Science

TOKYO — An office of the U.S. Department of the Interior is seeking information on concepts for performing offshore orbital launches, part of a broader effort by the federal government to reduce congestion at existing spaceports. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, or BOEM, published a request for information July 7 seeking details from companies

In some heavy atoms, like those of bismuth (pictured in crystalline form), electrons move at relativistic speeds savva_25/Shutterstock Albert Einstein’s theory of special relativity can reshape chemical bonds within molecules, and researchers have just seen it happen for the first time. The theory of special relativity describes how moving at speeds close to the speed

Static electricity: mysteries lurk within this everyday phenomenon – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

TOKYO — Japanese lunar exploration company ispace is buying space on a future Starship lunar lander mission to deliver larger payloads to the moon. The company announced at a briefing here July 8, held in conjunction with the Spacetide conference, that it is developing a Mobile Cargo System that will fly on a Starship lander

Particles in ships’ exhaust inadvertently cause cloud brightening, and a similar effect could be employed to engineer the climate NASA’s Earth Obervatory Short-term geoengineering to brighten clouds over the eastern Pacific Ocean could limit the damage caused by El Niño and save the global economy trillions of dollars, although there could be winners and losers

Does the Bullet Cluster contain a lot less dark matter than we thought? – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

SAN FRANCISCO – Italian space logistics specialist D-Orbit will provide a series of launches aboard its ION Satellite Carrier for Japanese startup ArkEdge Space, under a contract announced July 8 in Japan. “This is one of the most significant contracts D-Orbit has signed to date,” Matteo Andreas Lorenzoni, D-Orbit Orbital Access Business Unit director, told SpaceNews by

Peter Shor is known for his internet-breaking algorithm Christopher Harting “So, he’s the Beyoncé of this event?” a young woman standing behind me says to a colleague. The three of us are standing, looking at the back of a crowd, whose members are all looking at a bearded man in an orange sweater. Getting a

Antineutrino detectors could spot signs that a fusion reactor is producing weapons-grade plutonium – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

TOKYO — Blue Origin is continuing to develop its Blue Moon lunar landers, with seven vehicles in production, while recovering from the New Glenn pad explosion more than a month ago. In a talk at the Spacetide conference here July 6, John Couluris, senior vice president for lunar permanence at Blue Origin, said the company’s

Bumblebees appear to like the taste of sugar Dawn Monrose/Alamy Bees seem to show when they are pleased and like something, rather than just needing it, in one of the strongest signs yet that insects have subjective experiences. In recent decades, it has become clear that bees are capable of more complex behaviours than we

Evidence in action: how science helps us make better decisions – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

WASHINGTON — The European Space Agency has selected Airbus Defence and Space to start work on the successor to a wind-monitoring satellite. ESA announced July 2 it authorized Airbus to begin work on the Aeolus-2 satellite, funding the initial phases of the satellite’s development. The contract for that initial work is worth 51 million euros

NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory NASA Goddard Space Flight Center One of NASA’s premier space telescopes is falling, and an audacious mission to rescue it has just begun. The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory is months from dropping back to Earth, but if the rescue works, it could continue watching the sky for years to come.

‘Back to the future’ messages are more efficient – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Space Force has earned a reputation inside the Pentagon for moving faster than traditional military acquisition programs. But a new government watchdog report suggests some space procurements continue to confront many of the same problems that have plagued defense acquisitions for decades. The Government Accountability Office’s annual assessment of major defense

Submarine reliefs produced by a survey off the coast of Mayotte in 2019, showing the new underwater volcano Fani Maoré Campagne MAYOBS2 A rising underwater volcano off the coast of Madagascar has been spewing up chemical traces of material from a primordial magma ocean in the first 100 million years of Earth’s history. Scientists generally

Quiz of the week: what are researchers using to detect the motion of silent whales? – Physics World Skip to main content Discover more from Physics World Copyright © 2026 by IOP Publishing Ltd and individual contributors Read the original article here