Will We Ever Visit Other Stars?
In his poem “Strontium-90,” the great Turkish poet Nazım Hikmet says: “We are in a race with ourselves, my dear. Either we will take life to the dead stars, or death will descend upon our world.” Do you think that…
In his poem “Strontium-90,” the great Turkish poet Nazım Hikmet says: “We are in a race with ourselves, my dear. Either we will take life to the dead stars, or death will descend upon our world.” Do you think that…
In our daily lives, we usually don’t realize how strong gravity is unless we’re doing something that works against it, such as climbing a hill on a bicycle, going up stairs, or lifting a heavy object. But think about this:…
What if we could build a spaceship capable of leaving the solar system at the speed of light? How long would it take to reach interstellar space? Despite being small compared to our galaxy, let alone the entire universe, our…
If you’ve watched the very good science fiction series The Expanse, you will see that the concept of “g” is frequently mentioned. The accelerations/decelerations and maneuvers of spacecraft are always given in units of “g”. This is also true in…
It’s a well-known fact that light slows down in water, glass, or any other transparent medium. Even more interestingly, it returns to its original speed after leaving that medium. Yes, it speeds up! But how can that happen? Why does…
E=mc² is probably the world’s most famous equation. It means “Energy equals mass times the speed of light squared.” The formula implies that a small amount of rest mass corresponds to an enormous amount of energy, which is the physics…
At what altitude can you start seeing the curvature of the Earth? Is it visible from the top of a skyscraper, a mountain peak, or a passenger plane? Can a high-altitude balloon provide a clear view, or is it something…
Why do we see only one side of the Moon? You have probably heard references to the “dark side” of the Moon – there’s even a Pink Floyd album with that name. However, there is no “dark side” of the…
We see images and videos from the International Space Station (ISS) where astronauts float in space freely. That’s because they’re in space, so there is no gravitational force of Earth there, right? Wrong.