NEWS

Recent observations show that the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way, Sagittarius A*, flickers on a regular timescale of 30 minutes, with slower variations on hour-long timescales. The observations of this twinkling are presented in a publication led by Yuhei Iwata (Keio University). The twinkles around this 4-million-solar-mass black hole, detected …

Selections from 2020: A Twinkling Black Hole Read More »

Using NASA’s Chandra spacecraft, astronomers have performed high-resolution X-ray spectroscopic observations of a transient black hole X-ray binary known as GRS 1915+105. They report that the source exhibits a variable magnetic accretion disc wind. The team found a series of wind absorption lines in the soft state of GRS 1915+105. These lines appear to follow …

Black hole X-ray binary GRS 1915+105 has a variable magnetic disc wind, study suggests Read More »

Recently, a team of astronomers led by Sabina Ustamujic of the INAF-Palermo Astronomical Observatory, Italy, has developed a three-dimensional hydrodynamic (HD) model for IC 443, which describes the expansion of the SNR and its interaction with the surrounding circumstellar/interstellar medium (CSM/ISM). The model allowed the scientists to investigate the origin of the complex morphology and …

Study sheds more light on the complex morphology of supernova remnant IC 443 Read More »

Thousands of sparkling young stars are nestled within the giant nebula NGC 3603, one of the most massive young star clusters in the Milky Way Galaxy. NGC 3603, a prominent star-forming region in the Carina spiral arm of the Milky Way about 20,000 light-years away, reveals stages in the life cycle of stars. Powerful ultraviolet …

Stellar Jewel Box Read More »

Finding planets out in the Universe is pretty hard. Neptune wasn’t directly observed until 1846 despite being in our own solar system. We didn’t start discovering planets outside the solar system until 150 years after Neptune. Like Neptune, we find them (though indirectly), through visible light. However an international team of researchers may have just …

Radio emissions have been detected from an exoplanet Read More »

The narrow galaxy elegantly curving around its spherical companion in this image is a fantastic example of a truly strange and very rare phenomenon. This image, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, depicts GAL-CLUS-022058s, located in the southern hemisphere constellation of Fornax (the Furnace). GAL-CLUS-022058s is the largest and one of the most complete Einstein rings ever discovered in …

Hubble sees a ‘Molten ring’ Read More »

Molecular clouds are the birthplaces of stars, but their structure is still shrouded in mystery. Dust often obscures our view, and we still aren’t totally sure how magnetic fields factor into the equation of star formation. Today’s authors peer into Serpens South, a molecular cloud with trails of dust leading into a dense core, to …

All aboard the filament express Read More »

Some of black holes blast out gigantic, super-heated jets of plasma at nearly the speed of light. The primary way that the jets discharge this powerful motion energy is by converting it into extremely high-energy gamma rays. However, UMBC physics Ph.D. candidate Adam Leah Harvey says, “How exactly this radiation is created is an open …

Where giant jets from black holes discharge their energy Read More »

In addition to gravitational waves, a slew of electromagnetic radiation is produced in the merger of two neutron stars, spanning the spectrum from gamma rays to radio waves. In 2017, the now-famous neutron star collision GW170817 gave us a first look at this expected emission: it revealed a short gamma-ray burst, infrared and optical light …

A Radio Flare from Colliding Stars? Read More »

Astronomers have detected a remarkable new feature in the first all-sky survey map produced by the eROSITA X-ray telescope on SRG: a huge circular structure of hot gas below the plane of the Milky Way occupying most of the southern sky. A similar structure in the Northern sky, the “North polar spur,” has been known …

eROSITA finds large-scale bubbles in the halo of the Milky Way Read More »

A planet in an unlikely orbit around a double star 336 light-years away may offer a clue to a mystery much closer to home: a hypothesized, distant body in our solar system dubbed “Planet Nine.” This is the first time that astronomers have been able to measure the motion of a massive Jupiter-like planet that …

Hubble pins down weird exoplanet with far-flung orbit Read More »

It is possible to form glycine, the simplest amino acid, in the star nurseries of interstellar clouds. Glycine’s development in such an inhospitable environment had previously been theorized. Most notably, glycine has been observed in samples of comet Wild 2 returned from the Stardust mission as well as in observations of the coma of comet …

Glycine can form in interstellar clouds Read More »

The oldest light in the universe is that of the cosmic microwave background (CMB). This remnant glow from the big bang has traveled for more than 13 billion years. Along the way, it has picked up a few tales about the history and evolution of the cosmos. We just need to listen to what it …

Polarized light from the cosmic background hints at new physics Read More »

An international team of astronomers has identified a new ultraluminous X-ray source (ULX) in the galaxy NGC 7090. The object, designated NGC 7090 ULX3, was found using NASA’s Swift spacecraft. ULXs are point sources in the sky that are so bright in X-rays that each emits more radiation than a million suns emit at all …

New transient ultraluminous X-ray source detected in the galaxy NGC 7090 Read More »

The Borexino Collaboration reports results that blast past a milestone in neutrino physics. They have detected solar neutrinos produced by a cycle of nuclear-fusion reactions known as the carbon–nitrogen–oxygen (CNO) cycle. Measurements of these neutrinos have the potential to resolve uncertainties about the composition of the solar core, and offer crucial insights into the formation …

Neutrino detection gets to the core of the Sun Read More »

We know the universe is expanding, but as we’ve gathered more data it’s clear we don’t know how fast it’s expanding. We know the rate is about 70 (km/s)/Mpc, but we’re having difficulty pinning it down more precisely. The reason for this is that when we measure the rate in different ways the results don’t …

Gravitational lenses could be the key to measuring the expansion rate of the Universe Read More »

A team of astronomers, led by Peter Maksym of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian (CfA), in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has traced the rays back to the galaxy’s core, the location of an active supermassive black hole. Although the researchers have developed several plausible theories for the lightshow, the most intriguing idea suggests that …

Hubble catches possible ‘shadow play’ of the disk around a black hole Read More »

On Nov. 18, NASA was informed by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that, after careful assessment and consideration, they have decided to decommission the 305m radio telescope at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, which recently sustained structural damage from failed cables. The planetary radar capability at Arecibo, funded by NASA’s Near-Earth Object (NEO) Observations …

Decommissioning of Arecibo Radio Telescope Read More »

Using an amateur 0.14-m aperture telescope, astronomers have observed a nearby spiral galaxy known as M63 (or NGC 5055). The observations identified the presence of five faint dwarf galaxies around M63 and allowed the researchers to determine their basic parameters. Dwarf galaxies, containing up to several billion stars, are difficult to detect due to their …

Five new dwarf galaxies detected around M63 Read More »

The Theory of Relativity predicted theory predicted black holes, neutron stars, and the gravitational waves from their mergers. Scientists finally observed these mergers and their gravitational waves in 2015. Since then, the LIGO/Virgo collaboration has detected many of them. The collaboration has released a new catalogue of discoveries, along with a new infographic. The new …

All the gravitational wave events in one picture Read More »

Long ago and far across the universe, an enormous burst of gamma rays unleashed more energy in a half-second than the Sun will produce over its entire 10-billion-year lifetime. In May of 2020, light from the flash finally reached Earth and was first detected by NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. Scientists quickly enlisted other telescopes …

NASA’s Hubble sees unexpected brightness from colossal explosion Read More »

Cepheid variables — specifically, Classical Cepheid variables (hereafter Cepheids) — hold a special place in astronomy. This is largely thanks to their period–luminosity relations, which were discovered by Henrietta Swan Leavitt over a hundred years ago. In short, a Cepheid’s period is related to its brightness in a well-defined way, and we can use that …

Seeing Cepheids in the X-Ray Read More »

It can be difficult to detect brown dwarfs. Most of them are identified by infrared telescopes since they can emit a great deal of heat. While that works well for the warmest brown dwarfs, it doesn’t work well for cooler ones. But recently a team discovered a brown dwarf using a radio telescope, which opens …

Brown dwarf discovered with a radio telescope for the first time Read More »

The study probed the thermal history of the universe over the last 10 billion years. It found that the mean temperature of gas across the universe has increased more than 10 times over that time period and reached about 2 million degrees Kelvin today—approximately 4 million degrees Fahrenheit. “Our new measurement provides a direct confirmation …

The universe is getting hotter, a new study has found Read More »

To better understand stars and stellar evolution, the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, has launched an ambitious new initiative with NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, called ULLYSES (UV Legacy Library of Young Stars as Essential Standards). ULLYSES is Hubble’s largest observing program ever in terms of the amount of time Hubble will dedicate …

Hubble launches large ultraviolet-light survey of nearby stars Read More »

At some point a few hundred million years after the birth of the universe, the earliest stars began to form, as well as the first large-scale structures like galaxies. Supermassive black holes grew in the centers of those galaxies, and as the black holes accreted mass, they produced powerful radiation, appearing to us now as …

A distant quasar as a cosmic clock Read More »

Most of the potentially habitable exoplanets we’ve discovered orbit small red dwarf stars. Red dwarfs make up about 75% of the stars in our galaxy. Only about 7.5% of stars are g-type like our Sun. As we look for life on other worlds, red dwarfs would seem to be their most likely home. But red …

Even older red dwarf stars are pumping out a surprising amount of deadly radiation at their planets Read More »

A flash of luck helped astronomers solve a cosmic mystery: What causes powerful but fleeting radio bursts that zip and zigzag through the universe? Scientists have known about these energetic pulses—called fast radio bursts—for about 13 years and have seen them coming from outside our galaxy, which makes it harder to trace them back to …

Flash of luck: Astronomers find cosmic radio burst source Read More »

This ethereal remnant of a long dead star, nestled in the belly of The Whale, bears an uneasy resemblance to a skull floating through space. Captured in astounding detail by ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), the eerie Skull Nebula is showcased in this new image in beautiful bloodshot colours. This planetary nebula is the first …

Stars and Skulls: new ESO image reveals eerie nebula Read More »

It now seems clear that dark matter interacts more than just gravitationally. Earlier studies have hinted at this, and a new study supports the idea even further. What’s interesting about this latest work is that it studies dark matter interactions through entropy. Entropy is a subtle and powerful concept in physics. It was first introduced …

Something other than just gravity is contributing to the shape of dark matter halos Read More »

Using India’s AstroSat space observatory and ESA’s XMM-Newton spacecraft, astronomers have carried out X-ray observations of a symbiotic recurrent nova known as V3890 Sgr during its outburst in 2019. Symbiotic stars (SySts) are in general long-period interacting binaries consisting of an evolved giant transferring mass to a hot compact object—usually a late-sequence red giant providing …

Study investigates symbiotic recurrent nova V3890 Sgr Read More »

Astronomers have spent decades puzzling out how and when the Milky Way’s central bulge might have formed. Were the stars within the bulge born early in our galaxy’s history, 10 to 12 billion years ago? Or did the bulge build up over time through multiple episodes of star formation? Some studies have found evidence for …

New survey finds that single burst of star from formation created Milky way’s central bulge Read More »

What’s your computer doing when you’re not using it? It could be discovering hidden, record-breaking pulsars, like in the case of PSR J1653−0158, recently found via the Einstein@Home project. Einstein@Home is a distributed computing project that uses idle computer hours from volunteers to speed up computationally expensive searches for signatures of pulsing neutron stars — …

A Cosmic Dance from Einstein@Home Read More »

While scientists have found incontrovertible evidence of gravitational redshifts in our solar system, it has been challenging to observe them in more distant objects across space. The new Chandra results provide convincing evidence for gravitational redshift effects at play in a new cosmic setting. Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have discovered the phenomenon in …

Einstein’s theory of relativity, critical for GPS, seen in distant stars Read More »

An international team of astrophysicists under Dutch leadership has demonstrated with an improved model that colliding neutron stars can emit gamma rays. Old models did not predict this and faltered since the merging of two neutron stars in 2017 that released gamma rays. The researchers, led by Philipp Mösta (University of Amsterdam), provided their model …

Improved model shows gamma rays and gold at merging neutron stars Read More »

The dwarf galaxy known as Dragonfly 44 caused a stir recently: apparently it had way, way more dark matter than any other galaxy. Since this couldn’t be explained by our models of galaxy formation, it seemed like an oddball. But a new analysis reveals that Dragonfly 44 has much less dark matter than previously thought. …

The galaxy with 99.99% dark matter isn’t so mysterious any more Read More »

It may be another 100,000 years until the giant red star Betelgeuse dies in a fiery explosion, according to a new study by an international team of researchers. The study, led by Dr. Meridith Joyce from The Australian National University (ANU), not only gives Betelgeuse a new lease on life, but shows it is both …

Supergiant star Betelgeuse smaller, closer than first thought Read More »

A scientific collaboration of the Pierre Auger Observatory, including researchers from the University of Delaware, has found a “kink” in the cosmic ray energy spectrum that is shining more light on the possible origins of these subatomic space travelers. The team’s findings are based on the analysis of 215,030 cosmic ray events with energies above …

New feature found in energy spectrum of universe’s most powerful particles Read More »

Atop the summit of Haleakala on the Hawaiian island of Maui sits the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System, or Pan-STARRS1 (PS1). As part of the Haleakala Observatory overseen by the University of Hawaii, Pan-STARRS1 relies on a system of cameras, telescopes, and a computing facility to conduct an optical imaging survey of the …

The Most Comprehensive 3D Map of Galaxies Has Been Released Read More »

Using telescopes from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and other organisations around the world, astronomers have spotted a rare blast of light from a star being ripped apart by a supermassive black hole. The phenomenon, known as a tidal disruption event, is the closest such flare recorded to date at just over 215 million light-years …

Death by Spaghettification: ESO Telescopes Record Last Moments of Star Devoured by a Black Hole Read More »

Weighing the universe is a tricky task, but a team of astronomers have used a clever technique to measure how many galaxy clusters are in the cosmos, and from there come up with a total amount of matter. The answer: 31.5±1.3% of all the energy in the universe. Galaxy clusters are the largest gravitationally-bound objects …

Matter makes up exactly 31.5±1.3% of the Universe Read More »

An international team of astronomers reports that the transient Gaia18aen discovered by ESA’s Gaia spacecraft turns out to be a symbiotic star. This makes it the first symbiotic star identified by this astrometric satellite. Astronomers assume that symbiotic stars, which are among the widest interacting binaries, showcase dramatic, episodic changes in the spectra of their …

First symbiotic star detected by Gaia satellite Read More »

An international team of researchers led by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) has measured, with unprecedented accuracy, the gravitational redshift of the Sun, a change in frequency of the lines in the solar spectrum which is produced when the light escapes from the gravitational field of the Sun on its way to Earth. …

New measurements of the solar spectrum verify Einstein’s theory of General Relativity Read More »

Reinhard Genzel and Andrea Ghez have jointly been awarded the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work on the supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A*, at the centre of our galaxy. Genzel, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Germany, and his team have conducted observations of Sagittarius A* for nearly 30 …

2020 Nobel Prize in Physics awarded for research with ESO telescopes on Milky Way’s supermassive black hole Read More »

For years, researchers have puzzled over evidence that a supernova exploded somewhere in Earth’s vicinity a couple million years ago. The evidence is a concentration of 60Fe, an isotope of iron produced by supernovae, found around the Earth. Now, a new study presents additional evidence of a supernova explosion near Earth 2.5 million years ago. …

A supernova exploded dangerously close to Earth 2.5 million years ago Read More »

Massive stars end their lives with energetic explosions known as supernovae. Stripped-envelope supernovae show weak or no traces of hydrogen in their ejecta, meaning that the star loses most or all of its hydrogen-rich outer layers before exploding. Scientists hypothesize that these stars mostly originate in binary star systems, where one of the stars rips …

Revealing the lonely origin of Cassiopeia A, one of the most famous supernova remnants Read More »

With the help of ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have found six galaxies lying around a supermassive black hole when the Universe was less than a billion years old. This is the first time such a close grouping has been seen so soon after the Big Bang and the finding helps us better understand …

ESO telescope spots galaxies trapped in the web of a supermassive black hole Read More »

When a star unleashes as much energy in a matter of days as our Sun does in several billion years, you know it’s not going to remain visible for long. Like intergalactic paparazzi, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured the quick, fading celebrity status of a supernova, the self-detonation of a star. The Hubble snapshots have …

Hubble watches expoding star fade into oblivion Read More »

If you were to plot the magnitude and colour of a large sample of galaxies you would see that they fall into two groups: one is actively star-forming and filled with young blue stars, and the other has long since finished making new stars so is left with only the older, redder populations. Between these …

Feedback from AGN-driven Winds Read More »

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), astronomers spotted a pair of massive baby stars growing in salty cosmic soup. Each star is shrouded by a gaseous disk which includes molecules of sodium chloride, commonly known as table salt, and heated water vapor. Analyzing the radio emissions from the salt and water, the team found …

Pair of massive baby stars swaddled in salty water vapor Read More »

In April 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) released the first direct image of a black hole. It was a radio image of the supermassive black hole in the galaxy M87. Much of the image resulted from radio light gravitationally focused toward us, but there was also some light emitted by gas and dust near …

The shadow from M87’s supermassive black hole has been observed wobbling around the galaxy for years Read More »

An international team of astrophysicists has found distinctive signatures of black hole event horizons, unmistakably separating them from neutron stars, which are objects comparable to black holes in mass and size but confined within a hard surface. This is by far the strongest steady signature of stellar-mass black holes to date. A black hole is …

Cosmic X-rays reveal a distinct signature of black holes Read More »

Astronomers using the National Science Foundation’s Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) have made the first direct geometric measurement of the distance to a magnetar within our Milky Way Galaxy—a measurement that could help determine if magnetars are the sources of the long-mysterious Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs). A magnetar called XTE J1810-197, discovered in 2003, was …

VLBA makes first direct distance measurement to magnetar Read More »

We recently observed the strongest magnetic field ever recorded in the Universe. The record-breaking field was discovered at the surface of a neutron star called GRO J1008-57 with a magnetic field strength of approximately 1 BILLION Tesla. For comparison, the Earth’s magnetic field clocks in at about 1/20,000 of a Tesla – tens of trillions …

Astronomers measure a 1-billion tesla magnetic field on the surface of a neutron star Read More »

Turbulence, or chaotic changes in the pressure and velocity of a fluid, is one of the great mysteries of classical physics. Much of the gas in galaxies is known to be turbulent, but the mechanisms that developed and maintain this turbulence remain areas of active research. While we still don’t know all the details of …

A windy day in the Milky Way Read More »

An international team of astronomers today announced the discovery of a rare molecule — phosphine — in the clouds of Venus. On Earth, this gas is only made industrially or by microbes that thrive in oxygen-free environments. Astronomers have speculated for decades that high clouds on Venus could offer a home for microbes — floating …

Possible marker of life spotted on Venus Read More »

One-hundred million light years away from Earth, an unusual supernova is exploding. That exploding star—which is known as “supernova LSQ14fmg”—was the faraway object discovered by a 37-member international research team led by Florida State University Assistant Professor of Physics Eric Hsiao. Their research helped uncover the origins of the group of supernovae this star belongs …

Research team discovers unique supernova explosion Read More »

A recent study of 11 hefty galaxy clusters found that some small-scale clumps of dark matter are so concentrated that the lensing effects they produce are 10 times stronger than expected. These concentrations are associated with individual cluster galaxies. Researchers using the Hubble Space Telescope and the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile …

Hubble observations suggest a missing ingredient in dark matter theories Read More »

The Insight-HXMT team has performed extensive observations of the accreting X-ray pulsar GRO J1008-57 and has discovered a magnetic field of ~1 billion Tesla on the surface of the neutron star. This is the strongest magnetic field conclusively detected in the universe. This work, published in the Astrophysical Journal, was primarily conducted by scientists from …

Strongest magnetic field in universe directly detected by X-ray space observatory Read More »

It’s kind of hard to see inside a star as it’s blowing up, because of the whole “blowing up” part, but gravitational waves – tiny ripples in the fabric of spacetime itself – may help astronomers unlock how the biggest stars die. It takes a lot of raw energy to power a supernova. When the …

Gravitational waves could show what’s happening inside a star as it’s going supernova Read More »

Humanity has “eyes” that can detect all different types of light through telescopes around the globe and a fleet of observatories in space. From radio waves to gamma rays, this “multiwavelength” approach to astronomy is crucial to getting a complete understanding of objects in space. This compilation gives examples of images from different missions and …

NASA’s Chandra opens treasure trove of cosmic delights Read More »

Quasars are some of the most powerful objects in the Universe. They were first discovered in the 1950s as bright radio sources coming from almost point-like objects. They were given the name quasi-stellar radio sources, or quasars for short. We now know that they are powered by supermassive black holes at the center of distant …

Some quasars actually contain two supermassive black holes in the process of merging Read More »

Black holes can expel a thousand times more matter than they capture. The mechanism that governs both ejection and capture is the accretion disk, a vast mass of gas and dust spiraling around the black hole at extremely high speeds. The disk is hot and emits light as well as other forms of electromagnetic radiation. …

Researcher proposes universal mechanism for ejection of matter by black holes Read More »

In a landmark study, scientists using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have mapped the immense envelope of gas, called a halo, surrounding the Andromeda galaxy, our nearest large galactic neighbor. Scientists were surprised to find that this tenuous, nearly invisible halo of diffuse plasma extends 1.3 million light-years from the galaxy—about halfway to our Milky Way—and …

Hubble maps a giant halo around the Andromeda galaxy Read More »

Black holes are at the center of almost all galaxies that have been studied so far. They have an unimaginably large mass and therefore attract matter, gas and even light. But they can also emit matter in the form of plasma jets—a kind of plasma beam that is ejected from the center of the galaxy …

Spinning black hole powers jet by magnetic flux Read More »

Giant elliptical galaxies, the oldest known large galactic structures in the universe, have no spiral arms and little or no current star formation activity, but their central supermassive black holes are often active galactic nuclei (AGN). While nearly all galaxies host a supermassive black hole in their nuclei, most nuclei are not AGN. Astronomers think …

Very high energy gamma-ray emission from a radio galaxy Read More »

Astronomers have used NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory to record material blasting away from the site of an exploded star at speeds faster than 20 million miles per hour. This is about 25,000 times faster than the speed of sound on Earth. Kepler’s supernova remnant is the debris from a detonated star that is located about …

Kepler’s Supernova Remnant: Debris from Stellar Explosion Not Slowed After 400 Years Read More »

A new study led by University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign astronomy and physics professor Brian Fields explores the possibility that astronomical events were responsible for an extinction event 359 million years ago, at the boundary between the Devonian and Carboniferous periods. The team concentrated on the Devonian-Carboniferous boundary because those rocks contain hundreds of thousands of …

Exploding stars may have caused mass extinction on Earth Read More »

NGC 1614, captured here by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, is an eccentrically shaped galaxy ablaze with activity. The galaxy resides about 200 million light-years from Earth and is nestled in the southern constellation of Eridanus (the River).  NGC 1614 is the result of an active galactic merger, which creates its peculiar appearance, including a tidal tail. The cosmic …

Hubble catches a ring of stellar wildfire Read More »

Observations by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope are showing that the unexpected dimming of the supergiant star Betelgeuse was most likely caused by an immense amount of hot material ejected into space, forming a dust cloud that blocked starlight coming from Betelgeuse’s surface. Hubble researchers suggest that the dust cloud formed when superhot plasma unleashed from …

Hubble finds that Betelgeuse’s mysterious dimming is due to a traumatic outburst Read More »

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have revealed an extremely distant and therefore very young galaxy that looks surprisingly like our Milky Way. The galaxy is so far away its light has taken more than 12 billion years to reach us: we see it as it was when the Universe was just 1.4 …

ALMA sees most distant Milky Way look-alike Read More »

Using the Chandra and XMM-Newton spacecraft, astronomers from the Nicolaus Copernicus Astronomical Center in Warsaw, Poland, have investigated an ultraluminous X-ray source (ULX) in the galaxy NGC 5055. ULXs are point sources in the sky that are so bright in X-rays that each emits more radiation than 1 million suns emit at all wavelengths. They …

Astronomers investigate an ultraluminous X-ray source in NGC 5055 Read More »

Over the past couple decades astronomers have spotted thousands of exoplanets using a variety of techniques. There’s the ever-popular transit method, championed by observatories like Kepler and TESS. And there’s also a redshift technique, which closely monitors the light from a distant star. And then there’s astrometry. Astrometry is the technique of watching a star …

An exoplanet has been found for the first time using radio telescopes Read More »

Stars are formed by gravitational contraction of gaseous clouds. The densest parts of the clouds, called molecular cloud cores, are the very sites of star formation and mainly located along the Milky Way. The Taurus Molecular Cloud is one of the active star-forming regions and many telescopes have been pointed at the cloud. Previous observations …

Tracing evolution from embryo to baby star Read More »

Most AGN are suspected to feature supermassive black holes with masses greater than one million solar masses at their centers; however, today’s authors present exciting evidence, in tandem with previous studies that have uncovered hundreds of AGN within dwarf galaxies that harbor lower mass black holes, that is compelling astronomers to return to the drawing …

Faint jewels: discovering the brilliance of dwarf galaxies Read More »

New results achieved by combining big data captured by the Subaru Telescope and the power of machine learning have discovered a galaxy with an extremely low 1.6% oxygen abundance, breaking the previous record of the lowest abundance. The measured oxygen abundance suggests that most of the stars in this galaxy formed very recently. To understand …

Machine learning finds a surprising early galaxy Read More »

There’s always more than one way to look at the world. There’s also more than one way to look at a galaxy. And sometimes combining those ways of looking can result in something truly special. That is what happened recently when a team of astronomers from seven different universities in four different countries used three …

An image of a galaxy’s magnetic field Read More »

Resembling a butterfly with its symmetrical structure, beautiful colours, and intricate patterns, this striking bubble of gas — known as NGC 2899 — appears to float and flutter across the sky in this new picture from ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT). This object has never before been imaged in such striking detail, with even the …

Stunning space butterfly captured by ESO telescope Read More »

Two teams of astronomers have made a compelling case in the 33-year-old mystery surrounding Supernova 1987A. Based on observations of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and a theoretical follow-up study, the scientists provide new insight for the argument that a neutron star is hiding deep inside the remains of the exploded star. This would …

ALMA finds possible sign of neutron star in supernova 1987A Read More »

Using known distances of 50 galaxies from Earth to refine calculations in Hubble’s constant, a research team led by a University of Oregon astronomer estimates the age of the universe at 12.6 billion years. Approaches to date the Big Bang, which gave birth to the universe, rely on mathematics and computational modeling, using distance estimates …

New approach refines the Hubble’s constant and age of universe Read More »

A notable feature of most spiral galaxies is the multitude of arching spiral arms that seemingly spin out from the galaxy’s center. In this image, taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, the stunning silvery-blue spiral arms of the galaxy NGC 4848 are observed in immense detail. Not only do we see the inner section of the spiral …

Hubble snaps ghostly galaxy Read More »

For only the second time ever, astrophysicists have spotted a spectacular flash of ultraviolet (UV) light accompanying a white dwarf explosion. An extremely rare type of supernova, the event is poised to offer insights into several long-standing mysteries, including what causes white dwarfs to explode, how dark energy accelerates the cosmos and how the universe …

Spectacular UV flash may explain how white dwarfs explode Read More »

Gravitational wave astronomy has changed the way we view the cosmos. In only a few years we have observed the collisions of black holes and neutron stars, confirming our theoretical understanding of these strange objects. But as gravitational wave astronomy matures, it will allow us to probe the very nature of space and time itself. …

A black hole popping out of a traversable wormhole should give off a very specific signal in gravitational waves Read More »

The black holes we’ve observed in the universe typically fall into two categories: small star-sized black holes, and gargantuan black holes lurking at the centers of galaxies. Now, a new black-hole discovery sheds some light on the gray area between these extremes. Stellar-mass black holes of up to 100 solar masses are scattered by the …

The contradiction of a low-mass massive black hole Read More »

When stars blow up, they tend to release their energy in a roughly spherical shape. But much after the initial blast, the resulting shock waves can sometimes be elongated in one direction. A team of theorists used laboratory lasers to identify the potential culprit: magnetic fields. What could possibly tell a supernova blast what to …

Supernovae shockwaves aren’t spherical Read More »

By applying a machine-learning algorithm, scientists at the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, have developed a method to classify all gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), rapid highly energetic explosions in distant galaxies, without needing to find an afterglow—by which GRBs are presently categorized. This breakthrough may prove key in finally discovering the origins of these mysterious …

Separating gamma-ray bursts Read More »

Stellar physics is a broad field that touches on a range of phenomena from magnetic fields to radiative processes and thermonuclear fusion to plasmas. Stars form through the gravitational collapse of cold, dense, dusty protostellar cores, themselves embedded in thick molecular clouds or filaments. Massive stars, defined as those with a mass greater than 8 …

The formation of massive stars Read More »

Galaxies aren’t spread evenly throughout space. They exist in groups, clusters, and superclusters. Our own Milky Way galaxy exists in an impossibly vast structure called the Laniakea supercluster. Laniakea was defined in 2014, and it contains over 100,000 galaxies. Now a team of astronomers have discovered another immense feature beyond Laniakea, called the South Pole …

Enormous structure in the Universe called the South pole wall Read More »

Scientists at Harvard University and the Black Hole Initiative (BHI) have developed a new method to find black holes in the outer solar system, and along with it, determine once-and-for-all the true nature of the hypothesized Planet Nine. The paper, accepted to The Astrophysical Journal Letters, highlights the ability of the future Legacy Survey of …

Scientists propose plan to determine if Planet Nine is a primordial black hole Read More »

Type Ia supernova distances are in play in a rather contentious part of astronomy: measurements of the Hubble constant. The value of the Hubble constant is measured in one of two ways: using the cosmic microwave background (CMB), and using Type Ia supernovae and variable stars called Cepheids to measure the distances and velocities of …

Shining bright through the ages Read More »

One of the biggest cosmological mysteries right now is when “cosmic reionization” began. To find out, astronomers have been looking deeper into the cosmos (and farther back in time) to spot the first visible galaxies. Thanks to new research by a team of astronomers from University College London (UCL), a luminous galaxy has been observed …

A giant galaxy seen lighting up the Universe shortly after the Big Bang Read More »

Neutrinos have a relationship with supernovae, massive stars that explode at the end of their lives. Neutrinos may have a role in triggering the eventual supernovae explosions of these stars. For that and many other reasons, astronomers are deeply curious about them. A new study looked at what are called “pre-supernova neutrinos” which can be …

Detecting the neutrinos from a supernova that’s about to explode Read More »

The origin of carbon, an element essential to life on Earth, in the Milky Way galaxy is still debated among astrophysicists: some are in favor of low-mass stars that blew off their carbon-rich envelopes by stellar winds became white dwarfs, and others place the major site of carbon’s synthesis in the winds of massive stars …

Dying stars breathe life into Earth: study Read More »

The spiral pattern shown by the galaxy in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope is striking because of its delicate, feathery nature. These “flocculent” spiral arms indicate that the recent history of star formation of the galaxy, known as NGC 2775, has been relatively quiet. There is virtually no star formation in the central part …

Hubble spots feathered spiral Read More »

Probing black hole magnetic fields billions of light-years away from Earth requires very sensitive devices and to find the exact moment when the emission of high energy takes place. This is precisely what the research team led by Iván Martí-Vidal, CIDEGENT researcher of the Valencian Government at the Astronomical Observatory and the Department of Astronomy …

Scientists detect rapid changes in a black hole that may explain gamma-ray bursts Read More »

Using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have discovered the absence of an unstable massive star in a dwarf galaxy. Scientists think this could indicate that the star became less bright and partially obscured by dust. An alternative explanation is that the star collapsed into a black hole without producing a supernova. …

A cosmic mystery: ESO telescope captures the disappearance of a massive star Read More »

Using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have probed the chemical composition of a nearby metal-poor star-forming dwarf galaxy known as JKB 18. Results of the new observations indicate that the galaxy is chemically inhomogeneous. Studies of spatial distribution of metals in the gas throughout galaxies could be essential to improve our understanding of galaxy …

Astronomers investigate chemical composition of a nearby star-forming dwarf galaxy Read More »

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope captured a striking image of a fledgling star’s unseen, planet-forming disk casting a huge shadow across a more distant cloud in a star-forming region. The young star is called HBC 672, and the shadow feature was nicknamed the “Bat Shadow” because it resembles a pair of wings. The nickname turned out …

Hubble sees a cosmic flapping “Bat shadow” Read More »

Astronomers have discovered the second-most distant quasar ever found using three Maunakea Observatories in Hawai’i: W. M. Keck Observatory, the international Gemini Observatory, a Program of NSF’s NOIRLab, and the University of Hawai’i-owned United Kingdom Infrared Telescope (UKIRT). It is the first quasar to receive an indigenous Hawaiian name, Poniua’ena, which means “unseen spinning source …

Monster black hole found in the early universe Read More »

Astronomers and engineers have designed telescopes, in part, to be “time travelers.” The farther away an object is, the longer its light takes to reach Earth. Peering back in time is one reason why NASA’s upcoming James Webb Space Telescope specializes in collecting infrared light: These longer wavelengths, which were initially emitted by stars and …

Mapping the Early Universe with NASA’s Webb Telescope Read More »

Dark matter is notoriously difficult to detect. So difficult that we haven’t detected it yet. Evidence for dark matter can be seen in everything from the warping of light near galaxies to the way galaxies cluster together. We are pretty sure dark matter is real, but we also know it can’t be made of any …

Japanese dark matter detector is seeing a “Surprising Excess of Events” Read More »

Over the course of 182 days, the eROSITA X-ray telescope has completed its first full sweep of the sky which it embarked upon about a year ago. This new map of the hot, energetic universe contains more than one million objects, roughly doubling the number of known X-ray sources discovered over the 60-year history of …

Our deepest view of the X-ray sky Read More »

Astronomers recently discovered remarkable neutron star known as Swift J1818.0−1607. A new study estimates that it is only about 240 years old — a veritable newborn by cosmic standards. NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory spotted the young object on March 12, when it released a massive burst of X-rays. Follow-up studies by the European Space …

A cosmic baby is discovered, and it’s brilliant Read More »

When PeV particles accelerated by a galactic PeVatron collide with gas and dust in the vicinity of their origin, they should produce very high-energy tera-electron-volt (TeV, or 10^12 eV) gamma-ray photons. These photon by-products won’t be deflected by magnetic fields, so their arrival at gamma-ray observatories on Earth provides a clearer path back to the …

Spotted: A Galactic PeVatron? Read More »

Today, stars fill the night sky. But when the universe was in its infancy, it contained no stars at all. And an international team of scientists is closer than ever to detecting, measuring and studying a signal from this era that has been traveling through the cosmos ever since that starless era ended some 13 …

Scientists close in on 12-billion-year-old signal from the end of the universe’s ‘dark age’ Read More »

Inside the Rho Ophiuchi dark nebula lies a binary system named IRAS 16293-2422 A. Though it’s already a widely-studied object, previous studies produced some conflicting results. Different observations at different wavelengths showed multiple compact sources of radiation at different locations. The thick dust was making things difficult. This study went further than previous studies. ALMA …

This is a binary star in the process of formation Read More »

Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Southern Astrophysical Research (SOAR) telescope, astronomers have conducted X-ray observations and near-infrared imaging of a protostar named HOPS 383. The monitoring campaign detected a powerful X-ray flare from the source, which could help astronomers to better understand the earliest stages of star formation. The so-called Class 0 objects …

Powerful X-ray flare detected from the protostar HOPS 383 Read More »

Neutrons are made of three quarks, two down quarks and one up quark. Up and down quarks are only two of the six types of known quarks. In our everyday lives, and even in the hearts of stars, the quarks of a neutron stick tightly together. For all practical purposes, a neutron can be treated …

Neutron stars could have a layer of exotic quark matter inside them Read More »

New results from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope suggest the formation of the first stars and galaxies in the early universe took place sooner than previously thought. A European team of astronomers have found no evidence of the first generation of stars, known as Population III stars, as far back as when the universe was …

Hubble makes surprising find in the early Universe Read More »

About 3.5 million years ago, the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy unleashed an enormous burst of energy. Our primitive ancestors, already afoot on the African plains, likely would have witnessed this flare as a ghostly glow high overhead in the constellation Sagittarius. It might have persisted for 1 million …

Intense flash from Milky way’s black hole illuminated gas far outside of our Galaxy Read More »

Astronomers using European Southern Observatory (ESO) telescopes have discovered giant spots on the surface of extremely hot stars hidden in stellar clusters. Not only are these stars plagued by magnetic spots, some also experience superflare events, explosions of energy several million times more energetic than similar eruptions on the Sun. The findings, published today in …

Hot stars are plagued by giant magnetic spots, ESO data shows Read More »

Scientists in the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) consortium today announced at the 236th meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) that they have detected gamma rays from the Crab Nebula using a prototype Schwarzschild-Couder Telescope (pSCT), proving the viability of the novel telescope design for use in gamma-ray astrophysics. Detecting the Crab Nebula with the …

Scientists detect Crab nebula using innovative gamma-ray telescope Read More »

Active galactic nuclei (AGNs) play a major role in galaxy evolution. Astronomers from SRON and RuG have now used a record-setting sample of galaxies to confirm that galaxy mergers have a positive effect on igniting AGNs. They were able to compile about 10 times more pictures of merging galaxies than previous studies by using a …

Mergers between galaxies trigger activity in their core Read More »

Astronomers have caught a black hole hurling hot material into space at close to the speed of light. This flare-up was captured in a new movie from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. The black hole and its companion star make up a system called MAXI J1820+070, located in our Galaxy about 10,000 light years from Earth. …

MAXI J1820+070: Black hole outburst caught on video Read More »

Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope are finding that planets have a tough time forming in the rough-and-tumble central region of the massive, crowded star cluster Westerlund 2. Located 20,000 light-years away, Westerlund 2 is a unique laboratory to study stellar evolutionary processes because it’s relatively nearby, quite young, and contains a large stellar population. …

The Westerlund 2 star cluster’s raucous core is no place to form planets Read More »

Astronomers have found two objects that, added to a strange object discovered in 2018, constitute a new class of cosmic explosions. The new type of explosion shares some characteristics with supernova explosions of massive stars and with the explosions that generate gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), but still has distinctive differences from each. The saga began in …

Astronomers discover new class of cosmic explosions Read More »

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) found quasi-periodic flickers in millimeter-waves from the center of the Milky Way, Sagittarius (Sgr) A*. The team interpreted these blinks to be due to the rotation of radio spots circling the supermassive black hole with an orbit radius smaller than that of Mercury. This is an interesting …

ALMA spots twinkling heart of Milky Way Read More »

Gravitational-wave researchers at the University of Birmingham have developed a new model that promises to yield fresh insights into the structure and composition of neutron stars. The model shows that vibrations, or oscillations, inside the stars can be directly measured from the gravitational-wave signal alone. This is because neutron stars will become deformed under the …

New gravitational-wave model can bring neutron stars into even sharper focus Read More »

In our 13.8 billion-year-old universe, most galaxies like our Milky Way form gradually, reaching their large mass relatively late. But a new discovery made with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) of a massive rotating disk galaxy, seen when the universe was only ten percent of its current age, challenges the traditional models of galaxy …

ALMA discovers massive rotating disk in early Universe Read More »

Observations made with the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT) have revealed the telltale signs of a star system being born. Around the young star AB Aurigae lies a dense disc of dust and gas in which astronomers have spotted a prominent spiral structure with a ‘twist’ that marks the site where a …

ESO telescope sees signs of planet birth Read More »

A pair of gigantic gamma-ray bubbles centered on the core of the Milky Way galaxy were discovered by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope 10 years ago. But how these so-called “Fermi bubbles” arose was a mystery. Recently, however, researchers at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory (SHAO) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have presented a new …

Researchers reveal common origin of Fermi bubbles and galactic center X-ray outflows Read More »

Russian astrophysicists have come close to determining the origin of high-energy neutrinos from space. The astrophysicists focused on the origins of ultra-high-energy neutrinos at 200 TeV or more. The team compared the measurements of the IceCube facility with a large number of radio observations. The elusive particles were found to emerge during radio frequency flares …

Where neutrinos come from Read More »

Astronomers have detected elusive pulsation patterns in dozens of young, rapidly rotating stars thanks to data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). The discovery will revolutionize scientists’ ability to study details like the ages, sizes and compositions of these stars — all members of a class named for the prototype, the bright star Delta …

NASA’s TESS enables breakthrough study of perplexing stellar pulsations Read More »

Mergers between black holes and neutron stars in dense star clusters are quite unlike those that form in isolated regions where stars are few. Their associated features could be crucial to the study of gravitational waves and their source. Dr Manuel Arca Sedda of the Institute for Astronomical Computing at Heidelberg University came to this …

In star clusters, black holes merge with neutron stars, unseen Read More »

Many galaxies far more active than the Milky Way have enormous twin jets of radio waves extending far into intergalactic space. Normally these go in opposite directions, coming from a massive black hole at the centre of the galaxy. However, a few are more complicated and appear to have four jets forming an ‘X’ on …

South Africa’s MeerKAT solves mystery of ‘X-galaxies’ Read More »

In the depths of the night sky lies a barred spiral galaxy called NGC 3583, imaged here by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This is a barred spiral galaxy with two arms that twist out into the universe. This galaxy is located 98 million light-years away from the Milky Way. Two supernovae exploded in this galaxy, one in …

Hubble views a galaxy burning bright Read More »

Now and then there are bright flashes of radio light in the sky, and they are bothering astronomers. They are called Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs), and they’re like the chirp of a smoke alarm that needs its battery changed. They last for such a short time that it’s difficult to track down the source. They …

A fast radio burst has been detected from inside the Milky way Read More »

Have you ever wanted to examine the photosphere of a white dwarf up close and personal? Now you, too, can recreate and observe the atmospheric conditions of these extreme, dense, dead stars — assuming you have access to Sandia Labs’ Z Machine. White dwarfs are of enormous astronomical use to scientists. By observing white dwarfs, …

Build your own white dwarf photosphere Read More »

A team of astronomers from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and other institutes has discovered a black hole lying just 1000 light-years from Earth. The black hole is closer to our Solar System than any other found to date and forms part of a triple system that can be seen with the naked eye. The …

ESO Instrument Finds Closest Black Hole to Earth Read More »

A team of astronomers has discovered that the closest known brown dwarf, Luhman 16A, shows signs of cloud bands similar to those seen on Jupiter and Saturn. This is the first time scientists have used the technique of polarimetry to determine the properties of atmospheric clouds outside of the solar system, or exoclouds. Brown dwarfs …

Astronomers find Jupiter-like cloud bands on closest brown dwarf Read More »

Gravitational-wave astronomy provides a unique new way to study the expansion history of the Universe. On 17 August 2017, the LIGO and Virgo collaborations first detected gravitational waves from a pair of neutron stairs merging. The gravitational wave signal was accompanied by a range of counterparts identified with electromagnetic telescopes. This multi-messenger discovery allowed astronomers …

Future detectors to detect millions of black holes and the evolution of the universe Read More »

Before stellar-mass black holes merge in a spectacular burst of gravitational waves, they’re locked in a fatal dance around each other as a binary black hole. A new study uses clues from black hole spins to explore how these binaries came to be paired together in the first place. With ten detections of merging stellar-mass …

Spins point to how black hole binaries formed Read More »

The weight of the universe (technically the mass of the universe) is a difficult thing to measure. To do it you need to count not just stars and galaxies, but dark matter, diffuse clouds of dust and even wisps of neutral hydrogen in intergalactic space. Astronomers have tried to weigh the universe for more than …

How do you weigh the Universe? Read More »

Black holes aren’t stationary in space; in fact, they can be quite active in their movements. But because they are completely dark and can’t be observed directly, they’re not easy to study. Scientists have finally figured out the precise timing of a complicated dance between two enormous black holes, revealing hidden details about the physical …

Spitzer telescope reveals the precise timing of a black hole dance Read More »

Astronomers may have discovered a new kind of survival story: a star that had a brush with a giant black hole and lived to tell the tale through exclamations of X-rays. Data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and ESA’s XMM-Newton uncovered the account that began with a red giant star wandering too close to a …

Star survives close call with a black hole Read More »

On April 24, 1990, the space shuttle Discovery lifted off from Earth with its precious cargo, the Hubble Space Telescope. The next day, astronauts released the telescope into space to begin its journey of discovery. No one could have predicted what wonders Hubble would see in the 30 years that followed. From our own cosmic …

Hubble Marks 30 Years in Space Read More »

Galaxies grow large by eating their smaller neighbours, new research reveals. Exactly how massive galaxies attain their size is poorly understood, not least because they swell over billions of years. But now a combination of observation and modelling from researchers led by Dr. Anshu Gupta from Australia’s ARC Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics …

Hungry galaxies grow fat on the flesh of their neighbors Read More »

It’s easy to run out of superlatives and adjectives when your puny human language is trying to describe humongously-energetic events in the Universe. So now it’s down to this: a really powerful supernova is a “super-supernova.” But whatever name we give it, it’s a monster. A monsternova. In 2016, a team of astronomers identified a …

Super-supernova released ten times more energy than a regular supernova Read More »

A nova is a dramatic episode in the life of a binary pair of stars. It’s an explosion of bright light that can last weeks or even months. And though they’re not exactly rare—there are about 10 each year in the Milky Way—astronomers have never watched one from start to finish until now. A nova …

Astronomers watch a nova go from start to finish for the first time Read More »

Though mighty, the Milky Way and galaxies of similar mass are not without scars chronicling turbulent histories. University of California, Irvine astronomers and others have shown that clusters of supernovas can cause the birth of scattered, eccentrically orbiting suns in outer stellar halos, upending commonly held notions of how star systems have formed and evolved …

Milky Way could be catapulting stars into its outer halo, astronomers say Read More »

Everyone’s favorite red supergiant star is bright again. The American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) has been tracking Betelgeuse as it has gradually returned to its more normal brilliance. As of this writing, it is about 95% of its typical visual brightness. Supernova fans will have to wait a bit longer. Betelgeuse created quite …

Betelgeuse is bright again Read More »

Five days before NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope ended its mission on Jan. 30, 2020, scientists used the spacecraft’s infrared camera to take multiple images of a region known as the California Nebula — a fitting target considering the mission’s management and science operations were both based in Southern California at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and …

California nebula stars in final mosaic by NASA’s Spitzer Read More »

Magnetized neutron stars in distant globular clusters are a challenge to detect — but it’s a job made easier by the world’s largest filled-aperture radio telescope. Recent high-sensitivity observations have uncovered an erratic new star system. Pulsars are the compact remnants of dead stars that shine powerful beams of emission into space as they spin. …

Pulsar Discovery from an Enormous Telescope Read More »

Observations made with ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) have revealed for the first time that a star orbiting the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way moves just as predicted by Einstein’s general theory of relativity. Its orbit is shaped like a rosette and not like an ellipse as predicted by Newton’s …

ESO Telescope Sees Star Dance Around Supermassive Black Hole, Proves Einstein Right Read More »

High-mass stars, which are eight or more times the mass of our Sun, live hard and die young. They often end their short lives in violent explosions called supernovas, but their births are much more of a mystery. They form in very dense, cold clouds of gas and dust, but little is known about these …

Piercing the Dark Birthplaces of Massive Stars with Webb Read More »

We’ve developed scientific laws and theories that help us understand the cosmos. While our theories are powerful, they are still rooted in some fundamental assumptions. One of these is that the laws of physics are the same everywhere. This is known as cosmic isotropy, and it allows us to compare what we see in the …

New observations show that the Universe might not be expanding at the same rate in all directions Read More »

CLEMSON — A team of Clemson University College of Science researchers, in collaboration with international colleagues, has reported the first definitive detection of a relativistic jet emerging from two colliding galaxies — in essence, the first photographic proof that merging galaxies can produce jets of charged particles that travel at nearly the speed of light. …

Clemson researchers capture first-ever photographic proof of power-packed jet emerging from colliding galaxies Read More »

One year ago, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) Collaboration published the first image of a black hole in the nearby radio galaxy M 87. Now the collaboration has extracted new information from the EHT data on the distant quasar 3C 279: they observed the finest detail ever seen in a jet produced by a supermassive …

Something is lurking in the heart of Quasar 3C 279 Read More »

Sometimes it’s easy being an astronomer. When your celestial target is something simple and bright, the game can be pretty straightforward: point your telescope at the thing and just wait for all the juicy photons to pour on in. But sometimes being an astronomer is tough, like when you’re trying to study the first stars …

Astronomers are hoping to see the very first stars and galaxies in the Universe Read More »

Astronomers have found the best evidence for the perpetrator of a cosmic homicide: a black hole of an elusive class known as “intermediate-mass,” which betrayed its existence by tearing apart a wayward star that passed too close. Intermediate-mass black holes (IMBHs) are a long-sought “missing link” in black hole evolution. Though there have been a …

Hubble finds best evidence for elusive mid-sized black hole Read More »

An international team of researchers has found that neon inside a certain massive star can consume the electrons in the core, a process called electron capture, which causes the star to collapse into a neutron star and produce a supernova. The researchers were interested in studying the final fate of stars within a mass range …

Electron-eating neon causes star to collapse Read More »

Astronomers obtained the first resolved image of disturbed gaseous clouds in a galaxy 11 billion light-years away by using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA). The team found that the disruption is caused by young powerful jets ejected from a supermassive black hole residing at the center of the host galaxy. This result will cast …

ALMA resolves gas impacted by young jets from supermassive black hole Read More »

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are brief radio signals that last on the order of milliseconds. They appear to be extragalactic, coming from small, point-like areas on the sky. Some FRBs are one-off events, while others are periodic or “repeating”. The sources of FRBs are still unknown, but binary neutron star systems might be a piece …

Signals from Neutron Star Binaries Read More »

In April of 2019, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration made history when it released the first image of a black hole ever taken. This accomplishment was decades in the making and triggered an international media circus. The picture was the result of a technique known as interferometry, where observatories across the world combined light …

How Researchers Produce Sharp Images of a Black Hole Read More »

Astronomers from Nanjing University in China have detected gamma ray emission from two star-forming galaxies designated M33 and Arp 299. The finding could be helpful in improving knowledge about the origin of very high-energy emission in galaxies. It is believed that gamma rays in galaxies are the result of interaction of cosmic rays with the …

Chinese astronomers detect gamma-ray emission from two star-forming galaxies Read More »

Using the telescopes at the Large Binocular Telescope Observatory (LBTO) in Arizona, a research team recently observed a blazar located 13 billion light-years from Earth. This object, designated PSO J030947.49+271757.31 (or PSO J0309+27), is the most distant blazar ever observed and foretells the existence of many more! The object was selected by cross-matching data from …

Blazar Found Blazing When the Universe was Only a Billion Years Old Read More »

A supernova in a nearby galaxy may have originated from an explosion of a blue supergiant formed by the merger of two stars, simulations by RIKEN astrophysicists suggest. The asymmetric nature of this explosion may provide hints for where to look for the elusive neutron star birthed in this stellar cataclysm. A core-collapse supernova occurs …

Merger between two stars led to blue supergiant, iconic supernova Read More »

When two galaxies merge, the collision can have dramatic consequences — particularly if the galaxies are rich in gas. The gravitational interaction of galaxies oscillating during a merger drives shock waves through their gas. This can trigger bursts of star formation, launch jets from active galactic nuclei, and result in the eventual formation of a …

A Star-Bursting Galaxy Born from the Collision of Dwarfs Read More »

The “Spektr-RG” orbital observatory marks an important stage – one third of the X-ray map of the entire sky is built. The number of registered X-ray sources in the Russian half of this map (16.7% of the entire sky) exceeds 95,000. Only one sixth of them were detected by the German satellite ROSAT on the …

“Spectr-RG” Observatory scans a third of the entire sky Read More »

Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute; AEI) in Hannover together with international colleagues have published their second Open Gravitational-wave Catalog (2-OGC). They used improved search methods to dig deeper into publicly available data from LIGO’s and Virgo’s first and second observation runs. Apart from confirming the ten known binary …

Researchers find gravitational wave candidates from binary black hole mergers in public LIGO/Virgo data Read More »

Researchers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) have observed an extreme planet where they suspect it rains iron. The ultra-hot giant exoplanet has a day side where temperatures climb above 2400 degrees Celsius, high enough to vaporise metals. Strong winds carry iron vapour to the cooler night side where it condenses into iron droplets. This …

ESO Telescope Observes Exoplanet Where It Rains Iron Read More »

How big is a neutron star? These extreme, ultra-dense collapsed stars are fairly small, as far as stellar objects are concerned. Even though they pack the mass of a full-sized star, their size is often compared to the width of a medium-to-large-sized city. For years, astronomers have pegged neutron stars at somewhere between 19-27 km …

Neutron Star Measures Just 22 Kilometers Across Read More »

The Earth, solar system, the entire Milky Way and the few thousand galaxies closest to us move in a vast “bubble” that is 250 million light years in diameter, where the average density of matter is half as high as for the rest of the universe. This is the hypothesis advanced by a theoretical physicist …

Solved: The mystery of the expansion of the universe Read More »

A computational approach inspired by the growth patterns of a bright yellow slime mold has enabled a team of astronomers and computer scientists at UC Santa Cruz to trace the filaments of the cosmic web that connects galaxies throughout the universe. Their results, published March 10 in Astrophysical Journal Letters, provide the first conclusive association …

Astronomers use slime mold model to reveal dark threads of the cosmic web Read More »

Artist Mik Petter has created a vibrant new piece of art based on JunoCam images of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (GRS). The piece makes use of fractals, which are recursive mathematical creations; increasingly complex patterns that are similar to each other, yet never exactly the same. “The important thing in science is not so much to obtain …

Artwork Inspired by Jupiter’s Great Red Spot Read More »

Astronomers have a dark energy problem. On the one hand, we’ve known for years that the universe is not just expanding, but accelerating. There seems to be a dark energy that drives cosmic expansion. On the other hand, when we measure cosmic expansion in different ways we get values that don’t quite agree. Some methods …

The Chemicals That Make Up Exploding Stars Could Help Explain Away Dark Energy Read More »

Late last year, news broke that the star Betelgeuse was fading significantly, ultimately dropping to around 40% of its usual brightness. The activity fueled popular speculation that the red supergiant would soon explode as a massive supernova. But astronomers have more benign theories to explain the star’s dimming behavior. And scientists at the University of …

Dimming Betelgeuse likely isn’t cold, just dusty, new study shows Read More »

An international team of astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) captured the very moment when an old star first starts to alter its environment. The star has ejected high-speed bipolar gas jets which are now colliding with the surrounding material; the age of the observed jet is estimated to be less than 60 …

ALMA spots metamorphosing aged star Read More »

Some of the most spectacular images to come out of observatories like the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) or the Very Large Telescope (VLT) are detailed views of protoplanetary disks. These disks of gas and dust around young stars aren’t just smooth and featureless; instead, they exhibit arcs, rings, gaps, and spirals. What causes this …

Catastrophic Collisions in Protoplanetary Disks Read More »

University of British Columbia astronomy student Michelle Kunimoto has discovered 17 new planets, including a potentially habitable, Earth-sized world, by combing through data gathered by NASA’s Kepler mission. Over its original four-year mission, the Kepler satellite looked for planets, especially those that lie in the “Habitable Zones” of their stars, where liquid water could exist …

Astronomy student discovers 17 new planets, including Earth-sized world Read More »

When it comes to the challenges posed by interstellar travel, there are no easy answers. The distances are immense, the amount of energy needed to make the journey is tremendous, and the time scales involved are (no pun!) astronomical. But what if there was a way to travel between stars using ships that take advantage …

Riding the Wave of a Supernova to Go Interstellar Read More »

Scientists studying a distant galaxy cluster have discovered the biggest explosion seen in the Universe since the Big Bang. The blast came from a supermassive black hole at the centre of a galaxy hundreds of millions of light-years away. It released five times more energy than the previous record holder. The blast came from a …

Astronomers detect biggest explosion in the history of the Universe Read More »

A new study explores whether the collision of very small galaxies could lead to the merging black holes detected in gravitational waves. Thanks to the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO), we now know that black holes in our distant universe sometimes find each other in a dramatic inspiral and collision, releasing a burst of gravitational-wave …

Gravitational Waves After Galaxy Collisions Read More »

FU Orionis (FU Ori, for short) objects are young, pre-main-sequence stars that grow suddenly brighter — by several magnitudes! — over the span of perhaps a year. These flaring states can last on the order of decades, and they’re thought to be related to a period of increased accretion onto the star during its early …

ALMA Explores Possible Interacting Twin Disks Read More »

Using the Dutch-led Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) radio telescope, astronomers have discovered unusual radio waves coming from the nearby red dwarf star GJ1151. The radio waves bear the tell-tale signature of aurorae caused by an interaction between a star and its planet. The radio emission from a star-planet interaction has been predicted for over thirty-years …

LOFAR pioneers new way to study exoplanet environments Read More »

Allen Lawrence, wrapping up a long career as an electrical engineer, was serious about moving his astronomy hobby beyond the 20-inch telescope he’d hauled to star parties under the dark skies of Texas and Arizona. So in 2011 – in his late 60s, after 30 years of operating his own consulting firm around Green Bay, …

77-year-old amateur astronomer helps reveal rare galaxy double nucleus Read More »

Astronomers using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes have put together a detailed map of a rare collision between four galaxy clusters. Eventually all four clusters — each with a mass of at least several hundred trillion times that of the Sun — will merge to form one of the most massive objects in the universe. …

Chandra Spots a Mega-Cluster of Galaxies Read More »

Using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have captured the unprecedented dimming of Betelgeuse, a red supergiant star in the constellation of Orion. The stunning new images of the star’s surface show not only the fading red supergiant but also how its apparent shape is changing. Betelgeuse has been a beacon in the night sky …

ESO Telescope Sees Surface of Dim Betelgeuse Read More »

A team of scientists in Canada have found a Fast Radio Burst (FRB) that repeats every 16 days. This is in stark contrast to other FRBs, which are more sporadic. Some of those sporadic FRBs occur in clusters, and repeat irregularly, but FRBs with a regular, repeatable occurrence are rare. A Fast Radio Burst is …

A Rare Fast Radio Burst has been Found that Actually Repeats Every 16 Days Read More »

An international team of astrophysicists led by Australian Professor Matthew Bailes, from the ARC Centre of Excellence of Gravitational Wave Discovery (OzGrav), has shown exciting new evidence for ‘frame-dragging’—how the spinning of a celestial body twists space and time—after tracking the orbit of an exotic stellar pair for almost two decades. The data, which is …

Astronomers witness the dragging of space-time in stellar cosmic dance Read More »

For the first time, researchers from the Universities of Bonn and Strasbourg have simulated the formation of galaxies in a universe without dark matter. To replicate this process on the computer, they have instead modified Newton’s laws of gravity. The galaxies that were created in the computer calculations are similar to those we actually see …

Galaxy formation simulated without dark matter Read More »

Nine sources of extremely high-energy gamma rays comprise a new catalog compiled by researchers with the High-Altitude Water Cherenkov (HAWC) Gamma-Ray Observatory. All produce gamma rays with energies over 56 trillion electron volts (TeV) and three emit gamma rays extending to 100 TeV and beyond, making these the highest-energy sources ever observed in our galaxy. …

Galactic gamma-ray sources reveal birthplaces of high-energy particles Read More »

Using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and a new observing technique, astronomers have found that dark matter forms much smaller clumps than previously known. This result confirms one of the fundamental predictions of the widely accepted “cold dark matter” theory. All galaxies, according to this theory, form and are embedded within clouds of dark matter. Dark …

Hubble detects smallest known dark matter clumps Read More »

An international team of astronomers led by scientists at the University of California, Riverside, has found an unusual monster galaxy that existed about 12 billion years ago, when the universe was only 1.8 billion years old. Dubbed XMM-2599, the galaxy formed stars at a high rate and then died. Why it suddenly stopped forming stars …

Astronomers discover unusual monster galaxy in the very early universe Read More »

NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has discovered a faint but sprawling glow of high-energy light around a nearby pulsar. If visible to the human eye, this gamma-ray “halo” would appear about 40 times bigger in the sky than a full Moon. This structure may provide the solution to a long-standing mystery about the amount of …

Nearby pulsar’s gamma-ray ‘halo’ linked to antimatter puzzle Read More »

Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope have observed reservoirs of cool gas around some of the earliest galaxies in the Universe. These gas halos are the perfect food for supermassive black holes at the centre of these galaxies, which are now seen as they were over 12.5 billion years ago. This food storage might explain …

ESO found out black holes’ breakfast at the Cosmic Dawn Read More »

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have spotted the light of a massive galaxy seen only 970 million years after the Big Bang. This galaxy, called MAMBO-9, is the most distant dusty star-forming galaxy that has ever been observed without the help of a gravitational lens. “Observations with new and more capable technology …

ALMA spots most distant dusty galaxy hidden in plain sight Read More »

In a paper on the preprint site ArXiv and soon to be published in the Astrophysical Journal, researchers present the first analysis of data from a new configuration of the MWA designed specifically to look for the signal of neutral hydrogen, the gas that dominated the universe during the cosmic dark age. The analysis sets a …

Scientists inch closer than ever to signal from cosmic dawn Read More »

A Queen’s University Belfast scientist has led an international team to the ground-breaking discovery of why the Sun’s magnetic waves strengthen and grow as they emerge from its surface, which could help to solve the mystery of how the corona of the Sun maintains its multi-million degree temperatures. Dr David Jess from the School of …

Cracking 60-year-old mystery of Sun’s magnetic waves Read More »

It has been decades since the discovery of the first gamma-ray burst, yet some of their fundamental traits remain unclear. An international team of researchers, including two astrophysicists from the George Washington University, Chryssa Kouveliotou and Alexander van der Horst, now has taken the next step in understanding the physical processes at work during these …

Highest-energy light from a gamma-ray burst ever Read More »

Scientists have reported detecting gravitational waves from 10 black hole mergers to date, but they are still trying to explain the origins of those mergers. The largest merger detected so far seems to have defied previous models because it has a higher spin and mass than the range thought possible. In a new paper published in Physical Review Letters published on November 1, …

Massive, Spinning Black Holes Could Be the Result of ‘Pac-Man-Like’ Mergers Read More »

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics 2019 “for contributions to our understanding of the evolution of the universe and Earth’s place in the cosmos” with one half to James Peebles, Princeton University, USA “for theoretical discoveries in physical cosmology” and the other half jointly to Michel …

2019 Nobel Prize in Physics Read More »

Strontium was spotted in the aftermath of a collision between two neutron stars. This is the first time a heavy element has ever been identified in a kilonova, the explosive aftermath of these types of collision. The kilonova, AT2017gfo, emerging from the gravitational-wave–discovered neutron star merger, GW170817 was the first kilonova where detailed spectra were …

Strontium in the Kilonova Wreckage Read More »

The Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation allocated a grant in the amount of 87.5 million rubles (for two years 2019-2020) for the construction of the largest TAIGA gamma observatory (Tunka Advanced Instrument for cosmic ray physics and Gamma-ray Astronomy). TAIGA is designed for the study of gamma rays and charged …

The new grant for TAIGA Read More »