Welcome to my new newsletter! If you haven’t had enough of reading my words across various media and you still would like to know more about space or make sure you caught up with everything that has happened recently, this is the space for you. There will be some summaries of cool space stories - some of mine, some of others - as well as links to cool videos and stuff. Here is what has been happening in space recently.
Hubble Tension Remains THE DRAMA in cosmology
The story so far: the universe is expanding faster and faster. This expansion rate can be estimated from the Cosmic Microwave Background - the first light that ever shone - or by measuring the distance of galaxies and how fast they appear to be receding from us. The problem is that these two values are not the same, but they should be! That's the Hubble Tension! Astronomers were hoping that JWST observations would help clarify the situation, but instead, there is even more drama. Two teams using JWST data are arguing for opposite things: one that the Hubble Tension is confirmed, the other that it is gone. The latest development here.
Something Odd Inside The Moon
We only see one side of the Moon, the near side, but if you have a look at images of both sides, you'll recognize that there are major differences. It turns out that, unlike beauty, the differences on the Moon are not skin deep. Gravitational measurements suggest that the near side is warmer and more geologically active. And this difference plays a role in the surface differences.
More News In Brief
The first ever visible light aurora from the surface of another world has been snapped on Mars.
A planet is orbiting two stars the wrong way around, suggesting it formed billions of years after the stars.
Saturn's moon Titan has been caught having methane rain, and its atmosphere spins independently of the world below.
There is an odd celestial object that emits radio waves and X-rays, but (as far as we can tell) anything between.
Putting The Extra in Extraterrestrial
If you like movies and festivals, check out Doppleganger3 next week and The Space You Need at the London Film Festival. Also, watch Murderbot (and read the books, they are excellent!)
