It's fun to think about how we know stuff. For instance, the sun has a mass of about 2 x 10 30 kilograms. That is such an enormous mass that it's difficult to comprehend. And if it's so difficult for ...

Neutron star and black hole masses in binary systems are calculable using Kepler's laws of motion, based on orbital parameters and object speeds. Merging neutron stars or black holes emit ...

Astronomers cannot directly weigh celestial objects like galaxies; indirect methods are necessary. Mass determination leverages the relationship between gravity and mass, utilizing orbital periods and ...

Speed can make objects act as if they have more mass, but can you ever make an object appear to have less mass? It’s true that speeding an object up to considerable fractions of the speed of light ...

This is a good question, and also a good reminder to be careful with one’s language when writing about physics! Most of the time, if you’re reading an article, what we mean by mass and rest mass is ...

Barry Lienert, a geophysicist at the University of Hawaii, provides the following explanation. We start by determining the mass of the Earth. Issac Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation tells us that ...

The terms weight and mass are often used incorrectly. Phrases like ‘a bag of sugar weighs 1 kg’ are not scientifically correct. This means that a 1 kg mass would be attracted to Earth by a force of 10 ...

In my previous post about a floating Saturn, I hinted that I could write about the methods we can use to find the density of Saturn. Oh, and once again, the density of Saturn is lower than the density ...

Dark matter is an enigmatic form of matter not expected to emit light, yet it is essential to understanding how the rich tapestry of stars and galaxies we see in the night sky evolved. As a ...

The breakthrough measurement of the white dwarf LAWD 37 made with Hubble gives us a hint of how the sun will look at the end of its life. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an ...

The 3I/ATLAS interstellar object, detected by NASA, is remarkably larger and more massive than earlier estimates, making it an exceptionally rare visitor. Its unusual trajectory and characteristics, ...