Universe Today (Page 388)

It Looks Like LIGO/Virgo Have Detected a Black Hole Eating a Neutron Star. For the First Time Ever A new signal detected by LIGO/Virgo may be the so-called ‘holy grail’ of astrophysics: the merger of a neutron star and a black hole. They’ve discovered pairs of black holes merging, and pairs of neutron stars merging, but until now, not a neutron star-black hole pair. “I think we’re opening a window on the universe.” … Continue reading “It Looks Like LIGO/Virgo Have Detected a Black Hole Eating a Neutron Star. For the First Time Ever” The post It Looks Like LIGO/Virgo Have Detected a Black HoleRead More →

Keep an Eye Out for the Eta Aquarid Meteors This Weekend Never heard of the Eta Aquarid meteors? 2019 offers a good chance to check out this normally obscure meteor shower. 2019: The Prospects This year offers an especially good chance to spy these fast-moving meteors. First off, the peak for this shower arrives on the morning of Monday, May 6th less than 40 hours after … Continue reading “Keep an Eye Out for the Eta Aquarid Meteors This Weekend” The post Keep an Eye Out for the Eta Aquarid Meteors This Weekend appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a Hypothetical Asteroid Impact. You Can Watch it all Unfold Online. Remember when Orson Welles’ 1938 radio show called “The War of the Worlds” fooled people into thinking that Earth was actually being invaded? That was fun. Now, the ESA (European Space Agency) is tempting fate by live-tweeting the hypothetical approach of the hypothetical asteroid 2019PDC and hypothetically planning a hypothetical response to this hypothetically destructive … Continue reading “The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a Hypothetical Asteroid Impact. You Can Watch it all Unfold Online.” The post The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a HypotheticalRead More →

Weekly Space Hangout: May 1, 2019 – Dr. Mark Showalter of SETI Hosts: Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain) Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier ) Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org) Dr. Paul M. Sutter (pmsutter.com / @PaulMattSutter) Dr. Mark Showalter, Senior Research Scientist and Fellow at the SETI Institute, is one of four Planetary Scientists who, in 2013, discovered a tiny, mysterious moon around … Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout: May 1, 2019 – Dr. Mark Showalter of SETI” The post Weekly Space Hangout: May 1, 2019 – Dr. Mark Showalter of SETI appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go toRead More →

A Strange Ice Feature Wraps Halfway Around Titan For people interested in all things beyond Earth, the words methane and Titan go hand in hand. After all, Titan is the only other world in our Solar System where liquid flows over the surface. While trying to understand Titan’s methane cycle, scientists have discovered something else: a bizarre methane ice feature that wraps halfway … Continue reading “A Strange Ice Feature Wraps Halfway Around Titan” The post A Strange Ice Feature Wraps Halfway Around Titan appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Rapidly Spinning Black Hole is Spitting Out Blobs of Plasma Black holes, those beguiling singularities that sit on the precipice of the known and the unknown, keep surprising us with their behaviour. As organizations like the Event Horizon Telescope have made clear, there’s a lot we don’t know about the holes, and worse than that, we don’t even know how much we don’t know. Now … Continue reading “Rapidly Spinning Black Hole is Spitting Out Blobs of Plasma” The post Rapidly Spinning Black Hole is Spitting Out Blobs of Plasma appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Friday’s SpaceX Dragon Launch CRS-17 to Light Up the U.S. East Coast Ever seen a rocket launch before? Catching one is easier than you might think. You just need to be looking in the right direction at the right time, and have clear skies. If you happen to be watching from the U.S. south eastern seaboard, you just might catch the spectacular dawn launch of a SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket with Dragon on the CRS-17 (also known as SpX-17) mission headed to the International Space Station before dawn on the morning of Wednesday, May 1st. The post Friday’s SpaceX Dragon Launch CRS-17 to Light Up theRead More →

Carnival of Space #609 Welcome to the 609th Carnival of Space! The Carnival is a community of space science and astronomy writers and bloggers, who submit their best work each week for your benefit. We have a fantastic roundup today so now, on to this week’s worth of stories! Universe Today: The World’s Biggest Aircraft – the Rocket-Launching Stratolaunch … Continue reading “Carnival of Space #609” The post Carnival of Space #609 appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Messier 84 – the NGC Elliptical Galaxy Welcome back to Messier Monday! Today, we continue in our tribute to our dear friend, Tammy Plotner, by looking at the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy – also known as Messier 83! During the 18th century, famed French astronomer Charles Messier noticed the presence of several “nebulous objects”  while surveying the night sky. Originally mistaking these objects … Continue reading “Messier 84 – the NGC Elliptical Galaxy” The post Messier 84 – the NGC Elliptical Galaxy appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Here’s the Video of Hayabusa2 Bombing Asteroid Ryugu Japan’s recently shared a video of the crater their Hayabusa2 spacecraft created on the surface of Ryugu. The post Here’s the Video of Hayabusa2 Bombing Asteroid Ryugu appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

InSight Just Detected its First “Marsquake” The InSight lander recently detected the strongest seismic signal yet, thanks to its Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) instrument. The post InSight Just Detected its First “Marsquake” appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

As Expected, the Newly Upgraded LIGO is Finding a Black Hole Merger Every Week The LIGO detector is back online after months of upgrades, and has made two new detections already! The post As Expected, the Newly Upgraded LIGO is Finding a Black Hole Merger Every Week appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Astronomers Catch a Superflare From a Puny Star Astronomers recently spied a massive flare on a tiny diminutive star, a powerful, radiation spewing event that you wouldn’t want to witness up close. The post Astronomers Catch a Superflare From a Puny Star appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Weekly Space Hangout: Apr 24, 2019 – Nathaniel Putzig and Gareth Morgan of the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) Sounder Team on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) Hosts: Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain) Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier ) Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org) Dr. Paul M. Sutter (pmsutter.com / @PaulMattSutter) Dr. Nathaniel Putzig (Than) is a Senior Scientist with the Planetary Science Institute (PSI), and he serves as the US Team Leader for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter … Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout: Apr 24, 2019 – Nathaniel Putzig and Gareth Morgan of the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) Sounder Team on the MarsRead More →

Astronomers Think a Meteor Came from Outside the Solar System When ‘Oumuamua was first detected on October 19th, 2017, astronomers were understandably confused about the nature of this strange object. Initially thought to be an interstellar comet, it was then designated as an interstellar asteroid. But when it picked up velocity as it departed our Solar System (a very comet-like thing to do), scientists could … Continue reading “Astronomers Think a Meteor Came from Outside the Solar System” The post Astronomers Think a Meteor Came from Outside the Solar System appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Barfing Neutron Stars Reveal Their Inner Guts We don’t really understand neutron stars. Oh, we know that they are – they’re the leftover remnants of some of the most massive stars in the universe – but revealing their inner workings is a little bit tricky, because the physics keeping them alive is only poorly understood. But every once in a while two … Continue reading “Barfing Neutron Stars Reveal Their Inner Guts” The post Barfing Neutron Stars Reveal Their Inner Guts appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

You Could Travel Through a Wormhole, but it’s Slower Than Going Through Space A new study reveals that traveling through a wormhole may actually be possible, but don’t count on it saving you any time! The post You Could Travel Through a Wormhole, but it’s Slower Than Going Through Space appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Ep. 527: Ancient Astronomy of the American Southwest Ancient peoples had no light pollution, and they knew the night skies very well. In fact, they depends on them to know when to plant and when to harvest. Today Pamela talks about the archeoastronomical sites of the American Southwest. We usually record Astronomy Cast every Friday at 3:00 pm EST / 12:00 pm PST … Continue reading “Ep. 527: Ancient Astronomy of the American Southwest” The post Ep. 527: Ancient Astronomy of the American Southwest appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Carnival of Space #608 It’s that time again! This week’s Carnival of Space is hosted by Pamela Hoffman at the Everyday Spacer blog. Click here to read Carnival of Space #608. And if you’re interested in looking back, here’s an archive to all the past Carnivals of Space. If you’ve got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. … Continue reading “Carnival of Space #608” The post Carnival of Space #608 appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

What Will the James Webb Space Telescope See? A Whole Bunch of Dust, That’s What When it comes to the first galaxies, the James Webb Space Telescope will attempt to understand the formation of those galaxies and their link to the underlying dark matter. In case you didn’t know, most of the matter in our universe is invisible (a.k.a. “dark”), but its gravity binds everything together, including galaxies. So by … Continue reading “What Will the James Webb Space Telescope See? A Whole Bunch of Dust, That’s What” The post What Will the James Webb Space Telescope See? A Whole Bunch of Dust, That’s WhatRead More →