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Watch a super-rare dreamer anglerfish with ultra-black 'invisibility cloak' swim like a shadow in the deep sea
By Harry Baker published
MBARI researchers came across a rarely seen dreamer anglerfish off California's coast. Video footage of the alien-looking fish only shows its silhouette because its skin is so dark it absorbs almost all of the light that hits it.
Why is the sky blue?
By Donavyn Coffey published
The sky's blueness isn't from reflecting the water. Instead, its color has to do with scattered light.
Solar storm causes 'impossible,' pumpkin-colored auroras to fill the sky
By Harry Baker published
A striking new image shows bright orange auroras dancing in the night sky above Canada. But auroras should never be this color, so what's going on?
World's largest gravitational wave observatory squeezes light beyond the 'quantum limit'
By Ben Turner published
Researchers at the LIGO gravitational wave observatory used a new technique called frequency-dependent squeezing to boost weak signals above quantum noise.
Stunningly perfect 'Einstein ring' snapped by James Webb telescope is most distant gravitationally lensed object ever seen
By Harry Baker published
The James Webb Space Telescope has snapped a stunning image of a perfectly formed Einstein ring, which is also the most distant gravitationally lensed object ever detected.
Night sky 'bleeds' over Arizona after SpaceX rocket punches a hole in the atmosphere. Here's why.
By Harry Baker published
The recent launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in California created a gap in Earth's ionosphere, which resulted in a blood-red glow across the sky visible for hundreds of miles.
Rising and setting 'Omega sun' melts into a 'lava-like blob' in trippy mirage photos
By Harry Baker published
In back to back days, the sun appeared to melt into the horizon due to a trippy optical illusion called the "Omega sun."
NASA's Curiosity rover snaps extremely detailed 'postcard' of Martian landscape after waking up from a 'brain-boosting nap'
By Harry Baker published
The new panorama snapped by NASA's Curiosity rover combines photos from two different times of day to create a highly detailed image of the Red Planet.
What is a light-year?
By Jesse Emspak last updated
A light-year is a measure of the distance it takes light to travel through interstellar space over the course of a year.
Ethereal 'halo' and light arcs around the sun captured in photos of ultra-rare phenomena
By Harry Baker published
At least three separate optical phenomena are visible in the new images. Each of which is created by light refracting through millions of perfectly aligned ice crystals in the upper atmosphere.
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