Rebecca Boyle

Colorado Springs

Freelance Science Writer at Freelance

Author of OUR MOON, a new human history, @randomhouse @sceptrebooks 🌕 📝 @sciam @quantamagazine @nytimes @TheAtlantic etc. Life is short but sweet for certain.

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Articles

How to Take the Ultimate American Stargazing Road Trip

1 week ago | atlasobscura.com | Rebecca Boyle

In the West, where I grew up, there is rarely such a thing as a short drive. If you want to get outside beyond a city like Denver—and much of the reason for living in Denver is the chance to get outside—you have to get in a car, and then spend a lot of time there. Drives are an underrated form of exploration and expansion. And the ability to drive at night, if you can, offers an unparalleled chance to explore the stars. If you are the passenger, or your kids are in the backseat, even better.
Shedding light on the night sky

2 weeks ago | rockymountainreader.org | Rebecca Boyle

The first time I met Craig Childs in person, he told me he was astonished by the brightness of the mountain where I live. Childs was in Colorado Springs for the Colorado Book Award ceremony, for which his book Tracing Time was nominated, and he decided to camp at Cheyenne Mountain State Park, which is a couple miles from my house. The mountain is lit up at night because of Cheyenne Mountain Complex, which most of us here still call NORAD—the North American Aerospace Defense Command.
This Revolutionary New Telescope Will Observe the Whole Sky Every Three Days

2 weeks ago | scientificamerican.com | Rebecca Boyle

Astrophysics is, as many astrophysicists will tell you, the story of everything. The nature and evolution of stars, galaxies, galaxy clusters, dark matter and dark energy—and our attempts to understand these things—allow us to pose the ultimate questions and reach for the ultimate answers.
The Universe’s First Light Could Reveal Secrets of the Cosmic Dawn

1 month ago | yahoo.com | Rebecca Boyle

On what might have been the proudest day of Jack Burns’s long career in astronomy, he was sitting on a beach. Orbital dynamics and launch schedules wait for no one, and Burns couldn’t move his long-planned family trip. So in February 2024, while on vacation in Maui celebrating his successful cancer treatment the prior year, Burns listened to a live feed from the mission control of private aerospace company Intuitive Machines.
The Universe’s First Light Could Reveal Secrets of the Cosmic Dawn

1 month ago | scientificamerican.com | Rebecca Boyle

On what might have been the proudest day of Jack Burns’s long career in astronomy, he was sitting on a beach. Orbital dynamics and launch schedules wait for no one, and Burns couldn’t move his long-planned family trip. So in February 2024, while on vacation in Maui celebrating his successful cancer treatment the prior year, Burns listened to a live feed from the mission control of private aerospace company Intuitive Machines.
How astonishing observatories could do big physics from the moon

2 months ago | newscientist.com | Rebecca Boyle

When Michael Collins floated above the far side of the moon during the Apollo 11 mission in 1969, he knew he would be remembered as the loneliest human in history. He recalled feeling unafraid, almost exultant, thinking about everything on the other side of the moon: Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the lunar surface and, beyond that, every creature on Earth and everything humanity had ever built. On his side, as Collins wrote in his memoir, was “one plus God only knows what”.
Table of Contents - April 24, 2025

Mar 27, 2025 | nybooks.com | Catherine Hall |Katie Kitamura |Brandon Shimoda |Rebecca Boyle

Charting an Unheroic Past With her densely textured, ambitious, and deeply collaborative scholarship, the historian Catherine Hall has transformed public discourse about slavery.
7 wild herbs you can forage in the UK

Mar 26, 2025 | yahoo.com | Rebecca Boyle

This article was produced by National Geographic Traveller (UK). Wild greens and herbs have been part of our diet since the dawn of time, and it was only at the beginning of the 20th century, when food and farming became heavily industrialised, that their popularity dropped off. In the 2010s, however, they saw a resurgence, with high-end chefs like Rene Redzepi in Copenhagen, Michel Bras in Laguiole, France, and Dan Barber in New York incorporating hyperlocal, foraged ingredients into their menus.
7 wild herbs you can forage in the UK

Mar 26, 2025 | nationalgeographic.com | Rebecca Boyle

This article was produced by National Geographic Traveller (UK). Wild greens and herbs have been part of our diet since the dawn of time, and it was only at the beginning of the 20th century, when food and farming became heavily industrialised, that their popularity dropped off. In the 2010s, however, they saw a resurgence, with high-end chefs like Rene Redzepi in Copenhagen, Michel Bras in Laguiole, France, and Dan Barber in New York incorporating hyperlocal, foraged ingredients into their menus.
Comets Have Long Been Seen as Omens of Both Doom and Opportunity

Nov 20, 2024 | atlasobscura.com | Rebecca Boyle

In April of 1066, a streak of cool fire appeared in the heavens. The comet, called a “bearded star” back then, had appeared before. There are mentions of it around the world dating as far back as the fifth century B.C. It’s now called Halley’s Comet, for the 18th-century scientist who first calculated its return. But in the spring of 1066, the people of England saw this particular comet as a bad omen. Across the English Channel, Duke William of Normandy viewed the bearded star as a good sign.