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A routine map check found a new 728-foot crater on the Moon
McGetchin crater formed in spring 2024, but scientists found it later in a change map. The impact also left a 4-mile nighttime cold spot.
An astronaut photographed purple aurora from 255 miles up. Its color is a clue
The September 7 frame stacks city lights, white airglow and aurora above Central Asia. Different gases and altitudes make the colors.
The UN voted 164 to 1 for maps that show Africa at its true relative size
The resolution encourages Equal Earth and other equal-area maps when size matters. It does not ban Mercator, a projection built for navigation.
This Nunavut tundra changed color in 41 days. Peak autumn can last a week or less
Landsat 9 saw the same Coppermine River landscape on July 27 and September 6, as green tundra gave way to reds, oranges and yellows.
Apollo 11 held up a sheet of foil for 77 minutes. It came home carrying solar wind
Before Apollo 11 raised the flag, Buzz Aldrin aimed a 30-by-140-centimeter aluminum sheet at the Sun. The particles it trapped returned to Earth for analysis.
This viper flicks a fake spider at birds. Its tailbones look ordinary
X-ray computed tomography of the spider-tailed horned viper holotype found no specialized skeletal structure beneath the snake's elaborate bird-luring appendage.
Tiny mineral grains traced Yorkshire’s Devil’s Arrows to rocks 11 miles away
Zircon and apatite fingerprints link Britain’s tallest surviving standing-stone row to Brimham Rocks, while regional ice-flow evidence rules out a glacier making that journey.
The opening moved. Sixteen elephants had to abandon the route that worked
A box-rotation experiment found that Asian elephants paused when a familiar opening changed direction, then improved as the new route became familiar.
Curiosity reached 5,000 Martian days after climbing one vertical kilometer from its start
NASA’s Curiosity rover reached its 5,000th sol three days after gaining one vertical kilometer from its landing site, while examining a wind-shaped Martian ripple.
Star Trek’s famous alien rocks look like gray scratches from orbit
Landsat 9 turned a longtime science-fiction backdrop into a patch of curved gray stripes, revealing the real geology beneath the fiction.
This 10-metric-ton-plus instrument can sort light from about 1,000 cosmic targets at once
MOONS has made its first observations at the Very Large Telescope. Its robotic fibers feed two spectrographs housed inside one exceptionally cold machine.
The red speck on this frozen island marks one of Earth’s rare persistent lava lakes
Landsat found heat at Mount Michael’s summit on August 24. Eight days later, the same volcano drew a V-shaped wake through the clouds.
A NASA jet flew into the Moon’s shadow and caught three planets in one darkened sky
A cockpit camera aboard NASA’s WB-57 recorded the eclipsed Sun, Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, and the bright world beyond totality in a single frame.
Pluto’s famous heart holds two geologically different landscapes. Enhanced color makes the divide hard to miss
A New Horizons portrait shows that Pluto’s bright heart shape contains two geologically different regions, including an unusually smooth western lobe.
Hubble's new N44 portrait holds nearly half a million stars and one enormous hollow
The vast cavity was carved by stellar winds and supernovae. Along its compressed rim, another generation of stars is taking shape.
The “American cheetah” was a puma cousin. In the Arctic, it likely ate fish
Ancient DNA places Miracinonyx beside the puma, while chemical evidence suggests its northern populations occupied an unexpectedly aquatic food chain.
NASA's X-59 has flown 25 times. Its quietest claim still needs a clean test
The experimental aircraft reached Mach 1.2 on its 25th flight. NASA says a chase plane's booms masked the X-59's sound, while dedicated acoustic validation still lies ahead.
Saturn already had a hexagon. Now astronomers have found a decagon at the other pole
The ten-sided atmospheric wave was faint in 2023, clearer in 2024 and unmistakable in 2025. Scientists still do not know how long it will last.
Four rare peccaries moved into the National Zoo. They all chose one bathroom
The communal pile was not a keeper trick. It is natural behavior for an animal once known to science only from fossils.
Every state's geology now fits inside one searchable federal map
A new USGS release adds Alaska, Hawaii and most U.S. territories to the same standardized digital view as the Lower 48.
Smithsonian researchers are finding turtle nests with X-rays, plastic cups and 216 yards of thread
A Virginia field team followed 56 tagged eastern box turtles and found a difficult number waiting at the nests it located.
One gardener has broken the longest chili record three times. His latest reached 52.5 centimeters
Jürg Wiesli started at 45 centimeters in 2017, reached 50.5 a year later and returned with a longer cayenne in 2026.
The Smithsonian's second-oldest building is closing again. Its last weekend comes with a free circus
The Arts and Industries Building will host aerial performances, costume work and circus-science demonstrations before it closes September 7.
The FTC says an AI “Active Listening” service was not listening at all
Three firms claimed they could target ads from conversations captured by smart devices. The agency says the service did not use voice data.
Ridley Scott's The Dog Stars makes a farmer and a doctor the apocalypse's most valuable people
The new survival thriller puts a pilot, a military survivalist and a mysterious radio call inside a world where practical skill outranks status.
Coyote vs. Acme finally reached theaters and opened to an estimated $15.5 million
The finished movie took second place in the United States and Canada three years after Warner Bros. canceled its original release.
Hank's 17.12-inch ears set the record for a living donkey
A veterinarian repeated the measurement before witnesses in Pennsylvania, then averaged the results for Guinness World Records.
The government mapped 831 occupations against AI. Exposure is not the same as replacement
A new BLS dataset compares occupations by their contact with AI while the agency's 2035 projections show where employment may grow and shrink.
The FTC is asking what happens when the price knows who is looking
A proposed federal policy focuses on sellers that use personal data to estimate what one shopper may be willing to pay.
The FTC is sending 640,038 Grubhub payments. The deadline depends on how yours arrives
More than $23.8 million is going to eligible drivers and diners through checks and PayPal payments.
The ticket limit was six. The FTC says one broker grabbed 277 seats anyway
A federal complaint describes 75 accounts, 109 transactions, and hundreds of Metallica tickets moving into the resale market.
After 13.8 million visitors, this Smithsonian museum is planning a four-day reunion
The National Museum of African American History and Culture is marking ten years with four days of events at the museum and The Wharf.
With eight mating calls, female treefrogs chose the target only 25% of the time
A controlled experiment found that Cope's gray treefrogs became slower, less accurate, and more likely to walk away as choices multiplied.
The Labor Department's AI framework gives prompting just one of five slots
The federal AI literacy framework puts understanding, exploration, evaluation, and responsibility around the skill that gets the most attention.
The IRS says one online account can handle nine common tax errands
The official account brings balances, payments, transcripts, notices, refund status, IP PINs, and certain authorizations into one place.