Astronomy, the oldest of natural sciences, has changed often throughout history depending on general knowledge, geographical region and culture. The earliest practitioners of astronomy were early ...

On Oct. 13, 1773, Charles Messier spotted the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) for the first time. Writing of it a few months later, he described the object as a “very faint nebula without any stars”; it would ...

In March of 1899, William Pickering discovered Phoebe, a moon of Saturn, on photographic plates taken on Aug. 16, 1898, by DeLisle Stewart. It was the first moon to be discovered photographically, ...

Looking into space can be pretty daunting. How do we make sense of the vast expanse above our heads, the millions of stars we might be able to see, and the billions more we can’t? This new series ...

History is often taught as if astronomy followed a single European arc—from Greek philosophy to Renaissance telescopes to modern science—while Africa appears absent or myth-bound. This series, “When ...

On Feb. 10, 1842, Agnes Mary Clerke was born in County Cork, Ireland. As her bank manager father owned a telescope and the family observed at home, it is perhaps not surprising that Clerke showed ...

Irish Astronomy's "Golden Age" and the world's largest telescope IrishCentral contributor Michael O’Shea in conversation explores the history of astronomy in Ireland dating from the 18th century and ...

Originally published in England under the title The Fontana history of astronomy and cosmology. Statement of responsibility from jacket. Prehistory -- Ancient Egypt -- Mesopotamia -- The Greek and ...

Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www ...

The story of women in astronomy is not simply a tale of the planets they’ve discovered and the black holes they’ve mapped. It is a history filled with persistence and personal triumphs. “The Sky is ...

A visionary scientist investigates the deep history of astronomy in West Africa. A NASA spacecraft named Lucy blasts off from Cape Canaveral on a mission to the Trojans, a group of asteroids over 400 ...