Latest articles by Paul Sutter
Too much of a good thing: Early impacts delivered iron to Earth but almost wiped out life
A recent study has found that the hazards posed by large impactors far outweighed their benefits for life on Earth.
Physicists get closer than ever to measuring the elusive neutrino
Scientists used a 200-ton "neutrino scale" to measure the elusive particles.
Is there anything beyond the universe?
What's beyond the known limits? What lies outside the boundary of the universe? The answer is — well, it's complicated.
Loop quantum gravity: Does space-time come in tiny chunks?
Quantum mechanics tells us that the forces of nature come in discrete, tiny chunks. Gravity, the bending of space-time, is a force. So is space-time quantized as well?
What happened before the Big Bang?
The Big Bounce theory was once thought impossible. But recent research is keeping it alive.
What happens at the center of a black hole?
At the center of a black hole, matter is compressed down to an infinitely tiny point, and all conceptions of time and space completely break down.
The first life on Earth depended on a deadly poisonous gas, study suggests
Toxic hydrogen cyanide gas, used in chemical weapons today, may have been involved in the early stages of life's evolution, a new study suggests.
Will we ever know the true nature of 'Oumuamua, the first interstellar visitor?
Astronomers have proposed lots of ideas to explain 'Oumuamua's odd characteristics, and we're unlikely ever to find out which one is correct.
The mystery deepens: Ghostly neutrinos and fast radio bursts don't come from the same place
Knowing if high-energy neutrinos and FRBs came from the same place on the sky would help explain the origins of both. But alas, they do not.
Do we live in a simulation? The problem with this mind-bending hypothesis.
Does the simulation hypothesis offer a compelling argument, or is it just interesting food for thought? Let's find out.
What really makes a planet habitable? Our assumptions may be wrong
How common are ice-covered planets like Hoth from "Star Wars," and might they be capable of hosting life? As usual, the answer is, it depends.
Astronomers propose building a neutrino telescope — out of the Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean Neutrino Experiment would turn a massive swath of the Pacific Ocean into nature's own neutrino detector.
Yes, there is really 'diamond rain' on Uranus and Neptune
Hiding beneath the outer layers of some planets, there may be something spectacular: a constant rain of diamonds.
We may finally be able to test one of Stephen Hawking's most far-out ideas
The recently launched James Webb Telescope should help determine if dark matter is made up of primordial black holes.
5 space missions to look forward to now that the James Webb Space Telescope has launched
Now that the telescope is in space, what's next for astrophysics done from beyond Earth's surface? Here are five future missions to get excited about.
How real is the multiverse?
A multiverse may be a natural prediction of the physical theories that define the beginning of the universe.
Why are we still searching for intelligent alien life?
Humans have scanned and searched the heavens for signs of other advanced civilizations in the universe. And we've found nothing. Absolutely nothing. Maybe we shouldn't focus on intelligent life.
Here's how the universe could end in a 'false vacuum decay'
The world could end not with a bang, but with a quantum vacuum decay of the ground state of the universe to its true minimum.
Massive simulation of the universe probes mystery of ghostly neutrinos
How do you test theories of the universe? By building gigantic supercomputers and simulating the evolution of the cosmos.
Wormholes may be viable shortcuts through space-time after all, new study suggests
Wormholes may be stable after all, a new theory suggests, contradicting previous predictions that these hypothetical shortcuts through space-time would instantly collapse.
How many black holes are there in the universe?
In a recent study, researchers determined that about 1% of all the "normal" (that is, not dark) matter in the universe is bound up inside black holes.
Why is there a 'crisis' in cosmology?
Since 2014, there have been over 300 proposals for solutions to the "crisis in cosmology." None of these proposals is universally agreed upon by cosmologists, and the crisis just keeps getting worse.
Some supermassive black holes may contain fingerprints from the Big Bang
The elements around some giant black holes may be subtly different from the cosmic average, retaining a relic memory of the young universe.
