Hubble Reveals the Massive Remains of a Comet-Like Object Scattered Around a White Dwarf
Using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, a team astronomers has found the first evidence of the remains of a comet-like object scattered around a burned-out star….
cosmology
Astronomers Discover an Intermediate-Mass Black Hole
Astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics reveal new evidence that an intermediate-mass black hole weighing 2,200 Suns is hiding at the center of the…
NASA Study Shows Planets of Red Dwarf Stars May Face Oxygen Loss in Habitable Zones
New research expands how habitable zones are defined by taking into account the impact of stellar activity, which can threaten an exoplanet’s atmosphere with oxygen…
Chandra Reveals a Decade-Long Sustained Tidal Disruption Event
A trio of X-ray observatories has captured a remarkable event in their data: a decade-long binge by a black hole almost two billion light years…
Astronomers Obtain Sensitive Measurements of a Massive and Luminous Elliptical Galaxy
Using the spectrometer on the Keck telescope, astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics obtained very sensitive magnesium measurements in one of the most massive…
New ESO Image of the Cat’s Paw and Lobster Nebulae
This newly released image from ESO’s Very Large Telescope Survey Telescope shows the Cat’s Paw Nebula and the Lobster Nebula. Astronomers have for a long…
NuSTAR Helps Solve Forty-Year-Old Neutron Star Mystery
Astronomers may have solved a 40-year-old mystery surrounding a neutron star in the “Rapid Burster” system. Scientists observing a curious neutron star in a binary…
Fermi Views Gamma Rays from Solar Flares on the Far Side of the Sun
New research from NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope reveals high-energy light from solar eruptions located on the far side of the sun, which should block…
Fermi Reveals the Most Extreme Blazars to Date
NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has identified the farthest gamma-ray blazars to date, a type of galaxy whose intense emissions are powered by supersized black…
Radio Weak Blazars Challenge the Basic Explanation of Blazars
Using the Fermi catalog of very high energy sources and the WISE infrared sky catalog, astronomers have found two BL Lac blazars with no apparent…
New Research Supports Faster Than Expected Expansion of the Universe
A team of astronomers used the Hubble Space Telescope and galaxies as giant gravitational lenses to make an independent measurement of how fast the Universe…
NASA’s NuSTAR Reveals New Clues to ‘Chameleon Supernova’
NASA’s NuSTAR satellite reveals new clues to why supernova SN 2014C dramatically changed in appearance over the course of a year. “We’re made of star…
New Study Confirms the Ideas About Galaxy Cluster Evolution
A new millimeter wavelength study of massive clusters from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has found good agreement with current ideas about galaxy cluster evolution….
VISTA Survey Reveals Hidden Secrets of Orion’s Clouds
The VISTA infrared survey telescope reveals the most detailed view of Orion A molecular cloud in the near-infrared. The new image from the VISION survey…
Astronomers Discover a Cosmic Particle Accelerator in Abell 3411 and 3412
Using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and several other telescopes, a team of astronomers has discovered a cosmic one-two punch unlike any ever seen…
Astronomers Discover Giant Halos Around Early Galaxies
Using the Isaac Newton Telescope, a team of astronomers has discovered giant halos of photons around early Milky Way type galaxies. In order to understand…
Hubble Detects ‘Exocomets’ Plunging Into Young Star HD 172555
The Hubble Space Telescope has discovered comets plunging into young star HD 172555, which resides 95 light-years from Earth. The exocomets — comets outside our…
Hubble Views Shadow Caused by Possible Planet Encircling TW Hydrae
A team of astronomers view a shadow sweeping around a gas-and-dust disk encircling the young star TW Hydrae. Searching for planets around other stars is…