desert worlds outside our solar system are unlikely to host life, according to new research from the University of Washington. Scientists show that an Earth-sized planet needs at least 20 to 50% of the water in Earth's oceans to maintain a critical natural cycle that keeps water on the surface. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-planets-life-scientists-previously-thought.html Astrobiology Wed, 15 Apr 2026 18:40:03 EDT news695485502 The fossil record has given us another new prehistoric species, named Eosphorosuchus lacrimosa (from the Greek personification of the morning star—the planet Venus), a member of the group called Crocodylomorpha, which includes modern crocodiles. The bones had been sitting around in a museum drawer for three-quarters of a century and had been misidentified as another type of closely related reptile. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-museum-drawer-fossil-reveals-million.html Evolution Wed, 15 Apr 2026 16:00:05 EDT news695476133 Venus, often called Earth's twin, is in fact a planet of extremes. Beneath its thick carbon dioxide atmosphere are crushing surface temperatures and dense clouds of sulfuric acid. While the planet's main cloud layer sits between 47 and 70 kilometers above the surface, scientists have long been puzzled by a mysterious layer of particles below 47 kilometers, known as the "lower haze." First detected by spacecraft in the 1970s, the origin of this haze remained unexplained for more than half a century. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-cosmic-source-venus-enigmatic-haze.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 14 Apr 2026 09:40:02 EDT news695374801 An international team including the University of Bern (UNIBE) and the University of Geneva (UNIGE), members of the National Center of Competence in Research PlanetS, has succeeded in mapping the climate of rocky exoplanets with masses similar to Earth for the first time. This breakthrough is based on continuous observations using the James Webb Space Telescope. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-eternal-night-day-cousins-earth.html Astrobiology Mon, 13 Apr 2026 11:00:13 EDT news695294959 On April 10, Artemis II—humanity's first mission to the moon in more than half a century—will draw to a close when the Orion capsule carrying four crew members detaches from its service module. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-nasa-artemis-ii-mission-rediscovered.html Space Exploration Thu, 09 Apr 2026 17:20:05 EDT news694959750 The theory of panspermia holds that life is spread through the cosmos via asteroids, comets, and other objects. When the building blocks of life emerge on one planet, impacts can eject surface material into space, which then carries these seeds to other worlds. For decades, scientists have debated whether this could have occurred between Earth and Mars (in both directions). However, the recent controversy over the possible existence of microbial life in Venus's dense clouds has sparked discussions of interplanetary transfers between Venus, Earth, and Mars. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-life-venus-atmosphere-earth.html Astrobiology Mon, 06 Apr 2026 18:30:02 EDT news694687754 In Dante's "Divine Comedy," Hell is described as an "inferno" with nine concentric circles, the entrance of which has a sign that reads "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." For the planets of the solar system, Venus is about as close to this description as one can get. On the surface, temperatures are hot enough to melt lead (464°C; 872°F), while the atmosphere is dense enough to crush a human skull (more than 90 times Earth's atmospheric density). However, above the cloud deck, roughly 47–70 km (29–43 mi) above the surface, temperatures are stable, and the atmospheric pressure is roughly equivalent to Earth's. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-aerobot-isru-capabilities-explore-venus.html Planetary Sciences Mon, 06 Apr 2026 07:20:46 EDT news694678815 We're getting closer and closer to finding a real Earth-like exoplanet. But finding one is only half the battle. To truly know if we're looking at an Earth analog somewhere else in the galaxy, we have to directly image it too. That's a job for the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO), a planned space-based telescope whose primary job is to do precisely that. But even capturing a picture and a planet and getting spectral readings of its atmospheric chemistry still isn't enough, according to a new paper available on the arXiv preprint server by Kaz Gary of Ohio State and their co-authors. HWO will need to figure out how much a planet weighs first. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-habitable-worlds-observatory-astrometry-life.html Astronomy Fri, 03 Apr 2026 12:20:04 EDT news694437361 The planet Mercury is the closest planet to the sun, and also the most difficult for spacecraft to visit and explore. This is because as spacecraft get closer to Mercury, the sun's enormous gravity pulls in the spacecraft, greatly increasing its speed and making it hard to slow down without large amounts of fuel. But what if a spacecraft could both travel to and explore Mercury without fuel? This could drastically reduce mission costs while delivering impactful science. https://phys.org/news/2026-04-mercury-scout-mission-concept-solar.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 01 Apr 2026 21:00:01 EDT news694258645 Planetary scientists have long debated where the material that formed Earth comes from. Despite its location in the inner solar system, they consider it likely that 6–40% of this material must have come from the outer solar system, i.e., beyond Jupiter. For a long time, material from the outer solar system was considered necessary to bring volatile components such as water to Earth. Accordingly, there must also have been an exchange of material between the outer and inner solar systems during the formation of Earth. But is that really true? https://phys.org/news/2026-03-earth-material-exclusively-solar-planetary.html Planetary Sciences Mon, 30 Mar 2026 13:00:03 EDT news694087382 Finding life beyond our solar system goes beyond measuring an exoplanet's size, as rocky, Earth-sized worlds might not have the conditions for life as we know it. While exoplanets can be directly imaged by blocking their star's glare, these images are fuzzy and lack resolution to provide enough details about the habitability. Therefore, astronomers are limited to studying an exoplanet's atmosphere, and this has proven to be quite beneficial in teaching scientists about an exoplanet's formation and evolution, and whether it contains the necessary ingredients for life as we know it. https://phys.org/news/2026-03-henrietta-spectrograph-probe-alien-atmospheres.html Astrobiology Mon, 30 Mar 2026 12:00:01 EDT news694089632 Venus is increasingly becoming a touch point for our studies of exoplanets, as missions like the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the upcoming Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) begin to characterize rocky exoplanets around other stars. Understanding the difference between the evolutions of Venus and Earth, which ended up with such different results, is a key to understanding whether we might be looking at an Earth-analog or a hellish landscape like Venus. A new paper by Rodolfo Garcia of the University of Washington and his colleagues, which is available on the arXiv preprint server, simulates Venus' 4.5 billion year evolution as part of the solar system to try to understand some of those differences. https://phys.org/news/2026-03-venus-hellscape-simulations-reveal-paths.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 26 Mar 2026 14:40:03 EDT news693753260 Glittery sea worms and sea squirts fit for "The Lord of the Rings" universe might sound like pure fantasy, but they're very real creatures living in the deep sea. Some of these otherworldly ocean animals are even featured in the latest "Top 10 New Marine Species" list published by the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS). https://phys.org/news/2026-03-whale-falls-meters-deep-species.html Plants & Animals Fri, 20 Mar 2026 16:30:01 EDT news693212974