Astronomers are back in the dark about what dark matter might be, after new observations showed the mysterious substance may not be interacting with forces other than gravity after all. Dr Andrew Robertson of Durham University will today (Friday 6 April) present the new results at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science in Liverpool. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
The Most Distant Star Ever Seen, Only 4.4 Billion Years After the Big Bang In 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope was placed into Low Earth Orbit. Since then, Hubble has gone on to become the most well-known space observatory and has revealed some never-before-seen things about our Universe. Despite the subsequent deployment of several flagship telescopes – like the Kepler Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Spitzer Space Telescope – Hubble is still accomplishing some amazing feats. For instance, a team of astronomers recently used Hubble to locate the most distant star ever discovered. This hot blue star, which was located in aRead More →
Dead Star Circled by Light New images from ESO’s Very Large Telescope in Chile and other telescopes reveal a rich landscape of stars and glowing clouds of gas in one of our closest neighbouring galaxies, the Small Magellanic Cloud. The pictures have allowed astronomers to identify an elusive stellar corpse buried among filaments of gas left behind by a 2000-year-old supernova explosion. The MUSE instrument was used to establish where this elusive object is hiding, and existing Chandra X-ray Observatory data confirmed its identity as an isolated neutron star. ESO News Feed Go to Source Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Work by Cardiff University astronomers suggests there may be a cosmic lack of a chemical element essential to life. Dr. Jane Greaves and Dr. Phil Cigan will present their results at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science in Liverpool. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
NASA Simulates Their Orion Abort System. Now That Would be a Crazy Ride When it comes time for NASA to send astronauts back to the Moon and on to Mars, a number of new spacecraft systems will come into play. These include the Space Launch System (SLS), the most powerful rocket ever built, and the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) – a next-generation spacecraft that will carry crews beyond Low Earth Orbit (LEO). Naturally, before either of these systems can conduct missions, extensive testing needs to be conducted to ensure they are safe and will perform well. In this spirit, NASA Advanced Supercomputing (NAS) researchRead More →
Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have for the first time precisely measured the distance to one of the oldest objects in the universe, a collection of stars born shortly after the big bang. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Simulated View of a Newly Forming Planetary System with Rings and Gaps When searching for extra-solar planets, astronomers most often rely on a number of indirect techniques. Of these, the Transit Method (aka. Transit Photometry) and the Radial Velocity Method (aka. Doppler Spectroscopy) are the two most effective and reliable (especially when used in combination). Unfortunately, direct imaging is rare since it is very difficult to spot a faint exoplanet amidst the glare of its host star. However, improvements in radio interferometers and near-infrared imaging has allowed astronomers to image protoplanetary discs and infer the orbits of exoplanets. Using this method, an international team ofRead More →
Weekly Space Hangout: April 4, 2018: Mathew Anderson’s “Habitable Exoplanets” Hosts: Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain) Dr. Paul M. Sutter (pmsutter.com / @PaulMattSutter) Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier ) Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org) Special Guests: Mathew Anderson, author and good friend of the Weekly Space Hangout, joins us again this week to discuss his newest book, Habitable Exoplanets: Red Dwarf Systems Like TRAPPIST-1, in which he focuses on exoplanet properties and the chances for habitable planets around Red Dwarf stars. As he did with his two prior books, Our Cosmic Story and its followup Is Anyone Out There, Mathew willRead More →
A Columbia University-led team of astrophysicists has discovered a dozen black holes gathered around Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), the supermassive black hole in the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. The finding is the first to support a decades-old prediction, opening up myriad opportunities to better understand the universe. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Chemical models developed to help limit the emission of pollutants by car engines are being used to study the atmospheres of hot exoplanets orbiting close to their stars. The results of a collaboration between French astronomers and applied combustion experts will be presented by Dr Oliva Venot and Dr Eric Hébrard at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science (EWASS) 2018 in Liverpool. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
In a new study published today in the Astrophysical Journal, researchers from New York University Abu Dhabi and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, CA, share new findings about how the presence of “giant” planets (between 10 and 1000 times as large as the Earth) affects potentially habitable neighbors that would be discovered with the next generation of ground-based and space-borne telescopes. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Using microlensing method, an international team of astronomers has detected a new “super-Earth” alien world circling a low-mass star about five times less massive than our sun. The finding is detailed in a paper published March 28 on the arXiv pre-print repository. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Astronomers today announce one of the largest 3D maps of the infant Universe, in a presentation at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science in Liverpool. A team led by Dr David Sobral of Lancaster University made the chart using the Subaru telescope in Hawaii and the Isaac Newton telescope in the Canary Islands. Looking back in time to 16 different epochs between 11 and 13 billion years ago, the researchers discovered almost 4000 early galaxies, many of which will have evolved into galaxies like our own Milky Way. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Developments in artificial intelligence may help us to predict the probability of life on other planets, according to new work by a team based at Plymouth University. The study uses artificial neural networks (ANNs) to classify planets into five types, estimating a probability of life in each case, which could be used in future interstellar exploration missions. The work is presented at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science (EWASS) in Liverpool on 4 April by Mr Christopher Bishop. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
A study of the evolution of magnetic fields inside neutron stars shows that instabilities can create intense magnetic hot spots that survive for millions of years, even after the star’s overall magnetic field has decayed significantly. The results will be presented by Dr Konstantinos Gourgouliatos of Durham University at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science (EWASS) in Liverpool on Wednesday, 4th April. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
A gigantic and resilient “cold front” hurtling through the Perseus galaxy cluster has been studied using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. This cosmic weather system spans about two million light years and has been traveling for over 5 billion years, longer than the existence of our Solar System. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Tiangong-1 Splashes Down in the Pacific Ocean Over the weekend, multiple space agencies’ had their instruments fixed on the skies as they waited for the Tiangong-1 space station to reenter our atmosphere. For the sake of tracking the station’s reentry, the ESA hosted the 2018 Inter Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee, an annual exercise that consists of experts from 13 space agencies taking part in a joint tracking exercise. And on April 2nd, 02:16 CEST (April 1st, 17:16 PST), the US Air Force confirmed the reentry of the Tiangong-1 over the Pacific Ocean. As hoped, the station crashed down close to the South Pacific OceanRead More →
Did You Know That a Satellite Crashes Back to Earth About Once a Week, on Average? This past weekend, a lot of attention was focused on the Tiangong-1 space station. For some time, space agencies and satellite trackers from around the world had been predicting when this station would fall to Earth. And now that it has safely landed in the Pacific Ocean, many people are breathing a sigh of relief. While there was very little chance that any debris would fall to Earth, the mere possibility that some might caused its share of anxiety. Interestingly enough, concerns about how and when Tiangong-1 would fallRead More →
An international team of researchers has imaged newly forming jets of plasma from a massive black hole with unprecedented accuracy. Radio images made with a combination of telescopes in space and on the ground resolved the jet structure a couple of hundred black hole radii, or 12 light days from its origin point. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
Astronomers are detecting a mysterious, powerful form of radiation blipping across space, and nobody’s quite sure why. Powered by WPeMaticoRead More →
