The universe isn’t quiet; it rumbles in slow motion. When two galaxies drift close, gravity turns a gentle approach into an epic, multi‑billion‑year embrace. Astronomers have watched this drama unfold in snapshots – arcs of starlight, shredded gas, and ghostly streams that look like ripples frozen in time. The mystery is simple to ask and ...
For centuries, humans have been trying to figure out the ultimate destiny of the universe, will it collapse, freeze, or disappear into nothingness? Today, a new study indicates the universe’s end date could come much sooner than anyone ever thought. Picking up on the groundbreaking ideas of Stephen Hawking, astrophysicists estimate that the final traces ...
Somewhere in the dark between the stars, entire suns are vanishing without a trace, slipping past a boundary from which not even light can return. Black holes sit at the center of this mystery, warping space and time so violently that our best physics starts to crack. Astronomers can now photograph the shadows of ...
They lurk in the dark, bend time itself, and swallow light so completely that even our best telescopes see only their shadows, yet black holes have never been more visible in our imagination than they are now. In the past few years, astronomers have captured images of their silhouettes, weighed some that defy current ...
Somewhere in the dark, quiet reaches of the universe, two invisible giants are circling each other, tightening their orbit in a slow, relentless dance. For millions or even billions of years, they spiral closer, twisting the very fabric of space-time like a cosmic whirlpool. Then, in a fraction of a second, they collide and ...
