The landscape of potential hills and valleys in the Universe can be discerned by the motion of galaxies towards mass concentrations and away from voids. Space can be segmented into ‘basins of attraction’, which are now mapped with the aid of 56,000 galaxy velocities.

A void tens of metres in size below the Mare Tranquillitatis pit on the Moon is revealed by radar images from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. This finding implies that lava tubes or conduits are possibly common below lunar maria.

An Earth-mass planet is found to have a white dwarf host—the final evolutionary stage of Sun-like stars. This system suggests that terrestrial planets in Earth-like orbits may avoid being engulfed during the red-giant phases of their host stars.

The parsec-scale radio jets that form around supermassive black holes are orthogonal to the (kiloparsec-scale) optical shape of the galaxies they’re hosted in, implying an evolutionary connection.

Mid-infrared emission spectra and simulated JWST observations of basaltic rocky exoplanets show that the telescope can, in theory, observe the mineralogy and chemical composition of rocky exoplanet surfaces and detect the presence of water-bearing minerals.

A reanalysis of the Voyager 2 flyby of Uranus shows that it occurred during an extreme compression of the planet’s magnetosphere by the upstream solar wind. This would have had significant effects on the measurements made during the flyby.

Wenzel et al. detect radio signatures of two forms of cyanopyrene, a small molecular sheet of carbon, which can be used as indicators of the abundance of pyrene. Their findings suggest that small polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons must be formed in or transported to the cold interstellar medium.

A rapidly growing black hole in a very active phase has been observed with JWST ~1.5 billion years after the Big Bang. Bright in X-rays, it is accreting at a rate 4,000% in excess of the Eddington limit, offering insights into early black hole growth.

The surprising presence of several very wide binary systems of the Kuiper belt can be explained by the gradual widening of initially tighter binaries by the gravitational effects of passing bodies.

The Origin of Life Space Experiment, conducted on China’s Space Station Tiangong, aims to investigate the origin of genetic codes and its relation with gravity effects.

Is Mars exploration stalling? The unused 2022 and 2024 launch windows send some warning signs. A revitalized approach could orient a new phase of exploration and complement the long-awaited sample return process.