Lab Notes
Drifting in space and time
In 1916, Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity predicted ripples in the fabric of space known as gravitational waves. Just as accelerating electrons create...
Juno reaches Jupiter
In Roman mythology, Jupiter is king of the gods and his wife Juno is the queen. Jupiter was known for his infidelity, so Juno...
Chasing alien megastructures
In 1960, physicist Freeman Dyson suggested that the energy demands of all technological civilizations would eventually exceed the natural resources of their home planet....
Watching stellar heartbeats
In 1966, astronomer Olin Wilson started what would become a decades-long pursuit, searching for an answer to a simple question. Wilson knew that observations...
The OSIRIS-REx mission: To Bennu and back
On Sept. 8, 2016, Dr. Vicky Hamilton watched as NASA’s OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification Security, Regolith Explorer) lifted clear of Cape Canaveral’s...
Catching the solar eclipse
More than a century ago, Albert Einstein proposed a new theory of gravity, suggesting that concentrations of matter warp the underlying fabric of space,...
