How Solar Wind Breaks Through Earth’s Magnetic Field
A new study uses data from the four European Space Agency satellites in the Cluster mission to reveal how solar wind breaks through the Earth’s…
Astrophysics News
Exoplanets Can Be Divided Into Three Groups: Terrestrials, Gas Giants, and Mid-Sized Gas Dwarfs
A newly published study form the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics follows up on Kepler discoveries, revealing that exoplanets can be divided into three groups: terrestrials,…
New Research Reveals Harsh Space Weather May Doom Potential Life on Red-Dwarf Planets
New research presented at the meeting of the American Astronomical Society reveals that harsh space weather may strip the atmosphere of any rocky planet orbiting…
Theoretical Physicists Reveal the Turbulent Nature of Black Holes
A new study from the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics reveals the turbulent nature of black holes, showing that gravitational fields around black holes might…
Astronomers Discover a Thorne-Zytkow Object – A Red Supergiant and Neutron Star Hybrid
A team of astronomers has discovered the first Thorne-Żytkow object, a hybrid star formed by the interaction of a red supergiant and a neutron star…
New Study Measures the Strength of Magnetic Fields Near Black Holes
New research from the Berkeley Lab systematically measures the strength of magnetic fields near black holes for the first time, revealing that the measured magnetic…
Kepler-56b and Kepler-56c Will Be Swallowed by Their Star
Astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics announced that planets Kepler-56b and Kepler-56c will be swallowed by their star, providing a glimpse into the future…
Spitzer Discovers a Rare Supernova Where a Dead Star “Fed” Off an Aging Star
Using data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, astronomers examined a rare example of Type Ia explosion in which a dead star “fed” off an aging…
Fermi Reveals Distinctive Properties of Blazars
A team of astronomers has used Fermi data to reveal how blazars are distributed throughout the universe and to show the distinctive properties that define…
Astronomers Discover a New Type of Planet
Astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics have discovered a rocky planet that weighs 17 times as much as Earth and is 2.3 times larger…
Chandra Reveals Why Giant Elliptical Galaxies Have Few Young Stars
Astronomers shed new light on the mystery of why giant elliptical galaxies have few young stars. NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has shed new light on…
Dark Stars – Astronomers Investigate if Dark Matter Influenced the Development of Stars
Astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics used computer simulations of dark matter in the early universe to investigate if and how dark matter might…
High-Velocity Smith Cloud Appears to be Encased in a Shell of Dark Matter
New data from the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope reveals that the high-velocity cloud known as the Smith Cloud appears to be encased in…
Astronomers Solve the Mystery of Where Gamma Rays Originate
An international team of astronomers has for the first time confirmed a link between the gamma bursts and their counterparts in several radio frequencies, solving…
New Data from NASA Conflicts with Black Hole ‘Doughnut’ Theory
New data from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer reveals a new feature about active black holes, leaving astronomers to reexamining a decades-old theory about the…
First Direct Confirmation of a Wolf-Rayet Star Self-Destructing in a Type IIb Supernova
Using an innovative sky survey called the intermediate Palomar Transient Factory, scientists have the first direct confirmation that a Wolf-Rayet star died in a violent…
Newly Discovered Cosmic Clumps Cast the Darkest Shadows Ever Recorded
Using data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, astronomers have discovered cosmic clumps within a huge cosmic cloud of gas and dust that cast the deepest…
Hubble Confirms the Distance of Galaxy Cluster JKCS 041
New research from the Carnegie Institute for Science has confirmed the distance of galaxy cluster JKCS 041, revealing 19 galaxies at precisely the same great…
