All Stories

In 1920, Astronomers Heber Curtis and Harlow Shapley debated at the Smithsonian whether Andromeda was a separate galaxy.

With the advent of the Space Age, scientists began searching for extraterrestrial life using radio waves, believing advanced civilizations might send signals across space. Despite Cold War tensions, researchers from different countries worked together to explore this possibility. Their efforts led to international meetings, shaping modern SETI research in the search for cosmic communication.

Scientists and engineers are trying to use what they do know to create bat-inspired flying machines, but traits like bats' self-cambering stretchy wing skin, skeletal muscles and tiny hair sensors are proving difficult to replicate. 

The Moon is pockmarked with impact craters. Everywhere you look, you can see a crater. On Earth, however, impact craters are few and far between, with barely any visible. Why do we see so many craters on the Moon but so few on Earth?

Our museum collection is sometimes a working one. That means that scientists come to do aviation or space research using objects in the Museum. 

Humankind has known about them for thousands of years. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are all visible in the night sky with the unaided eye. As such, these planets have been known for thousands of years and there is no one person who can be credited with discovering these planets. These planets appear as bright objects that do not shimmer, like stars do. 

Ed Stone’s long and distinguished career in space science connects to many of the planetary exploration objects displayed in the galleries at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. That so many of the Museum’s objects have connections to his professional achievements illustrates Stone’s significant legacy in space science and exploration.

Many books have been written and movies made about the possibility of humans colonizing Mars. Some include descriptions of growing food in habitats or even changing the Martian climate via “terraforming” to enable large scale agriculture. But how realistic is it to think that Earth plants could grow unprotected on Mars today?

As a physicist, engineer, entrepreneur, and astronaut, Franklin Chang-Díaz has made significant contributions to space exploration. Born in San José, Costa Rica, he developed a passion for science and space at an early age. He moved to the United States to continue his education and achieve his dream of becoming an astronaut and in 1980, NASA selected Chang-Díaz as an astronaut candidate, making him the first Latin American immigrant to become a NASA astronaut.

On September 18, 1941, the Brooklyn Dodgers were in Pittsburgh to play a game against the Pirates. In the fourth inning, with the score tied 0-0, announcer Red Barber’s radio broadcast was disrupted, and listeners suffered 15 minutes of silence. When the broadcast resumed, the Pirates had scored four runs.