On Wednesday, December 7, skywatchers around the world were treated to a celestial spectacle as the full moon eclipsed Mars in the night sky. The rare event, known as a lunar occultation, refers to one celestial body – in this case Mars – appearing to disappear or hiding behind another – in this case the …
Rare full moon Mars eclipse impresses astronomers with occultation (video) Read More »
Enlarge / Artist’s impression of GRB 211211A. The kilonova and gamma burst is on the right. Aaron M. Geller/Northwestern/CIERA A year ago, astronomers discovered a powerful gamma-ray burst (GRB) lasting nearly two minutes, dubbed GRB 211211A. Now, this unusual event upends the long-held assumption that longer GRBs are the distinctive signature of a massive stellar …
New kilonova causes astronomers to rethink what we know about gamma-ray bursts Read More »
humanity is improve a planetary defense – at least against external threats from outer space, as long as they’re just dumb rocks that follow the laws of physics. And a group of extraordinary humans proved it last week when the planetary defense community stepped in to accurately track and predict exactly where a relatively small …
Astronomers spot a small incoming asteroid and make a big breakthrough Read More »
Earlier this year, astronomers found an absolute monster of a galaxy. Hidden some 3 billion light-years away, Alcyoneus is a giant radio galaxy reaching 5 megaparsecs in space. It’s 16.3 million light-years long, and it is the largest known structure of galactic origin. This discovery sheds light on our poor understanding of these colossi and …
Astronomers spot the largest galaxy ever, and the scale will break your brain Read More »
It was an event not seen in over a decade: a sudden burst of energy launched from the center of a distant galaxy, bright enough to be visible 8.5 billion light-years away. . With a burst of light equivalent to more than 1,000 trillion suns, the flash was first detected by the Zwicky Transient Facility, …
A black hole tore apart a star and brought together astronomers from around the world Read More »
Enlarge / Illustration of a spaghetti star as it is sucked into a supermassive black hole during a tidal disturbance event (TDE). ESO/M. Cereal fairs Earlier this year, astronomers picked up an unusually bright signal in the X-ray, optical and radio regimes, dubbed AT 2022cmc. They have now determined that the most likely source of …
Astronomers capture black hole engulfing star in ‘hyper-feeding frenzy’ Read More »
NASA captures a ‘smiling’ sun NASA has shared a video taken by its Solar Dynamic Observatory showing dark spots on the sun, giving the illusion of a smile. (Credit: @NASASun/Twitter) A group of astronomers talk about the impact of a large satellite designed to connect directly to mobile phones. In a statement on Monday, the …
Huge satellite eclipses stars, confusing astronomers Read More »
Step out of the Milky Way for a moment and you might notice that the luminous disk of stars we call home has a strange distortion. Now, it looks like the rest of our galaxy is a little off as well. A new map of stars above and below the galactic plane shows that its …
The Milky Way’s star halo isn’t the neat sphere astronomers expected Read More »
An “overweight” neutron star has been observed by astronomers, who say the mysterious object confuses astronomical theories. The hypermassive star was produced by the merger of two smaller neutron stars. Normally, such collisions result in neutron stars so massive that they almost instantly collapse into a black hole under their own gravity. But the latest …
‘Overweight’ neutron star challenges black hole theory, astronomers say Read More »
Artist’s impression of ancient white dwarfs WDJ2147-4035 and WDJ1922+0233 surrounded by orbiting planetary debris, which will accumulate on stars and pollute their atmospheres. WDJ2147-4035 is extremely red and dark, while WDJ1922+0233 is exceptionally blue. Credit: University of Warwick/Dr. Marc Garlic New study gives age of fainting white dwarf A white dwarf star is the remnant …
