Have you met anyone who was completely confident that humanity had conquered space? If yes, then know that this person is a rare optimist. The cosmos has not revealed all its secrets to us. And even what we already know is sometimes more frightening than pleasing.
What is the value of the assumption about the existence of planets unknown to us, which can suddenly crash into the Earth, leading to a new end of the world? NASA is seriously considering this possibility. But besides the frightening and absolute darkness and uncertainty, space is fraught with real wonders... really, will we be able to observe them with our own eyes?
We present to you 11 interesting facts about our Universe that may surprise, amaze and even scare you.
Black holes
This phrase sounds quite scary, and for good reason. Black holes, as is known, are formed as a result of the destruction of stars, forming a real “whirlpool” that sucks in everything that gets in its way. Moreover, the word “path” is extremely appropriate here. Black holes actually move through the Universe, and their trajectory cannot be predicted. Sometimes they crash into massive objects that they cannot absorb, causing the black holes to change direction. All this is accompanied by the lowest sound that has been recorded so far. For incredulous musicians, let us explain: this sound is B flat, which is 57 octaves below the note to the first octave.
Planet with diamond icebergs floating in an ocean of carbon
No, this is not a line from a poem by some space-obsessed poet. This is exactly how scientists imagine the surface of Neptune and Uranus. Due to special conditions, it can even rain diamonds there.
Dark matter and dark energy
More than 90% of the entire Universe consists of this combination, and we cannot see or explore it. Both energy and matter are absolutely invisible to humans and cannot be measured in any way. And yet our entire world (including ourselves) consists almost entirely of dark energy and matter. It's not that we're saying that there are some creatures from other dimensions that we also can't notice... ...we're just not sure that they don't exist.
Hot planet
Another incredible planet could well surprise us with a rain of molten glass, because due to its close position in relation to its “sun”, the temperature on its surface reaches more than 4000 C°. Yes, if we end up there, we will die immediately. Apparently, everything beautiful that is in space is deadly to humans.
Sometimes the satellites of planets are much more interesting than the planets themselves
For example, on Titan, a moon of Saturn, the gravity is so low that we could fly there like birds with our wings tied on. And we would float above the amazingly beautiful green and yellow surface... ...until the gasoline rain killed us. It's sad, isn't it?
The Phantom Menace
In addition to giant asteroids, unknown planets and roaming black holes, our planet is also threatened by a huge cloud of gas. It weighs as much as one million stars and is slowly moving straight towards us. True, before it reaches our planet, millions of years will pass. But when this happens, it will definitely be the end of the world and the beginning of a new life cycle.
Stars have their own quirks
Stars are one of the few cosmic wonders that we can regularly observe with the naked eye. Everyone knows about their beauty, but how many have heard about their sound? Yes, stars can sing. True, unfortunately, we cannot hear their singing, because the height of this singing is about a trillion hertz. (18) However, these heavenly fireflies are not as cute as they seem at first glance. Among them there are real vampires and zombies. So, technically, a dead star can pull matter from its “living” neighbors. Usually such stars are called supernovae, and they are a subtype of white dwarfs. As a result, these cuties suck out all the energy of their neighbors, and what is left of these neighbors subsequently floats around the universe in the form of space debris.
Earthly things are not from Earth
Have you ever imagined that many of the things we are familiar with are actually of unearthly origin? For example, gold. All the gold on our planet came here as a result of numerous collisions with asteroids. What else? Yes, even life! Yes, you heard right: there is an assumption, the essence of which boils down to the fact that life in the form of microorganisms came to our planet from Mars. Why isn't she there now? Who knows... You never know what terrible secret the “red planet” hides about the death of all living things.
People as a phenomenon
That's right - we are one of the wonders of our Universe. And not only our existence in itself (which, of course, is amazing), but also our behavior. This is what really amazes us: we never tire of polluting our planet and are ready to kill each other for a ghostly idea. We have some amazing craving for self-destruction in every possible way. I don’t know how other intelligent representatives of this Universe are doing (if they exist, of course), but I wouldn’t want to come into contact with us. Just watch it, just for fun.
Contacts with extraterrestrial intelligence... ...or not?
At least two cases have been recorded in history that describe possible contact with extraterrestrial life forms. So, in August 1977, the Big ear radio telescope (translated as “Big Ear”), located at the Ohio State University Observatory, picked up a radio signal that later became known as “WOW!” The fact is that the telescope showed exactly the frequency and periodicity of the waves, which, as expected, would be characteristic of extraterrestrial sources. The scientist who recorded this signed the printed data - “Wow!” - hence the name.
The last interesting phenomenon was noticed in October 2016. It was the mysterious blinking of stars. It would seem strange? However, such a bright pulsation is extremely atypical for stars. So, it is likely that these are some alien life forms that were sending us signals... or maybe not.
New house
Humanity has long been considering the need to search for a new planet, because, as we have already found out, sooner or later we will face a new end of the world. So, the closest planet in terms of conditions is Gliese 581g, to which we will have to fly about 20 light years. True, there is one “but”: the peculiarities of the location of this planet are such that if a person located on its surface goes out into the “sunlight”, his skin will melt, and upon entering the shadow, he will immediately freeze. This is such an alternative... ...dubious.
Space. There is nothing more interesting and mysterious. Day after day, humanity increases its knowledge of the universe, while simultaneously expanding the boundaries of the unknown. Having received ten answers, we ask ourselves a hundred more questions - and so on all the time. We have collected the most interesting facts about the universe in order not only to satisfy the curiosity of readers, but also to rekindle their interest in the universe with renewed vigor.
The moon is running away from us
The Moon is moving away from the Earth - yes, our satellite is “running away” from us at a speed of approximately 3.8 centimeters per year. What does this mean? As the radius of the lunar orbit increases, the size of the lunar disk observed from Earth decreases. This means that such a phenomenon as a total solar eclipse is under threat.
In addition, some planets orbit from their star at a distance suitable for the existence of liquid water. And this makes it possible to discover planets suitable for life. And in the near future.
What do they write in space?
American scientists and astronauts have long been thinking about the design of a pen that could be used to write in space - while their Russian colleagues simply decided to use an ordinary slate pencil in zero gravity, without changing it in any way and without spending huge sums on developing concepts and experiments.
Diamond showers
According to, diamond rains occur on Jupiter and Saturn - thunder constantly rages in the upper atmosphere of these planets, and lightning discharges release carbon from methane molecules. Moving towards the surface of the planet and overcoming hydrogen layers, subjected to gravity and enormous temperatures, carbon turns into graphite and then into diamond.
If you believe this hypothesis, up to ten million tons of diamonds can accumulate on gas giants! At the moment, the hypothesis still remains controversial - many scientists are sure that the proportion of methane in the atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn is too small, and, having difficulty even converting into soot, methane most likely simply dissolves.
These are just a few of the huge number of mysteries of the universe. Thousands of questions remain unanswered, we still do not know about millions of phenomena and secrets - our generation has something to strive for.
But we will try to tell more about space on the pages of the site. Subscribe to updates so you don't miss a new episode!
Real sizes of all solar system objects
- The sun is 300,000 times larger than our planet Earth.
- The sun rotates completely around its axis in 25-35 days.
- It takes light 8.3 minutes to get from the Sun to our Earth, so if the Sun goes out, we won’t know it right away.
- Earth, Mars, Mercury and Venus are also called the “inner planets” because they are closest to the Sun.
- The distance between the Earth and the Sun is defined as the Astronomical Unit (abbreviated AU) and is equal to 149,597,870 kilometers.
- The Sun is the largest object in the Solar System.
- The Sun loses up to 1,000,000 tons of its mass every second due to the solar wind.
- The solar system is about 4.6 billion years old. Scientists estimate that she will live for another 5,000 million years.
Mercury
- Mercury and Venus are unique in that they do not have any satellites.
- Mariner 10 was the only spacecraft to ever visit Mercury. He managed to take photographs of 45% of its surface.
- The hottest planet in our solar system is Venus. Many people believe that it should be Mercury, because it is closer to the Sun, but since Venus has too much high-density carbon dioxide in its atmosphere, a greenhouse effect is formed on the planet.
- A day on Mercury is equivalent to 58 Earth days, but at the same time a year is only 88 days! Let us explain that this difference is due to the fact that Mercury rotates extremely slowly around its axis, but rotates quite quickly around the Sun.
- Mercury has no atmosphere, which means there is no wind or any other weather.
- Venus is the only planet that rotates in the opposite direction relative to the other planets in the solar system.
- Venus has more volcanoes than any other planet in our solar system.
Black hole sucks matter from a star (computer graphics)
- Stars located near black holes can be torn apart by them.
- From the point of view of the Theory of Relativity, in addition to black holes, white holes should also exist, although we have not yet discovered one (the existence of black holes is also questioned).
Armstrong's footprint on the moon
- The first man on the moon was from the USA and his name was Neil Armstrong.
- Armstrong's first footprint is still on the moon.
- All traces and imprints of the lunar rovers will remain on the surface of the Moon forever, since there is no atmosphere there, and therefore no wind. Although theoretically all this could disappear due to meteor shower or any other bombardment object.
- The tides on our planet are formed due to the gravity of the Sun and Moon.
- NASA's LCROSS Research Satellite has discovered evidence of large amounts of water on the Moon.
- Buzz Aldrin became the second man on the moon.
- Interestingly, Buzz Aldrin's mother's name was "Luna".
- Our Moon moves away from the Earth by 4 cm per year.
- Our moon is about 4.5 billion years old.
- February 1865 and 1999 were the only months without a full moon.
- The mass of the Moon is 1/80 of the mass of the Earth.
- It takes light 1.3 seconds to travel the distance from the Moon to the Earth.
Mars and Earth
- The tallest mountain, known as Olympus Mons, is located on Mars. The height of the peak reaches 25 km, which is about 3 times higher than Everest.
- Mars has a much lower gravitational field, so a person weighing 100 kg on Earth would weigh only 38 kg on the surface of Mars.
- There are 24 hours, 39 minutes and 35 seconds in a Martian day.
Jupiter and some of its moons
- Scientific calculations suggest the presence of 67 moons of Jupiter, but so far only 57 of them have been discovered and named.
- 4 planets of the solar system are gas giants: Jupiter, Neptune, Saturn and Uranus.
- The planet with the most moons is Jupiter with 67 moons.
- Jupiter is also known as the dumping ground for the entire solar system (or Earth's shield), as a large percentage of asteroids are attracted by its gravitational force.
Saturn and its rings
- Saturn is the second largest planet in our world after Jupiter.
- If you were driving at a speed of 121 km per hour, it would take you 258 days to travel around one of Saturn's rings.
- Enceladus is one of the smallest moons of Saturn. This satellite reflects up to 90% of sunlight, which is even greater than the percentage of light reflected from snow!
- Although Saturn is only the second most massive planet, it is the first in brightness!
- Since Saturn has low density, if you put it in water, it will float!
- The satellite Triton gradually moves closer to Neptune as it rotates.
- Scientists' calculations predict that Triton and Neptune will eventually come so close that Triton will be torn apart, and Neptune will have many more rings than even Saturn currently has.
- Triton is also the only large satellite in the entire solar system that rotates in the opposite direction to the rotation of its planet.
- It takes Neptune 60,190 days (almost 165 years) to circle the Sun. That is, since its discovery in 1846, it has completed only one rotation cycle!
- The Kuiper region is a region of the solar system located beyond Neptune, which consists of heaps of various debris left over from the creation of the solar system.
- Uranus has a blue glow due to the methane in its atmosphere, since methane does not transmit red light.
- Uranus has relatively recently discovered 27 satellites.
- Uranus has a unique tilt, due to which one night on it lasts, just imagine, 21 years!
- Uranus was originally called "George's Star".
Pluto is smaller than Russia
List of dwarf planets and other small objects
- Pluto is even smaller than the Moon!
- Charon is a satellite of Pluto, but it is not much smaller in size.
- A day on Pluto lasts 6 days and 9 hours.
- Pluto is named after the Roman god, and not after the Disney dog, as some believe.
- In 2006, the International Astronomical Union reclassified Pluto as a dwarf planet.
- There are currently 5 dwarf planets in the solar system: Ceres, Pluto, Haumea, Eris and Makemake.
Soviet satellite
- The first artificial Earth satellite was launched by the USSR in 1957 and was called Sputnik-1.
- The first person to go into space was from the Soviet Union and his name was Yuri Gagarin.
- The second man in space was German Titov. He was Yuri Gagarin's understudy.
- The first woman cosmonaut was USSR citizen Valentina Tereshkova.
- Soviet and Russian cosmonaut Sergei Konstantinovich Krikalev holds the record for time spent in space. His record reaches 803 days, 9 hours and 39 minutes, which is equivalent to 2.2 years!
International Space Station
- The International Space Station is the largest object that humanity has ever launched into space.
- The International Space Station orbits the Earth every 90 minutes.
- The Buzz Lightyear toy from the famous cartoon "Toy Story" was in outer space! He spent 15 months aboard the ISS and returned to Earth on September 11, 2009.
Comparison of the Earth with other space objects
- The Earth's daily rotation increases by 0.0001 seconds every year.
- Stars appear to twinkle in the night sky because the light coming from them is destroyed in the Earth's atmosphere.
- Only 24 people have seen our planet from space. But thanks to the Google Earth project, other people have downloaded the view of the Earth from space more than 500 million times.
- Recently, the “Flat Earth” movement has become more active. And it is no longer clear whether they are joking or arguing seriously. Any person with logic can independently carry out many observations and establish that the Earth has a spherical shape (more precisely, a geoid, a slightly flattened sphere).
Whirlpool Galaxy
- The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) was the very first cosmic spiral object.
- A light year is the distance that light travels in one year. This distance is equal to 95 trillion kilometers!
- The width of our Milky Way galaxy is about 100,000 light years.
- The gravitational force of large objects sometimes tears apart comets flying nearby.
- Any liquid that finds itself in free movement in space will take on the shape of a sphere due to the forces of surface tension. The sphere will then have the smallest possible surface area that will be possible for this liquid.
- It's funny, but we know much more about space than we know about the depths of our oceans.
Prospero X-3
- The only satellite launched by Britain is called Prospero X-3.
- The chance of being killed by space debris is 1 in 5 billion.
- There are three types of galaxies in space: spiral, elliptical and irregular.
- Our Milky Way galaxy consists of approximately 200,000,000 stars.
- In the northern part of the sky you can see two galaxies - the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and the Triangulum Galaxy (M33).
- The closest galaxy to us is the Andromeda galaxy.
- The first supernova not from our galaxy was first observed in the Andromeda galaxy and was called Andromeda S. It exploded in 1885.
- The Andromeda Galaxy is visible in the sky as a small spot of light. It is the farthest object that you can observe with the naked eye.
- If you screamed in space, no one would hear you, since sound requires an atmosphere to propagate, and there is none in space.
- Due to the lack of gravity in space, astronauts can grow approximately 5 cm in height.
- There are a total of 166 satellites in our solar system.
R136a1 compared to the Sun and Earth
- The largest known star is star R136a1, whose mass is 265-320 times greater than the Sun!
- The most distant galaxy we have discovered is called GRB 090423, which is 13.6 billion light years away! This means that the light emanating from it began its journey only 600,000 years after the formation of the Universe!
- The most massive object known to us is Quasar OJ287. The predicted mass should be 18 billion times the mass of the Sun.
An image from the Hubble Telescope shows some of the most distant galaxies visible using modern technology, each containing billions of stars. It's just part of the universe.
- Asteroids are byproducts of the formation of the solar system, which arose more than 4 billion years ago.
- The first mammal to go into space was the Soviet dog Laika. Before her, there were a number of unsuccessful launches with fatal consequences for animals.
- The term “astronaut” comes straight from Ancient Greece and literally consists of the words “star” (astro) and sailor (naut), so astronaut means “star sailor”.
- If you add up all the time that people spent in space, you get 30,400 days or 83 years!
- Red dwarf stars have the smallest mass and can burn continuously for 10 trillion years.
- There are about 2*10 23 stars in space. In Russian, this number is 200,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000!
- Since there is no gravity in space, ordinary pens will not work there!
- There are 88 constellations in our night sky, some of which coincide with the names of the zodiac signs.
- The center of a comet is called the "nucleus".
- Even before 240 BC. Chinese astronomers began documenting the appearance of Comet Galileo.
10 strangest things in the universe - interesting facts for Sunday evening. The more we look at the sun and stars, the more strange things we see. Even the space itself is perplexing. Recent research shows that the universe extends 150 billion light-years across, and that the cosmos itself is about 13.7 billion years old. From ultra-fast stars to the nature of things - especially for you, we have collected ten of the strangest and most mysterious objects outside our little world.
10. Moving stars
If you've ever lain on the southern coast of Crimea in August or simply looked up at the night sky dotted with myriads of stars, you've probably seen shooting stars. Although in fact these are meteors burning up (or not burning up) in the Earth's atmosphere. Tell your child that stars don't fall and ruin his childhood dream. In fact, shooting stars exist. One in a hundred million.
In 2005, astronomers discovered the first "moving star," which was moving through the galaxy at ten times the normal speed of about 900 kilometers per second. We have some guesses about what launches these rare stars into deep space, but we're not sure. It could be a supernova explosion or a supermassive black hole.
9. Black holes
“It’s getting weirder and weirder,” thought Alice as she traveled through Wonderland. Astronomers don’t know what could be stranger than a black hole. We dedicated an entire article to these beauties and the consequences of their collision with the Solar System.
Nothing can escape the gravitational boundary of a black hole - the so-called event horizon - neither matter nor light. Astrophysicists think that black holes form dying stars with the mass of 3-20 suns. At the centers of galaxies, black holes can be 10,000 or even 18 billion times the mass of the sun. And they grow, sucking in gas, dust, stars and smaller black holes.
As for medium-sized black holes, their existence, oddly enough, is highly questionable.
8. Magnetars
The sun rotates around its axis approximately once every 25 days, gradually distorting the magnetic field. But imagine a dying star heavier than the sun, which collapses and shrinks into a lump of matter only a few tens of kilometers in diameter. Just as a spinning ballerina spins faster and faster, pressing her arms closer to herself and spreading them out to the sides, this gesture also spins the neutron star along with its magnetic field.
Calculations show that such objects have a temporary magnetic field that is a million billion times stronger than the earth's. This is enough to destroy your credit card at a distance of hundreds of thousands of kilometers and curl atoms into ultra-thin cylinders.
7. Neutrino
Take a coin out of your pocket and hold it in front of you for a second. And guess what? About 150 billion tiny, virtually weightless particles called neutrinos just flew through it as if it didn't exist.
Scientists have discovered that they are born in stars (living or exploding), nuclear materials and during the Big Bang. Elementary particles have three “flavors” and, most interestingly, disappear whenever they want.
And because neutrinos sometimes interact with “normal” matter like water and mineral oil, scientists hope they can use them as a kind of revolutionary telescope to peer into the furthest reaches of the universe hidden by dust and gas.
6. Dark matter
If you took all the energy and matter in space, baked it into a cake and divided it, the result would surprise you.
All the galaxies, stars, planets, comets, asteroids, dust, gas and particles make up only 4 percent of the known universe. Most of what we call "matter" - approximately 23 percent of the universe - is invisible to the human eye and instruments.
Scientists can see the gravitational influence of dark matter on stars and galaxies, but are feverishly searching for a way to detect it directly with their instruments. They believe that along with neutrinos there may be more massive elusive particles.
5. Dark energy
Here's what will really surprise everyone on the planet - and especially scientists - dark energy. Continuing the pie analogy, dark energy accounts for 73 percent of the known Universe. It seems to permeate the entire cosmos and drive galaxies further and further apart at enormous speeds.
Some cosmologists believe that this expansion over several trillion years will make the Milky Way an “island of the universe” from where other galaxies will not be visible.
Others believe that the rate of growth is so great that it will lead to a "Great Divide." In this case, the force of dark energy will overcome gravity and separate stars from planets, the forces that hold particles together, the molecules of those particles, and ultimately the atom and subatomic particles. Fortunately, humanity will most likely not see this cataclysm.
4. Planets
Despite the fact that we live on a planet, it and others like it remain one of the most significant mysteries in the Universe. For example, there is no theory that fully explains how planets—especially rocky ones—formed from gas and dust around stars. The fact that most of the planet is hidden under its surface is also not explained. Powerful instruments could shed light on the latter, but we can barely study the planets even in our solar system.
The first planet outside our solar system was only discovered in 1999, and it wasn't until 2008 that we got our first decent picture of an exoplanet. And recently, scientists discovered the smallest exoplanet to date.
3. Gravity
The force that makes stars burn, planets stay together and form orbits remains one of the most widespread and weakest in space.
Scientists have calculated almost all the equations and models that describe and predict gravity, but its source outside of matter remains an absolute mystery.
Some believe that incredibly small particles called gravitons are responsible for gravity, but whether they can be detected in principle is a big question.
However, there is an active hunt for large disturbances in the Universe called gravitational waves. If they are discovered (presumably from black hole mergers), Albert Einstein's concept that the universe has a fabric of spacetime will be on solid ground.
2. Life
There is plenty of matter and energy throughout the Universe, but only in some places of cosmic diversity there are sufficiently favorable conditions for the emergence of life.
And thanks to constant access to life here on Earth, we have a good understanding of what elements and conditions are needed for this strange phenomenon to occur. But the exact recipe for how carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur are converted into the body is unknown.
Scientists are searching for new areas in the solar system where life could flourish (or perhaps, under the surface of watery moons), in the hope of developing a compelling theory about the origins of life.
1. Universe
Dodecahedral Poincaré space. The supposed shape of the Universe.
The source of energy, matter, the Universe itself, and the greatest mystery is the Universe itself.
Based on widespread waves of cosmic radiation and other evidence, scientists believe that the cosmos formed after the Big Bang - an inexplicable expansion of energy from a super-dense and super-hot source.
But describing the time before this event may be impossible, since time did not exist before the Big Bang. Particle accelerators, which smash atoms together, are trying to shed light on the formation of the universe. And make it a little less weird than it is today.
The universe we live in is a pretty strange place. A person has not even studied it completely, because he simply does not have such an opportunity. Most of the currently available information is the theoretical calculations of scientists. Fortunately, they are confirmed by observations from spacecraft, but who knows what is actually happening in deep space?
Gravitational waves
Albert Einstein reported the existence of gravitational waves back in 1916, but his calculations proved it only a hundred years later. The world of science was completely delighted: people realized that space-time is a completely tangible material quantity.
Interplanetary transport network
It sounds like the title of a book by a science fiction writer. However, the interplanetary transport network is perhaps the most amazing phenomenon in our Universe. It is a set of paths based on the competing gravity of celestial bodies. Satellites and even spacecraft can use the transport network to move between objects without using energy.
Plasma
Most of us were taught in school that there are three types of matter: solid, liquid and gas. But there is a fourth: plasma, the most abundant matter in the Universe.
sky glow
A unique phenomenon that can only be seen from space. The glow comes from the release of energy from atoms and molecules high in the atmosphere. By releasing their energy received during the day from the sun, the molecules can produce visible light - oxygen, for example, produces green light.
Regulation of the Sun
The sun independently regulates the state of its own core. When too many hydrogen atoms collide and fusion occurs at too high a rate, the core heats up and expands slightly towards the outer layers. The extra space reduces the density of atoms and, therefore, the frequency of collisions - the nucleus begins to cool, starting the reverse process.
Dark matter
One of the strangest things astronomers encounter is dark matter. This is a hypothetical substance that (hypothetically) makes up 80% of the Universe. Scientists are smashing particles at the Large Hadron Collider to try to figure out if it really exists.
Other worlds
Although no mission has been planned to the nearest star after the Sun, Proxima Centauri, that is where one might look for extraterrestrial intelligence. Unfortunately, the spacecraft will travel to Proxima Centauri for as long as 74,000 Earth years.