BILLIONS OF YEARS FROM NOW, the night sky will glow with stars, dust, and gas from two galaxies: the Milky Way, in which we live, and the encroaching Andromeda Galaxy (M31). Astronomy by Lynette Cook

Our galaxy, the Milky Way, is colliding with its nearest large neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy (M31). The merger will change the structure of both galaxies billions of years from now, resulting in a new arrangement of stars known as Milkomeda (“milk-AHM-mee-da”). The merging will significantly change the night sky. But into what?

The Milky Way’s thin disk of stars and gas is currently visible as a nebulous band arching over the summer sky. As Andromeda travels across the Milky Way, a second lane of stars will join the one that is currently visible in the night sky. The stars will no longer be limited to two narrow lanes after the final merger, but will instead scatter throughout the entire sky.

New paleomagnetic research suggests Earth’s solid inner core formed 550 million years ago and restored our planet’s magnetic field.

Swirling liquid iron in the Earth’s outer core, located approximately 1,800 miles beneath our feet, generates our planet’s protective magnetic field, called the magnetosphere. Although this magnetic field is invisible, it is vital for life on Earth’s surface. That’s because the magnetosphere shields the planet from solar wind—streams of radiation from the sun.

However, about 565 million years ago, the magnetic field’s strength dropped to 10 percent of its strength today. Then, mysteriously, the magnetic field bounced back, regaining its strength just before the Cambrian explosion of multicellular life on Earth.

NASA plans to bring 30 Martian rock samples back to Earth in 2033, the agency said Wednesday — and is sending two small helicopters to help the mission.

The Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in February 2021, has so far collected 11 samples as part of its hunt for signatures of ancient life.

But bringing them back for detailed lab study on Earth is proving to be a highly complex task.

Physics World.

One of the most distant galaxies ever observed is very likely to be rotating, say astronomers. An in.

With breathtaking videos, citizen scientists have shown researchers a new pattern of auroras that may solve the mystery behind a strange red glow.

You really want to view this photo from Juno’s recent flyby in full length if possible.

But Lindgren received an abrupt request to comment on the day’s big news: the new Russian space chief Yuri Borisov said the nation, which has been a steady NASA partner in space and that has ferried American astronauts up to the ISS as recently as 2020, would end their decades-long space station collaboration.

The news spread on Tuesday after the Kremlin published a transcript meant to represent a dialogue between Borisov and President Vladimir Putin, in which Borisov tells Putin that Russia will end their partnership on the ISS in 2024.

“That’s a good question,” Lindgren said after twiddling with the microphone in microgravity.