This looks like an abstract painting, but it's a satellite image of the Tanezrouft Basin, a part of the Sahara Desert in central Algeria known as the Land of Terror.
In 1967, while helping analyze data from a new telescope, Cambridge student Jocelyn Bell observed a bit of "scruff" - the first evidence of a pulsar. The discovery changed our view of the universe.
Finally, scientists know how the universe makes gold. They've seen it created in the cosmic fire of 2 colliding stars via the gravitational wave they emitted.
The 2017 Nobel prize for physics was awarded to scientists who helped pioneer the discovery of ripples in the fabric of spacetime, known as gravitational waves.
Members of the EarthSky community - including scientists, as well as science and nature writers from across the globe - weigh in on what's important to them.