Astronomy

Scientists were studying the properties of the light coming from a quasar — one of the brightest objects in the universe — when the light just seemed to wink out. Now they think they know why.

SciWorks Radio is a production of 88.5 WFDD and SciWorks, the Science Center and Envir

Clay tablets show that Babylonian astronomers tracked planets using a method that was thought to be invented 1,400 years later. In a way, scientists say, the ancient techniques were "very modern."

For astrophysicist Shrinivas Kulkarni, "The sky is so much richer and so much more imaginative than the imagination."

Amid this week's hoopla celebrating the Hubble Space Telescope, don't forget the clever astronomer for whom the space scope was named. In the 1920s, he changed our sense of ourselves and the universe.

Launched shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Hubble telescope isn't showing its age. Astronomers and other fans hope this old charmer will be useful for many years to come.

Construction is starting in Chile on a new sort of telescope. One aim is to survey huge swaths of sky for faint signals of a "Planet X" that may be lurking on the farthest edges of our solar system.