Marcus Chown

Marcus Chown is an award-winning writer and broadcaster and a former radio astronomer at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. He is the author of Breakthrough: Spectacular stories of scientific discovery from the Higgs particle to black holes (Faber & Faber, 2021).

Recent articles by Marcus Chown

Illustration of a wormhole or Einstein-Rosen bridge

How a simulation wormhole may unite gravity and quantum theory

If the universe is expanding, how is it possible that the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxy are getting closer to one another? © NASA/ESA/STSCL

If the universe is expanding, how are the Milky Way and Andromeda getting closer together?

What’s on the other side of a black hole? © Getty Images

What is on the other side of a black hole?

Dark matter: is it time we gave up looking for it? © Getty Images

Dark matter: Is it time we gave up looking for it?

These 4 signs of alien technology could lead us to extraterrestrial life © Getty Images

These 4 signs of alien technology could lead us to extraterrestrial life

The mission to search for signs of alien technology in our Solar System and beyond © Magic Torch

Project Galileo: The search for alien tech hiding in our Solar System

Superluminous supernovae: How we’ll find the most powerful explosions in the Universe © Getty Images

Superluminous supernovae: How we’ll find the most powerful explosions in the Universe

Should we be worried about Earth’s magnetic core? © Alamy

Earth’s magnetic field: Should we be worried about the poles flipping?

GettyImages-478183957-crop

What's inside the fifth dimension?

Photomultiplier tubes in Japan’s Super-Kamiokande detector facility, buried 1km underground, stand ready to pick up neutrinos generated 295km away in Tokai © Kamioka Observatory, ICRR (Institute for Cosmic Ray Research), The University of Tokyo

Where did all the antimatter go?

theory of everything © Science Photo library

Why a theory of everything may never be possible – or any use

Does the universe have an edge? © Getty

Does the universe have an edge?

Inside the simple computer program that could explain why the Universe exists at all © Tom Straw

Inside the simple computer program that could explain why the Universe exists at all

A visualisation of two black holes merging © Caltech/R Hurt (IPAC)

The cracks in cosmology Why our Universe doesn't add up

The Universe's 7 biggest unsolved mysteries © Sam Chivers

The Universe’s 7 biggest mysteries (and why they’re unsolved)