HowStuffWorks Newsletter
Explore the vast reaches of space and mankind’s continuing efforts to conquer the stars, including theories such as the Big Bang, the International Space Station, plus what the future holds for space travel and exploration.
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Yep, two small-bodied Russian tortoises made it to the moon and back before man did.
By Mark Mancini
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and his brother plan to blast into space next month. But even if you're not related to a billionaire, you can still experience the fun of space at a 'down-to-Earth' price.
NASA will be sending two new missions to Venus between 2028 and 2030, but why is this so exciting and what do they hope to accomplish?
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Recently, there's been a spike in UFO sightings — officially UAP, or Unidentified Aerial Phenomena — all over the world and nobody seems to know why or what the objects we're seeing might be.
What most people remember about Apollo 14 is Alan Shepard hitting golf balls on the moon. But on the same mission, command module pilot Stuart Roosa took seeds to space and back and now they're beautiful trees on Earth.
Since Dennis Tito first visited the International Space Station, eight more space tourists have paid between $20 and $30 million to fly through the Russian space program. Will human spaceflight ever get a little cheaper and more democratized?
In recent years, Saturn has overtaken Jupiter as the planet with the most moons in our solar system. How many does it have and could it have even more?
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One of the three-man crew of Apollo 11, the mission that first set foot on the moon, Michael Collins was a true American hero.
By Mark Mancini
You know Saturn and Venus and Mars and ... some others. Can you put the eight planets of the solar system in the correct order? There are several ways to do this.
Missions to Mars are increasing and the dream of landing a human on the red planet is no longer far-fetched — it might even happen in the next decade. So, how long does it take to get there?
Astronauts have been playing live music on the International Space Station since it's been in space. One even impressed the late, great David Bowie with his rendition of "Space Oddity."
By Mark Mancini
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Humans have made it to the moon a number of times so we know how long the journey should take. But sometimes it may be much faster than that.
Scientists at Yale are using "quantum squeezing" to reduce "noise" in their search for dark matter.
Surely you've watched tons of sunsets in your lifetime. But have you ever seen the sunset and the moonrise simultaneously? Is that even possible?
Arcturus is 113 times brighter than our sun, even though it's only a little bigger. What else should we know about this red giant?
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Showering every day is likely something you take for granted. But for astronauts on the International Space Station, it's not an easy task.
The law is the first of its kind by any nation, but how much weight it has is yet to be seen. It is perhaps just one small step to preserve human heritage in space.
Everyone's heard of the blue moon and the harvest moon, but every other full moon of the year has a name, too. What are their names, and when do these moons occur?
Stars are giant nuclear fusion reactors, and we wouldn't exist without them. Find out how much you know about these twinkling lights with our quiz.
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Whether it's a solar eclipse, a meteor shower or the launch of the long-awaited James Webb Space Telescope, 2021 has a lot to offer.
All of the planets in the solar system are named for Greek gods, except Earth. So where did the name come from?
By Mark Mancini
The Quadrantids are a short but powerful meteor shower that shows up in early January. How can you glimpse it?
A magnetar is a neutron star with a super-strong magnetic field. Astronomers consider them among the scariest objects in the universe, but why?
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There are four others with this unusual honor. While not every other went from space to the Senate like Mark Kelly, their stories are equally as interesting.
Until recently, Arecibo had the biggest radio telescope in the world, and its ability to detect distant signals made it a very powerful tool for studying the universe. It even starred in two movies.