Stories by Lee Billings

Check out the weird and wonderful stories that delighted us this year

A major report outlining the highest priorities and recommendations for U.S. astronomy has finally been released, revealing the shape of things to come

One study suggests the Curiosity rover’s landing site is not as it seems

Half the award goes to Giorgio Parisi for his studies of disorder and chaos. The remainder is shared between Syukuro Manabe and Klaus Hasselmann for modeling global warming and climate variability

A battle for the future of American stargazing is about to begin—and the stakes are sky high

Scientists and engineers react with elation to the historic interplanetary flight

The author of a new book reveals the hidden human history of NASA’s in-development Europa Clipper mission

Jessica Watkins is excited for humans to get to work on the lunar surface

Last week’s pinpoint touchdown of NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover in Jezero Crater was historic for many reasons, chief among them the epochal nature of the mission’s task of seeking signs of ancient life—and caching relevant samples for eventual return to Earth. But even if the rover finds no evidence of Martian microbes during its operations, it will have still produced another spectacular “first” for the textbooks, which NASA officials unveiled today: An unprecedented look at the “seven minutes of terror” between Perseverance’s fiery plunge through the planet’s skies and its coming to rest on solid ground far below. This is the first ever high-definition video of atmospheric entry, descent and landing on another world.

Perseverance’s predecessor Curiosity recorded snippets of the final stages of its Mars landing in 2012 that resulted in a short stop-motion video, and in 2005 the Cassini mission’s Huygens lander beamed back images and telemetry data from its chilly descent to Saturn’s moon Titan that were later used to construct remarkable visualizations. And there is, of course, no shortage of lunar landing footage from the Apollo missions of yore. But never before has a spacecraft captured the entire sequence of an otherworldly landing in such lush detail. More than mere eye candy, this data could prove crucial for the design of future, more ambitious voyages to the Red Planet’s surface, which is considered to be one of the solar system’s most technically challenging landing destinations.

Here is NASA's livestream on the footage.

Video credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASA’s latest mission to the Red Planet will seek out signs of ancient life, gather samples for return to Earth and even fly a first-of-its-kind interplanetary helicopter

The candidate could be a “warm Neptune” or a mirage. Either way, it signals the dawn of a revolution in astronomy

In conversation, the Harvard University professor explains his shocking hypothesis—and calls out what he sees as a crisis in science

Strange radio transmissions appear to be coming from our nearest star system. Now scientists are trying to work out what is sending them

Join Scientific American for a conversation about the next steps in humanity’s reconnaissance of Mars. Featuring Casey Dreier, senior space policy adviser at the Planetary Society, and space and physics editor Lee Billings, this deep dive will begin with an overview of NASA’s upcoming Perseverance rover—slated to land on Mars in February 2021 to search for signs of past and present life and to gather samples for future return to Earth.

Dreier and Billings will also discuss the “post-Perseverance” future in which space agencies and private companies may pursue major shifts in Mars exploration strategies and how those plans could forever change our understanding of—and relationship with—the Red Planet.

Climate change, nuclear arms control, the pandemic and more will be determined by whoever wins the White House and Congress

Half the award goes to Roger Penrose, with the rest split between Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez, for work revealing the “darkest secrets of the universe”

How massive can black holes become? How do astronomers typically observe them? How do they die? Scientific American presents a conversation about these mysterious cosmic phenomena with Yale University astrophysicist Priyamvada Natarajan.

Three decades into the life of the world’s most revered orbital observatory, Ken Sembach, director of the Space Telescope Science Institute, reflects on its future

A new book captures the pioneering, propaganda-infused visions of mid-20th-century Soviet space exploration

A new study of galaxy clusters suggests the cosmos may not be the same in all directions

Emmy and Peabody Award–winning science writer, producer and director Ann Druyan talks about Cosmos: Possible Worlds, the next installment of the Cosmos series.

Cosmos co-creator discusses communicating her dream for humanity 

An encounter with Arrokoth at the outskirts of the solar system offers the best evidence yet for how worlds coalesce from dust

Scientists have detected relativistic frame dragging, a prediction of Einstein’s greatest theory, around a distant pair of exotic stars