The James Webb Space Telescope, the most powerful telescope ever built, has reached its final destination in space. Now comes the fun part. Thirty days after its launch, the tennis court-size telescope made its way into a parking spot that's about a million miles away from Earth. From there, it will begin its ambitious mission to better understand the early days of our universe, peer at distant exoplanets and their atmospheres and help answer large-scale questions such as how quickly the universe is expanding.

Nearby galaxies and their black holes could hold the answers to the existential questions that remain unanswered about the beginning of the universe. A black hole within a nearby galaxy called Tol 0440-381 shines about one million times brighter than the sun, researchers from the University of Iowa found in a new study. This object suggests that powerful black holes could have played a major role in cosmic evolution, the team asserts in this work.

Probably not.

Electroconvulsive therapy appears to be more effective than ketamine, according to a randomized controlled trial that examined hospitalized, severely depressed patients. But the findings, published in the International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology, indicate that both treatment options are relatively safe and valuable tools for treating depression. ...

Today's the day: Nearly a month after launch, the James Webb Space Telescope will arrive at its deep-space celestial destination on Monday (Jan. 24). Webb will be orbiting Earth-sun Lagrange Point 2 (L2), which is about 930,000 miles (1.5 million kilometers) away from our planet. Here, the spacecraft can use a minimum of fuel to orbit thanks to its alignment with the sun and Earth.

The universe is a pretty busy place, with stars blowing up, black holes consuming material and high-energy radiation galore. Some of these events show up on Earth as high-energy neutrinos, ghostly particles that hardly ever interact with normal matter. Still others show up as fast radio bursts (FRBs), which are brief but intense flashes of radio energy.

NASA is studying several moons of Saturn and Jupiter that carry oceans of liquid water deep beneath their surfaces, where alien life could thrive. Another moon, previously assumed to be a barren ice rock, might join their ranks.

These structures are a sci-fi solution to the problem of getting objects into orbit without a rocket—but you don’t want to be under one if the cable snaps.

The Hubble Space Telescope has observed a black hole at the center of a dwarf galaxy that is not acting like the destructive monsters they are often portrayed as. Instead, this black hole is creating stars rather than absorbing them. The black hole is at the center of dwarf galaxy Henize 2-10 that lies 30 million light-years away in the southern constellation Pyxis. According to NASA, the black hole is apparently contributing to a “firestorm” of new star formation taking place in the galaxy.

A human-driven mass extinction “has begun on land and in freshwater seems increasingly likely,” according to a new article.

A brilliant blast from a galaxy 2 billion light-years away is the brightest cosmic “Cow” found yet. It’s the fifth known object in this new class of exploding stars and their long-glowing remnants, and it’s giving astronomers even more hints of what powers these mysterious blasts.

A study published by researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago describes a new method for analyzing pyroptosis — the process of cell death that is usually caused by infections and results in excess inflammation in the body — and shows that process, long thought to be irreversible once initiated, can in fact be halted and controlled.

A budding industry that aims to catch zooplankton for health supplements and fish food has scientists fearing that its effects on marine ecosystems could be devastating

With fingers crossed, some experts think we may get a bit of a break from the Covid roller coaster after Omicron.

If we find an Earth-size planet around a star that sits outside the "habitable zone," we shouldn't write it off just yet.

Biologists at several startups are applying the latest advances in genetic engineering to the age-old problem of baldness, creating new hair-forming cells that could restore a person’s ability to grow hair.

One hormone we are seeing implicated more and more in obesity research goes by the name of leptin, and scientists continue to demonstrate how changing the way the body responds to it might lead to improved health. A new study has shown how targeting an enzyme within fat cells can alter sensitivity to leptin and in turn drive rapid weight loss in obese mice, while also improving overall metabolic health.

Consuming sweeteners during pregnancy may affect baby’s microbiome and obesity risk, finds new study in Frontiers in Nutrition

Planetary-scale engineering schemes designed to cool Earth's surface and lessen the impact of global heating are potentially dangerous and should be blocked by governments, more than 60 policy experts and scientists said on Monday.

A recent study has shown that some astronauts could suffer from a "space anemia." A study from the University of Ottawa and the Ottawa Hospital studied 14 astronauts after they had been to space. Studies have shown that 54% more red blood cells are destroyed by the human body in space than on Earth.