Astronomers have spotted one of the strangest-looking asteroids we have ever seen. The space rock, called 44 Nysa, was discovered in 1857, but it wasn’t until now that we had the observational capability to figure out its shape – and its shape is weird.

An E-type asteroid, which is a relatively rare type rich in a mineral called enstatite, 44 Nysa circles the sun in the main asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. It is the brightest E-type asteroid we know of and one of the largest, with an average diameter of about 75 kilometres, which makes it a tempting observational target.

at the Lowell Observatory in Arizona and her colleagues used the Large Binocular Telescope, also in Arizona, and the Very Large Telescope in Chile to take a closer look at 44 Nysa. They used that data to build a three-dimensional model of the asteroid, and found that it seems to have three lobes, each separated from the others by a thin “neck” that holds the asteroid together.

While two-lobed asteroids are relatively common, trinary ones are much rarer. It isn’t yet clear how exactly it formed – it could have once been a more normal-shaped asteroid and then been battered beyond recognition by other space rocks, or the three lobes could have once been separate and then joined together in what’s called a contact trinary. Either way, its interior must be strong to have stuck together.

Another wrinkle in the story is that 44 Nysa seems to have a tiny moon, just about a kilometre across. In future observations, measuring the moon’s orbit could give us more information about 44 Nysa’s interior structure, and therefore its origins.

Western Europe’s first total solar eclipse since 1999 will happen on 12 August and see eclipse chasers travel to eastern Greenland, western Iceland and northern Spain for totality, when the moon covers the sun’s disc and the usually hidden solar corona bursts into view. Solar and atmospheric scientists will be among them – and above them.

It is tempting to think total solar eclipses have been made obsolete for scientists by spacecraft. NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has flown through the sun’s corona, while the European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter and study the sun from space. can even create artificial eclipses in orbit. So why do scientists still need to chase the moon’s shadow across Earth?

The answer is simple: total eclipses offer cheap and accessible opportunities to study both the sun and Earth. “Research groups that have novel ideas can go to an eclipse and take observations without having to bid for tens of millions of pounds’ worth of grants from NASA or the European Space Agency – the barrier to entry is much lower,” says , a solar physicist at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder, Colorado.

One example is the , which will send teams from several US universities to Spain and Iceland to study atmospheric responses to the eclipse. Balloons released in Spain will reach an altitude of 27 to 37 kilometres, carrying 360-degree cameras, ozone instruments and radio experiments. Icelandic teams will launch balloons carrying radiosondes, devices that can monitor pressure, temperature, humidity and other atmospheric parameters. The idea is to measure the effects the eclipse has on the planetary boundary layer, the atmosphere’s lowest region where its behaviour is most heavily influenced by warm air rising from the ground.

NASA’s WB-57 high-altitude aircraft can measure polarised coronal light and will fly for the 2026 eclipse. Flying high avoids the problem of cloud cover obscuring the view, while also minimising atmospheric interference. “At high altitude, you can observe infrared light that you can’t observe from the ground,” says French.

During the 2024 total solar eclipse, – an experiment funded by the US National Science Foundation and NASA – used telescopes spread along the path of totality to create a 1-hour timelapse of the corona. This will be repeated during the 2026 eclipse, ahead of a plan to produce a timelapse of the corona with the larger experiment during the longer eclipse that will happen in August 2027. Totality in 2027 will last much longer because the new moon will be closer to Earth, and the path of totality is close to the equator, where Earth effectively bulges out towards the moon.

Subscriber-only newsletter

Sign up to Lost in Space-Time

Sign up to newsletter

“Most of the scientific instruments at an eclipse are not just taking photographs, but collecting measurements of spectra,” says French. Spectroscopy can reveal the speed, temperature and density of plasma in the corona. “When you observe specific spectra, this can give you information on the speed of plasma moving in the sun, and can tell you about the temperature and the density of plasma sloshing around the sun,” he says.

Other eclipse scientists ask a fundamental question: what is the radius of the sun? Because the sun has no solid surface, its visible edge is difficult to define. Yet tiny differences can shift the predicted edge of the path of totality. The , a group of researchers scattered across the world, records flash spectra at the path’s edge to refine eclipse maps and calculate the sun’s actual radius.

The eclipse may also offer a rare chance to test whether aurora can be detected during totality. NASA scientist , founder of citizen science project , will use all-sky cameras to search for faint auroral glow. It is a long shot, but Iceland lies beneath the auroral oval, a region surrounding the geomagnetic North Pole within which the aurora can regularly be seen. Even a non-detection could help constrain whether eclipse darkness can reveal aurora.

Total solar eclipses are brief, vulnerable to clouds and geographically specific, but they open a rare observing window onto the sun’s inner corona – and let scientists try bold ideas without first building a spacecraft.

Discovery Tours: Eclipses

Explore our tours and cruises designed to help you make the most of experiencing awe-inspiring solar eclipses in handpicked locations around the world.

Find out more

On 12 August, a total solar eclipse will sweep across parts of Europe and the Atlantic ocean as the moon passes between Earth and the sun, blocking out sunlight. Parts of the US and Africa, along with the entire UK and much of Europe and Canada, will see a partial solar eclipse.

Where can I see the eclipse?

Totality, which occurs when the moon lines up perfectly with the disc of the sun and blocks it out entirely, will begin in Russia around midday before sweeping eastward across the Arctic ocean. It will pass just south of the North Pole and make landfall in northeastern Greenland just after 4.00pm local time.

The shadow will then rush along the eastern coast of Greenland at a speed of more than 3400 kilometres per hour. The maximum length of totality will be about 2 minutes and 18 seconds, as the moon’s shadow crosses from Greenland into the Atlantic ocean. It will cross to Iceland, at which point the eclipse will become visible from more heavily inhabited areas – everywhere it will have passed so far is home only to small villages, research stations and those specifically making the journey to see the eclipse. In Reykjavík, though, totality will be visible for just over one minute at 5.48pm local time. This is the first time a total eclipse has been visible in Iceland since 1954, and the last time one will be visible there until 2196.

After skimming the western coast of Iceland, the total eclipse will make another ocean crossing and reach land again in northern Spain just before 8.30pm local time, grazing the northeast corner of Portugal and crossing the Balearic Islands off Spain’s east coast before the sun sets and the eclipse is over.

What happens during a total solar eclipse?

During totality, when the disc of the sun is completely concealed by the moon, temperatures on the ground rapidly drop by several degrees and daytime transforms into twilight. The stars and the outer reaches of the sun become visible. Usually, the sun’s outermost layer, the corona, is completely lost in the glare from its far brighter inner regions, but when those are blocked out, its shimmering sheets of extraordinarily hot plasma become briefly visible to the naked eye. In all other phases of the eclipse, it is crucial to wear eclipse glasses or use a solar filter while looking directly at the sun to prevent eye damage, but during totality it is safe to look at the corona.

That is precisely what many solar scientists will be doing during August’s eclipse. Total eclipses mark a valuable opportunity to observe the corona and try to unravel its many mysteries, including why it is so much hotter than the sun’s surface.

Free newsletter

Sign up to Launchpad

Sign up to newsletter

While the total eclipse will be short and only visible in a few areas, a partial eclipse, with the moon taking a “bite” out of the sun, will last much longer across about a quarter of the entire planet. In many locations across the northern US, all of Canada, much of Europe and northwestern Africa, the partial eclipse will last more than an hour. It won’t be as dramatic as a total eclipse – the corona will not become visible, and the ambient light levels and temperatures won’t drop as dramatically – but will be watchable for many more people. During a partial eclipse, eye protection is needed the whole time. If you don’t have eye protection, there are several ways to watch the eclipse without looking directly at the sun, including using a pinhole camera or even natural shadows to create a projection of the sun’s shape as the moon passes in front of it.

Discovery Tours: Eclipses

Explore our tours and cruises designed to help you make the most of experiencing awe-inspiring solar eclipses in handpicked locations around the world.

Find out more

NASA has revealed details of its plans to build a permanent base on the moon. Initially, this will see autonomous rovers and hopping drones scouting out the lunar surface. Down the line, the plan is for astronauts to build a future lunar home, slated to be hundreds of square kilometres in size.

Plans for a lunar base have been part of NASA’s Artemis programme for years, but its main focus has been landing astronauts on the moon for the first time since the 1970s. The human space-flight part of the project has been successful so far, with the Artemis II mission sending four astronauts on a path around the moon and back to Earth in April this year. But until recently, NASA had released fewer concrete details about a timeline for building a moon base.

On 26 May, it that the first three missions to build a lunar base will be targeted for this year, with at least a further nine to be announced before 2027. The overall programme will consist of three phases, with the first lasting until 2029 to “secure reliable access” to the moon’s surface. The second will last until 2032 for “initial moon base operating capability”, and the actual base itself is to be built near the lunar south pole in the third and final phase, lasting up to 2036.

This year’s missions won’t be crewed and will look to study the lunar surface in detail in order to reduce the risks for future landing missions, as well as to test out autonomous rovers to help guide the design of future moon vehicles. The first of these missions, Moon Base I, will launch towards the end of this year and will feature a lander built by Jeff Bezos’s space company Blue Origin, which hasn’t yet tested a lunar lander.

Moon Base II and III are also planned for launch this year, though with no launch window yet, and each will involve a lander from two different private companies: Astrobotic, which will launch its Griffin lander and an autonomous rover, and Intuitive Machines, which has already attempted two lunar landings, neither of which were fully successful.

As well as these upcoming missions, NASA has also announced that two companies, Astrolab and Lunar Outpost, will each be given more than $200 million dollars to develop future lunar-terrain vehicles, as part of the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services programme. Astrolab’s will be a bulkier, human-operated design, capable of carrying nearly 1000 kilograms and travelling at nearly 10 kilometres per hour. Lunar Outpost’s design will be nimbler, travelling at more than 14 km/h, and will be capable of moving autonomously.

Subscriber-only newsletter

Sign up to Lost in Space-Time

Sign up to newsletter

NASA has also given further details of its MoonFall mission, which will see four drones make short hopping journeys across the lunar surface in 2028, taking high-resolution pictures to find suitable landing sites for future Artemis missions. While NASA will make the drones in house at its Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, the company Firefly Aerospace will build the spacecraft that takes the drones from Earth to the moon.

However, there are still scant details of crucial elements of a future moon base, such as how it might be powered, constructed and shielded from the harsh radiation in outer space. Previous NASA administrator Sean Duffy had announced that a nuclear fission reactor would be built on the lunar surface by 2030, but there were no updates about this in the most recent announcement from NASA, which is now led by Jared Isaacman.

The history and future of space exploration: US

Embark on an extraordinary journey through the heart of the US’s space and astronomy landmarks, designed for curious minds and lifelong learners.

Read more