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Proxima Centauri. Image credit: Hubble / ESA / NASA.

Astronomers Find Evidence for 7-Year Stellar Cycle in Proxima Centauri

Oct 12, 2016 by Natali Anderson

The Sun’s nearest stellar neighbor, Proxima Centauri, has a regular cycle of starspots, according to a team of astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian...

This image from ESO’s VISTA telescope shows the central part of the Milky Way. While normally hidden behind obscuring dust, the infrared capabilities of the telescope allow astronomers to study stars close to the Galactic center. Within this field of view astronomers detected several RR Lyrae stars. Image credit: ESO / VVV Survey / D. Minniti et al.

VISTA Spots Ancient Stars near Milky Way Center

Oct 12, 2016 by News Staff

Astronomers using ESO’s VISTA infrared survey telescope have discovered a dozen ancient stars, of a type known as RR Lyrae, in the vicinity of the center...

This image shows the spiral galaxy NGC 278, which lies in the northern constellation Cassiopeia, about 41.7 million light-years away. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / S. Smartt, Queen's University Belfast.

Hubble Space Telescope Captures Image of NGC 278

Oct 10, 2016 by News Staff

This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows a spiral galaxy known as NGC 278. This image shows the spiral galaxy NGC 278, which lies in the northern...

V Hydrae. Image credit: NASA / ESA / A. Field, STScI.

Astronomers Detect Giant Balls of Plasma Shooting from Binary Star System

Oct 7, 2016 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have detected blobs of plasma being ejected near a dying red giant star called V Hydrae. This image...

This Hubble image shows the lenticular galaxy GJ1417+52. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Astronomers Find Wandering Black Hole in Galaxy 4.5 Billion Light-Years Away

Oct 7, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

A rogue black hole has been found in the outer regions of the lenticular galaxy SDSS J141711.07+522540.8 (GJ1417+52 for short). Evidence suggests this...

Planets form from epic collisions between asteroids and even bigger bodies, called protoplanets. Sometimes the colliding bodies are ground to dust, and sometimes they stick together to ultimately form larger, mature planets. This artist’s conception shows one such smash-up. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Mystery of KIC 8462852 Deepens

Oct 5, 2016 by News Staff

Planets form from epic collisions between asteroids and even bigger bodies, called protoplanets. Sometimes the colliding bodies are ground to dust, and...

This image of Messier 78 was captured using the VISTA telescope at ESO’s Paranal Observatory. In the image, Messier 78 is the bluish haze in the center, the other reflection nebula towards the right goes by the name of NGC 2071. Image credit: ESO.

ESO’s VISTA Telescope Sees Hidden Stars in Messier 78

Oct 5, 2016 by News Staff

This detailed view of the reflection nebula Messier 78 was taken with the Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) at ESO’s Paranal...

This Hubble image shows the central region of the dwarf spiral galaxy NGC 247, which lies in the constellation Cetus, about 11.5 million light-years away. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

New Hubble Photo Shows Center of Spiral Galaxy NGC 247

Oct 3, 2016 by News Staff

This image snapped by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals a detailed view of the central part of the disc of NGC 247, a relatively small spiral...

ALMA peered into the Ophiuchus star-forming region to study the protoplanetary disk around Elias 2-27. Image credit: L. Pérez / B. Saxton / MPIfR / NRAO / AUI / NSF / ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NASA / JPL Caltech / WISE Team.

ALMA Spots Spiral-Armed Protoplanetary Disk around Young Stellar Object

Oct 1, 2016 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array have detected a pair of trailing symmetric spiral arms in the protoplanetary disk surrounding...

LMC P3 (circled) is located in the supernova remnant DEM L241 in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Record-Breaking Gamma-Ray Binary Spotted in Large Magellanic Cloud

Sep 30, 2016 by News Staff

A gamma-ray binary discovered in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy approximately 163,000 light-years away, is the first object of its kind ever...

This figure shows observations of the first hot molecular core to be found outside the Milky Way Galaxy with ALMA and a view of the region of sky in infrared light. Left: distributions of molecular line emission from a hot molecular core in the LMC observed with ALMA. Emissions from dust, sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitric oxide (NO), and formaldehyde (H2CO) are shown as examples. Right: an infrared image of the surrounding star-forming region (based on data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope). Image credit: T. Shimonishi / Tohoku University / ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO.

First ‘Hot Molecular Core’ Discovered Outside Milky Way

Sep 29, 2016 by Natali Anderson

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have discovered the first ‘hot molecular core’ — a cocoon of complex...

The surface of Europa looms large in this newly-reprocessed color view; image scale is 1.6 km per pixel; north on Europa is at right. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SETI Institute.

Hubble Space Telescope Directly Images Possible Water Plumes on Europa

Sep 26, 2016 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has imaged what may be water vapor plumes erupting off the surface of Europa, the sixth-closest moon of Jupiter and...

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the spiral galaxy NGC 24. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Hubble Space Telescope Observes NGC 24

Sep 26, 2016 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has taken a picture of the spiral galaxy NGC 24, which is found in the constellation of Sculptor. This image from the...

Universe is Expanding Uniformly, Scientists Say

Sep 23, 2016 by News Staff

The Universe is not spinning or stretched in any particular direction, according to a team of researchers from University College London and Imperial College...

Astronomers Confirm Existence of Giant Circumbinary Exoplanet 8,000 Light-Years Away

Sep 22, 2016 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have confirmed the existence of a Saturn-mass exoplanet in the binary system OGLE-2007-BLG-349L,...

A trove of galaxies, rich in carbon monoxide (indicating star-forming potential) were imaged by ALMA (orange) in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field. The blue features are galaxies imaged by Hubble. Image credit: B. Saxton / NRAO / AUI / NSF / ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NASA / ESA / Hubble.

ALMA Probes Hubble Ultra Deep Field

Sep 22, 2016 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array have explored the same corner of the early Universe first revealed in the iconic image...

This image shows the Lyman-alpha blob LAB-1. This picture is a composite of two different images taken with the FORS instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope - a wider image showing the surrounding galaxies and a much deeper observation of the blob itself at the center made to detect its polarization. The intense Lyman-alpha ultraviolet radiation from LAB-1 appears green after it has been stretched by the expansion of the Universe during its long journey to Earth. These new observations show for the first time that the light from this object is polarized. This means that the giant ‘blob’ must be powered by galaxies embedded within the cloud. Image credit: M. Hayes / ESO.

Astronomers Unravel Mystery of Gigantic Lyman-Alpha Blobs

Sep 21, 2016 by News Staff

This image shows the Lyman-alpha blob LAB-1. This picture is a composite of two different images taken with the FORS instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope...

This Hubble image shows the barred spiral galaxy Messier 77; the streaks of red and blue in the image highlight pockets of star formation along the pinwheeling arms, with dark dust lanes stretching across the galaxy’s starry center; the galaxy belongs to a class of galaxies known as Seyfert galaxies, which have highly ionized gas surrounding an intensely active center. Image credit: NASA / ESA / A. van der Hoeven.

ALMA Finds Cosmic Fountain at Center of Messier 77

Sep 20, 2016 by News Staff

This Hubble image shows the barred spiral galaxy Messier 77; the streaks of red and blue in the image highlight pockets of star formation along the pinwheeling...

This image captured by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 shows a dust-bathed cluster of fragments receding from the main nucleus of Comet 332P/Ikeya-Murakami at speeds in the range of 0.06 - 3.5 m/s. The nucleus of the comet is the bright object at lower left. This observation was made on January 27, 2016. Image credit: NASA / ESA / D. Jewitt, University of California at Los Angeles.

Hubble Images Reveal 332P/Ikeya-Murakami Disintegrating as It Approaches the Sun

Sep 19, 2016 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured one of the most detailed observations of a comet breaking apart. This image captured by Hubble’s Wide...