Astronomy News

Super Spirals Spin Faster Than Expected, Astronomers Say

The top row of this mosaic features Hubble images of three spiral galaxies, each of which weighs several times as much as the Milky Way. The bottom row shows three even more massive spiral galaxies that qualify as super spirals, which were observed by the ground-based Sloan Digital Sky Survey. The galaxy at lower right, 2MFGC 08638, is the most massive super spiral known to date, with a dark matter halo weighing at least 40 trillion Suns. Image credit: NASA / ESA / P. Ogle & J. DePasquale, STScI / SDSS.
Oct 18, 2019 by News Staff

Super spirals are the most massive star-forming disk galaxies in the Universe. They are much larger, brighter, and more massive than our own Milky Way Galaxy. Dr. Patrick Ogle of the Space Telescope Science Institute and his colleagues have found that these enormous galaxies spin faster than expected for their mass, at speeds up to 350 miles per second (570 km/sec); for comparison, the Milky Way — an average spiral galaxy — spins at a...

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This artist’s rendering shows a white dwarf star with two planets. Image credit: Mark Garlick.

Rocky Exoplanets Often Have Earth- and Mars-Like Internal Properties

Oct 18, 2019 by News Staff

White dwarfs are dense, burned-out remnants of normal stars. Due to their strong gravitational pull, surface atmospheres of these ancient objects should...

An artist’s impression of gas flowing like a waterfall into a protoplanetary disk gap, which is most likely caused by an infant planet. Image credit: NRAO / AUI / NSF / S. Dagnello.

ALMA Finds Gas Waterfalls in Planet-Forming Disk around HD 163296

Oct 18, 2019 by News Staff

At three locations in the protoplanetary disk around HD 163296, a young star located approximately 400 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius,...

An artist’s impression of the center of the barred spiral galaxy Messier 77. ALMA discovered two counter-rotating flows of gas around the black hole. The colors in this image represent the motion of the gas: blue is material moving toward us, red is moving away. Image credit: NRAO / AUI / NSF / S. Dagnello.

ALMA Spots Counter-Rotating Disks around Supermassive Black Hole in Messier 77

Oct 17, 2019 by News Staff

Supermassive black holes, millions to billions of times the mass of our Sun, are found at the centers of galaxies. Many of these enormous objects are hidden...

On October 12, 2019, Hubble observed the interstellar comet 2I/Borisov at a distance of approximately 261 million miles from Earth. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / D. Jewitt, University of California, Los Angeles.

Hubble Captures Sharpest Image Yet of Interstellar Comet 2I/Borisov

Oct 16, 2019 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured an amazing new photo of 2I/Borisov, the first known interstellar comet ever identified. On October 12,...

False-color and X-ray images of the giant arc in SPT-CLJ2344-4243: the X-ray-emitting giant arc is shown relative to the center of the foreground lensing galaxy cluster in a false-color image at optical wavelengths; the inset shows Chandra X-ray (left) and Hubble optical (right) images of the giant arc at a scale 1.5 times larger; the optical colors here are given by Hubble imaging data in the F850LP (red), F775W (green) and F475W (blue) filters; two magenta circles indicate the locations of the X-ray emission from the giant arc in both inset panels; the lensing geometry of the giant arc is a pair of merging images, where the lower and upper halves of the arc are each a single image with mirror symmetry. Image credit: Bayliss et al, doi: 10.1038/s41550-019-0888-7.

Phoenix Cluster’s Gravity Magnifies X-Rays from Extremely Distant Star-Forming Galaxy

Oct 15, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers have used a huge group of galaxies called the Phoenix cluster as a cosmic magnifying glass to detect X-ray emission from a very distant dwarf...

Dwarf galaxies hosting active galactic nuclei that have spatially extended outflows. Image credit: Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

Black Hole-Driven Winds Suppress Star Formation in Dwarf Galaxies

Oct 14, 2019 by News Staff

Supermassive black hole-driven outflows in dwarf galaxies have a significant impact on the evolution of these galaxies by suppressing star formation, according...

This image from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope shows the yellow hypergiant HR 5271A. Image credit: A. Lobel / NASA / Spitzer Space Telescope / IRAC.

Study Sheds New Light on Evolution of Yellow Hypergiants

Oct 14, 2019 by News Staff

In a study published this month in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, astronomers analyzed the properties of four yellow hypergiant stars, including...

This Hubble image reveals a detailed view of part of the disk of the spiral galaxy NGC 4380. The image is made up of observations from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) in the infrared and optical parts of the spectrum. It is based on data obtained through three filters. The color results from assigning different hues to each monochromatic image associated with an individual filter. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / P. Erwin.

Hubble Captures Detailed Image of NGC 4380

Oct 14, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has produced a spectacularly detailed image of a galaxy called NGC 4380. This Hubble image reveals a detailed view...

This composite image, obtained by the Gemini North Multi-Object Spectrograph on the 8.2-m Gemini North telescope, shows the interstellar comet C/2019 Q4. Image credit: Gemini Observatory / NSF / AURA / Travis Rector.

Diatomic Carbon Detected in Interstellar Comet 2I/Borisov

Oct 13, 2019 by Sergio Prostak

Astronomers have detected the emission from the small carbon chains C2 in the coma of 2I/Borisov, the first known interstellar comet to visit our Solar...

Milky Way Captured Few Dwarf Galaxies from Nearby Large Magellanic Cloud

Oct 11, 2019 by News Staff

Our Milky Way Galaxy is orbited by more than 50 companion galaxies. According to new research led by University of California, Riverside astronomers, several...

This illustration envisions the Milky Way Galaxy’s gas recycling above and below its stellar disk. Image credit: NASA / ESA / D. Player, STScI.

Milky Way Galaxy Accretes More Gas Than Expected

Oct 11, 2019 by News Staff

Using data gathered by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have calculated the mass inflow and outflow rates of cool ionized gas around our...

This image shows the Oort cloud comet C/2016 R2 (PANSTARRS). Image credit: ESO / SPECULOOS Team / E. Jehin.

ESO Releases Beautiful New Image of Comet C/2016 R2

Oct 9, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

The European Southern Observatory (ESO) has released an incredibly beautiful image of an Oort cloud comet called C/2016 R2 (PANSTARRS). The image was captured...

An artist’s conception of the 20 newly-discovered Saturnian moons. Image credit: Carnegie Institution for Science.

Astronomers Discover Twenty New Saturnian Moons and You Can Help Name Them

Oct 8, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii have found 20 new moons orbiting Saturn. The discovery brings the total number of known Saturnian moons...

An artist’s impression of a Jupiter-like exoplanet and a cool red dwarf. Image credit: CARMENES / RenderArea / J. Bollain / C. Gallego.

Massive Gas Giant in Orbit around Red Dwarf Challenges Current Models of Planet Formation

Oct 8, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers have discovered a massive exoplanet orbiting Gliese 3512 (GJ 3512), an M-dwarf star (red dwarf) located 31 light-years away. Dubbed Gliese...

An artist’s impression of the massive bursts of ionizing radiation exploding from the center of the Milky Way and impacting the Magellanic Stream. Image credit: James Josephides / ASTRO 3D.

Highly Energetic Explosion Occurred in Milky Way’s Center 3.5 Million Years Ago

Oct 7, 2019 by News Staff

About 3.5 million years ago, a Seyfert flare from Sagittarius A*, a supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way Galaxy, created two enormous...

An artist’s impression of TOI-503b and its star. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

TESS Discovers Its First Brown Dwarf

Oct 7, 2019 by Natali Anderson

Astronomers using NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) have discovered an intermediate-mass brown dwarf orbiting a young star about 841...

This Hubble image shows the edge-on spiral galaxy NGC 3717. The image is made up of observations from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) in the infrared and optical parts of the spectrum. Two filters were used to sample various wavelengths. The color results from assigning different hues to each monochromatic image associated with an individual filter. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / D. Rosario.

Hubble Spots Edge-On Spiral Galaxy

Oct 7, 2019 by Enrico de Lazaro

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has produced a beautiful image of the spiral galaxy NGC 3717. This Hubble image shows the edge-on spiral galaxy NGC...

Andromeda Galaxy Swallowed Many Dwarf Galaxies During Its Lifetime

Oct 5, 2019 by News Staff

An analysis of data from the Pan-Andromeda Archaeological Survey (PAndAS) has uncovered two major episodes of accretion, probably separated by billions...

This ALMA image shows the binary protostar [BHB2007] 11. Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / Alves et al.

Double Protostar Caught in Process of Forming

Oct 4, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have captured a stunning image of two circumstellar disks in which two protostars...

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