The Artemis II rocket rolls out to the launchpad from the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Saturday, Jan. 17, 2026. (Cassandra Klos/The New York Times) By KENNETH CHANG Reid Wiseman, a NASA astronaut selected in 2011, said Saturday morning that a few days ago he looked up and saw the crescent moon in the light of the sunrise. He thought about the far side of the moon — the part that is always hidden from Earth. “You just think about a

In an undated image provided by Gonzalo Ignazi, a puma and penguins in the Patagonia region of South America. In Argentina, the return of pumas brought top predators back to the landscape — much to penguins’ dismay. (Gonzalo Ignazi via The New York Times) By ALEXA ROBLES-GIL Penguins throughout the southern seas have to worry about being picked off by seals or hunted by orcas. On land, they can find safety in numbers. But in the Patagonia region of Argentina, the flightless s

An image provided by University of British Columbia (A.Trites), Dalhousie University (S. Fortune), Hakai Institute (K. Holmes), Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (X. Cheng) shows researchers near killer whales in waters off British Columbia, Canada. (University of British Columbia, Dalhousie University, Hakai Institute, Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research via The New York Times) By ALEXA ROBLES-GIL In the waters off British Columbia, an unusual partn

A wary red-footed tortoise in Casanare, Colombia, June 26, 2024. Long dismissed as unintelligent, reptiles are emerging as cognitively and emotionally complex animals — a new study involving tortoises suggests that they also possess mood states. (Federico Rios/The New York Times) By BRANDON KEIM Should you meet a turtle basking on a log in the sun, you might reasonably conclude that the turtle is in a good mood. Granted, there has been little scientific evidence that reptiles

In an undated image provided by Ibiricu et al, Nature Communications 2025, Joaquinraptor, one of the most complete megaraptor specimens ever found. A fossil of the 23-foot-tall predator could help unlock secrets of an order of dinosaurs that remain poorly understood. (Ibiricu et al, Nature Communications 2025 via The New York Times) By ASHER ELBEIN In 2019, a team of researchers uncovered a 70-million-year-old dinosaur in a Patagonian province of Argentina. The dinosaur, a hu

In an undated image provided by Gabriel Diaz Yanten, a life reconstruction of Kostensuchus, a large, land-dwelling crocodile that was large enough to fight with predatory dinosaurs over prey. A fossil found in Argentina shows that up to the very end of the age of dinosaurs, they faced serious competition from other reptile species. (Gabriel Diaz Yanten via The New York Times) By ASHER ELBEIN An apex predator prowled the forests of Patagonia a few million years before the age

A photo provided by Bryan O’Malley shows a collage of foraminifera, a kind of single-celled organism, found in a potential mining zone and arranged by O’Malley, a lead researcher. An ocean-mining company has funded some of the most comprehensive scientific studies to date, and peer-reviewed results have begun to emerge. (Bryan O’Malley via The New York Times) By Sachi Kitajima Mulkey Industrial mining of the seabed could reduce the abundance and diversity of tiny animals livi

In an undated image provided by Chris Gunn/NASA, inspecting the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope’s Wide Field Instrument upon delivery to NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. In 2026, there will be journeys to the moon and Mars, new visions of the cosmos and a solar eclipse that might be worth traveling for. (Chris Gunn/NASA via The New York Times) By KATRINA MILLER and MICHAEL ROSTON The thing about space is that you have to be patient. The universe does not