Plus NOAA's GOES-19 satellite spies the lunar disk crossing the face of our parent star.

We tend to think of gravity as being about as constant as it gets. It is the invisible anchor that keeps our feet on the ground and the oceans in their beds. But if you look closely enough — and deep enough — it’s not constant at all.

Pink boulders led scientists to a massive granite formation buried under Antarctica’s ice, solving a decades-old geological mystery.

Early on Tuesday, Feb. 26, a rare annular solar eclipse created a “ring of fire” over Antarctica, while South Africa and Indian Ocean locations saw partial phases.

Even Antarctica’s toughest native insect can’t escape the reach of plastic pollution. Scientists have discovered that Belgica antarctica — a tiny, rice-sized midge and the southernmost insect on Earth — is already ingesting microplastics in the wild.

A stunning “ring of fire” eclipse was totally visible to a lucky few in the Southern Hemisphere. Here’s how to see the next one

After accounting for Earth’s rotation, gravity is slightly weaker beneath Antarctica than anywhere else on the planet. That weakness creates a kind of “gravity hole,” a broad low in the field that helps shape the sea surface around the southern continent.

Forte and colleagues now believe Antarctica’s gravity hole was weaker before eventually intensifying around 30 to 50 million years ago. This corresponds to large-scale changes in the continent’s climate that included the arrival of glaciers. These, in turn, exert major influences on Earth’s ecosystems, including sea levels and ocean acidity.

Antarctica is home to many mysteries, but one of the strangest is an enormous 'gravity hole' deep beneath the ice. Now, scientists know why it is there.