Astronomy News

Supernova Remnant SN 1987A Reveals Clues to How Stars are Born

This is an artist's impression of the SN 1987A remnant. The image is based on real data and reveals the cold, inner regions of the remnant, in red, where tremendous amounts of dust were detected and imaged by ALMA. This inner region is contrasted with the outer shell, lacy white and blue circles, where the blast wave from the supernova is colliding with the envelope of gas ejected from the star prior to its powerful detonation. Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / Alexandra Angelich, NRAO / AUI / NSF.
Jul 11, 2017 by News Staff

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), two teams of astronomers have discovered a rich inventory of molecules at the center of supernova 1987A remnant and mapped the location of these molecules to create a high-resolution 3D image of the object. This is an artist’s impression of the SN 1987A remnant. The image is based on real data and reveals the cold, inner regions of the remnant, in red, where tremendous amounts of...

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This image shows the barred spiral galaxy NGC 2500, which lies in the northern constellation of Lynx, about 32 million light-years away. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Hubble Snaps Beautiful Barred Spiral Galaxy Image

Jul 10, 2017 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured a stunning image of the nearby galaxy NGC 2500, also known as LEDA 22525 and IRAS 07581+5052. This image...

The photo of the super-Jupiter HIP 65426b. Image credit: ESO / SPHERE Consortium / G. Chauvin et al.

Astronomers Directly Image Super-Jupiter around HIP 65426

Jul 9, 2017 by Sergio Prostak

Using an adaptive optics system and coronagraphic facility at ESO’s Very Large Telescope, an international team of astronomers has discovered and directly...

This artist’s illustration portrays what the gravitationally lensed galaxy SGAS 1110 might look like up close. A sea of young, blue stars is streaked with dark dust lanes and studded with bright pink patches that mark sites of star formation. SGAS 1110 is one of more than 70 studied as part of the Sloan Giant Arcs Survey, an imaging survey that searched 240 galaxy clusters to find new examples of gravitational lensing. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Z. Levay, STScI.

Hubble Finds Patches of Newborn Stars in Galaxy 11 Billion Light-Years from Earth

Jul 7, 2017 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have captured a detailed image of an extremely distant, gravitationally lensed galaxy they believe...

This image shows the barred spiral galaxy Messier 77, which lies in the constellation Cetus, about 62 million light-years away. Image credit: ESO.

Very Large Telescope Takes Close Look at Messier 77

Jul 7, 2017 by News Staff

ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) has delivered an unrivalled snapshot of the spiral galaxy Messier 77. This image shows the barred spiral galaxy Messier...

False-color near-infrared image of the core of the young massive cluster RCW 38 taken with the adaptive-optics camera NACO on ESO’s Very Large Telescope. RCW 38 lies at a distance of about 5,500 light years from the Sun. The field of view of the central image is approximately 1 arc minute, or 1.5 light-years across. The insets, each spanning about 0.07 light-years on a side, show a subset of the faintest and least massive cluster candidate brown dwarfs (indicated by arrows) of RCW 38 discovered in this new image. Image credit: Muzic et al.

Milky Way Galaxy is Home to At Least 25 Billion Brown Dwarfs

Jul 5, 2017 by News Staff

A new estimate suggests that the Milky Way’s population of brown dwarfs — objects too large to be a planet but too small to be a star — exceeds...

A hypervelocity star leaving the Large Magellanic Cloud. Image credit: NASA / CXC / M.Weiss / Ruth Bazinet, CfA / Sci.News.

Hypervelocity Stars are ‘Runaways’ from Large Magellanic Cloud, Astronomers Say

Jul 5, 2017 by News Staff

Hypervelocity stars — ultrafast stars with speeds up to a few hundred miles per second above the average — were likely ejected from the Large...

This composite, false-color infrared image of Jupiter reveals haze particles over a range of altitudes, as seen in reflected sunlight. It was taken using the Gemini North telescope’s Near-InfraRed Imager (NIRI) on May 18, 2017. The multiple filters corresponding to each color used in the image cover wavelengths between 1.69 microns and 2.275 microns. Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (GRS) appears as the brightest (white) region at these wavelengths, which are primarily sensitive to high-altitude clouds and hazes near and above the top of Jupiter's convective region. The GRS is one of the highest-altitude features in Jupiter’s atmosphere. Narrow spiral streaks that appear to lead into it or out of it from surrounding regions probably represent atmospheric features being stretched by the intense winds within the GRS, such as the hook-like structure on its western edge (left side). Some are being swept off its eastern edge (right side) and into an extensive wave-like flow pattern, and there is even a trace of flow from its northern edge. Other features near the GRS include the dark block and dark oval to the south and the north of the eastern flow pattern, respectively, indicating a lower density of cloud and haze particles in those locations. Both are long-lived cyclonic circulations, rotating clockwise -- in the opposite direction as the counterclockwise rotation of the GRS. A prominent wave pattern is evident north of the equator, along with two bright ovals, which are anticyclones that appeared in January 2017. Both the wave pattern and the ovals may be associated with an impressive upsurge in stormy activity that has been observed in these latitudes this year. Another bright anticyclonic oval is seen further north. High hazes are evident over both polar regions with much spatial structure not previously been seen quite so clearly in ground-based images. Image credit: Gemini Observatory / AURA / NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Infrared Images of Jupiter from Subaru and Gemini Telescopes to Enhance Juno Flyby

Jul 4, 2017 by News Staff

High-resolution imaging of Jupiter and its Great Red Spot by the Subaru Telescope and the Gemini North telescope, both on Hawaii’s Mauna Kea peak, is...

Ground-Based Telescope Detects Methanol at Saturn’s Moon Enceladus

Jul 3, 2017 by News Staff

Using the IRAM radio telescope, astronomers have observed an extended gas cloud around Saturn’s moon Enceladus and detected the signature of the organic...

In this image, Hubble has captured the brilliance of the spiral galaxy IC 342. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Hubble Space Telescope Sees ‘Hidden Galaxy’

Jul 3, 2017 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured this vivid image of the spiral galaxy IC 342. In this image, Hubble has captured the brilliance of the...

Artist’s conception of an exoplanet’s atmosphere being stripped by the radiation from its parent star. Image credit: Mark A. Garlick / University of Warwick.

Atmosphere Stripping May Limit Habitability of Extrasolar Planets

Jul 2, 2017 by News Staff

Huge coronal mass ejections (CMEs) on the Sun produce extreme space weather effects at Earth. Models of solar CMEs have now been applied to M-dwarf and...

Artist’s impression of two hypervelocity stars speeding from the center of the Milky Way to its outskirts. Image credit: ESA / CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.

ESA’s Gaia Satellite Spots Six Hypervelocity Stars

Jul 2, 2017 by News Staff

With the help of an artificial neural network, ESA’s Gaia satellite spotted six hypervelocity stars — stars whose velocity in the rest frame of...

This artist’s conception shows two supermassive black holes, similar to those observed by Bansal et al, orbiting one another more than 750 million light years from Earth. Image credit: Josh Valenzuela, University of New Mexico.

First Detection of Orbital Motion in Supermassive Black Hole Binary

Jun 29, 2017 by News Staff

For the first time ever, astronomers have been able to observe and measure the orbital motion between two supermassive black holes — a discovery...

The protostar FIR 3 with outflow that may have triggered the formation of the younger protostar FIR 4. Pullouts are individual VLA images of each protostar. Image credit: Osorio et al / NRAO / AUI / NSF.

Protostar May Have Triggered Formation of Another, Younger Star

Jun 28, 2017 by News Staff

Astronomers using NSF’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) have found new evidence suggesting that a jet of fast-moving material ejected from an intermediate-mass...

This image from ALMA shows the M2 spectral-type supergiant star Betelgeuse. Image credit: ALMA / ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / E. O’Gorman / P. Kervella.

ALMA Analyzes Atmosphere of Supergiant Star Betelgeuse

Jun 28, 2017 by Sergio Prostak

Astronomers have used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to observe the nearby supergiant star Betelgeuse. Beyond just delivering...

This image shows the galaxy 2XMM J143450.5+033843, which lies in the constellation Virgo, some 400 million light-years away. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Hubble Sees Distant Seyfert Galaxy

Jun 26, 2017 by Enrico de Lazaro

NASA has released a beautiful photo taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope of 2XMM J143450.5+033843, a galaxy that lurks within the Virgo constellation...

A view of the limb of the Sun. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio.

Researchers Uncover Origins of Solar Spicules

Jun 26, 2017 by News Staff

A team of solar physicists from the Bay Area Environmental Research Institute, University of Oslo and Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory...

This artist’s concept shows what the young, ‘dead,’ disk galaxy MACS 2129-1 (right) would look like when compared with our Milky Way Galaxy (left). Although three times as massive as the Milky Way, it is only half the size. MACS 2129-1 is also spinning more than twice as fast as the Milky Way. Note that regions of the Milky Way are blue from bursts of star formation, while MACS 2129-1 is yellow, signifying an older star population and no new star birth. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Z. Levy, STScI.

Hubble Spots Massive, ‘Dead’ Disk Galaxy in Early Universe

Jun 23, 2017 by News Staff

Using a powerful astronomical technique called gravitational lensing, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope made a stunning discovery — the first example...

A planetary mass object the size of Mars would be sufficient to produce the observed perturbations in the distant Kuiper Belt. Image credit: Heather Roper / Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, University of Arizona.

Mars-to-Earth-Mass Planet May Lurk in Outer Solar System: Planet 10

Jun 22, 2017 by News Staff

An unknown Mars-to-Earth-mass planet may lurk in the outer reaches of the Solar System, according to new research on the orbits of minor planets to be...

The Milky Way Galaxy has a strong preference for two types of planets: rocky planets up to 1.75 times the size of Earth, and gas-enshrouded mini-Neptunes, which are from 2 to 3.5 times the size of Earth. Our Galaxy rarely makes planets with sizes in between these two groups. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Small Exoplanets Come in Two Sizes: Rocky ‘Earths’ and Mini-Neptunes

Jun 20, 2017 by News Staff

Astronomers have classified extrasolar planets in the same way that biologists identify new species and have learned that the majority of planets found...

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