https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. The most massive stars in the universe are destined to explode as brilliant supernova before collapsing into black holes. Yet one huge star appears to have never fulfilled its destiny; in a twist of irony, the star wandered too close to a gargantuan black hole, which gobbled it up, shredding the star to bits and pieces. https://phys.org/news/2025-11-unprecedented-black-hole-flare-billion.html Astronomy Tue, 04 Nov 2025 11:40:06 EST news681478238 Why has silicon, one of the most common elements in the universe, gone largely undetected in the atmospheres of Jupiter, Saturn, and gas planets like them orbiting other stars? A new study using observations from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope sheds light on this question by focusing on a peculiar object that astronomers discovered by chance in 2020 and called "The Accident." https://phys.org/news/2025-09-cosmic-accident-jupitersaturn-silicon-puzzle.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 09 Sep 2025 13:08:04 EDT news676642082 Astronomers from Seoul National University, South Korea and elsewhere report the detection of 62 new luminous quasars as part of the All-sky BRIght, Complete Quasar Survey (AllBRICQS). The discovery was detailed in a research paper published August 8 on the arXiv preprint server. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-astronomers-dozens-luminous-quasars.html Astronomy Tue, 19 Aug 2025 08:30:01 EDT news674750781 Using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and the Gemini Observatory, European astronomers have observed a nearby cold brown dwarf known as WISE 1738. Results of the observational campaign, published July 16 on the arXiv preprint server, deliver important insights into the physical properties and atmospheric chemistry of this object. https://phys.org/news/2025-07-reveal-properties-nearby-cold-brown.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 23 Jul 2025 08:00:03 EDT news672458313 NASA's newest astrophysics space telescope launched in March on a mission to create an all-sky map of the universe. Now settled into low-Earth orbit, SPHEREx (Spectro-Photometer for the History of the universe, Epoch of Reionization, and Ices Explorer) has begun delivering its sky survey data to a public archive on a weekly basis, allowing anyone to use the data to probe the secrets of the cosmos. https://phys.org/news/2025-07-nasa-spherex-mission-sky-world.html Astronomy Thu, 03 Jul 2025 13:03:04 EDT news670766579 A recent breakthrough by researchers led by Prof. Li Jiayang from the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology (IGDB) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences offers new hope in the battle against parasitic weeds that cause global agricultural losses exceeding $10 billion annually. https://phys.org/news/2025-02-scientists-key-gene-critical-parasitic.html Molecular & Computational biology Mon, 17 Feb 2025 17:07:03 EST news659034421 In the years following the launch of NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have tallied over 1 trillion galaxies in the universe. But only one galaxy stands out as the most important nearby stellar island to our Milky Way—the magnificent Andromeda galaxy (Messier 31). It can be seen with the naked eye on a very clear autumn night as a faint cigar-shaped object roughly the apparent angular diameter of our moon. https://phys.org/news/2025-01-panorama-andromeda-galaxy-unveils-hundreds.html Astronomy Thu, 16 Jan 2025 16:19:43 EST news656266778 While NASA's NEOWISE telescope ended its journey through space on Nov. 1, 2024, the team at IPAC, a science center at Caltech, was working on one further gift from the prolific mission. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-undiscovered-images-nasa-neowise.html Astronomy Tue, 26 Nov 2024 14:43:58 EST news651854633 To take a census of nearby cosmic objects, sending out a survey won't work. Scientists need to use many telescopes with different specializations to chart what is in the general neighborhood of the sun. https://phys.org/news/2024-04-solar-neighborhood-census-nasa-citizen.html Astronomy Tue, 16 Apr 2024 11:27:04 EDT news632485622 By analyzing the data from the SPICY catalog and from NASA's WISE spacecraft, an international team of astronomers has discovered four new eruptive young stellar objects (YSOs). The finding was presented in a research paper published in the December issue of the Journal of the Korean Astronomical Society (JKAS). https://phys.org/news/2023-12-eruptive-young-stellar.html Astronomy Thu, 07 Dec 2023 08:45:15 EST news621161110 Showers in bathrooms bring us comfort; showers from space bring astrophysicists joy. Osaka Metropolitan University scientists have observed, with their novel method, cosmic-ray extensive air showers with unprecedented precision, opening the door to new insights into the universe's most energetic particles. When a high energy cosmic ray collides with the Earth's atmosphere, it generates an enormous number of particles known as an extensive air shower. https://phys.org/news/2023-10-lens-universe-energetic-particles.html Astronomy Thu, 12 Oct 2023 09:57:03 EDT news616323421 An international team of astronomers reports the detection of a new, hot-dust-obscured galaxy (DOG). The galaxy, which received designation WISE J190445.04+485308.9, was found at a relatively low redshift of 0.415, which makes it the first confirmed low-redshift hot DOG. The discovery was presented in a paper published May 23 on the arXiv preprint server. https://phys.org/news/2023-06-hot-dog-sky-astronomers-hot-dust-obscured.html Astronomy Thu, 01 Jun 2023 09:29:28 EDT news604830562 Asteroids sharing their orbits with the planet Neptune have been observed to exist in a broad spectrum of red color, implying the existence of two populations of asteroids in the region, according to a new study by an international team of researchers. The research is published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters. https://phys.org/news/2023-03-redness-neptunian-asteroids-early-solar.html Astronomy Tue, 28 Mar 2023 12:51:30 EDT news599226688 Chinese scientists have identified a key gene involved in crop alkaline tolerance that may greatly improve crop yield in sodic environments through the use of genetic engineering. https://phys.org/news/2023-03-gene-discovery-alkaline-tolerance-crops.html Molecular & Computational biology Thu, 23 Mar 2023 14:00:02 EDT news598785923 Using the Subaru telescope, an international team of astronomers have performed deep multi-band photometric observations of a dwarf irregular galaxy known as NGC 6822. Results of the observational campaign, presented May 30 on arXiv.org, deliver important insights into stellar populations of this galaxy. https://phys.org/news/2022-06-stellar-populations-ngc.html Astronomy Wed, 08 Jun 2022 09:10:05 EDT news573897150 A team of astronomers, led by Arizona State University undergraduate student Emma Softich, has discovered a rare pair of brown dwarfs that has the widest separation of any brown dwarf binary system found to date. https://phys.org/news/2022-01-team-astronomers-widest-brown-dwarf.html Astronomy Thu, 13 Jan 2022 16:53:39 EST news561315213 Clustered at the center of this image are six luminous spots of light, four of them forming a circle around a central pair. Appearances can be deceiving, however, as this formation is not composed of six individual galaxies, but only three: to be precise, a pair of galaxies and one distant quasar. Hubble data also indicates that there is a seventh spot of light in the very center, which is a rare fifth image of the distant quasar. This rare phenomenon is caused by the presence of two galaxies in the foreground that act as a lens. https://phys.org/news/2021-08-hubble-captures-gravity-lensed-quasar.html Astronomy Fri, 27 Aug 2021 09:41:56 EDT news549276114 Nestled among the vast clouds of star-forming regions like this one lie potential clues about the formation of our own solar system. https://phys.org/news/2021-08-image-hubble-peers-dusty-stellar.html Astronomy Fri, 13 Aug 2021 12:42:50 EDT news548077366 A recent article published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, led by Dr. Kostas Kouroumpatzakis, of the Institute of Astrophysics at the Foundation for Research and Technology, Hellas (IA-FORTH), and the University of Crete, provides new insights into the connection between the X-ray luminosity of accreting black holes and neutron stars and the composition of the stellar populations they are associated with. This research was conducted at the Institute of Astrophysics of FORTH and the University of Crete. https://phys.org/news/2021-06-metal-x-rays-key-high-luminosity.html Astronomy Wed, 23 Jun 2021 09:16:19 EDT news543658575 Using the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), astronomers have conducted near-ultraviolet through near-infrared observations of a young planetary nebula (PN) known as NGC 6302. Results of the monitoring campaign, presented May 28 on arXiv.org, could help us better understand the nature of this PN. https://phys.org/news/2021-06-astronomers-probe-planetary-nebula-ngc.html Astronomy Tue, 08 Jun 2021 10:20:01 EDT news542366158 Located around 5,000 light-years away in the constellation of Cygnus (the Swan), Abell 78 is an unusual type of planetary nebula. https://phys.org/news/2021-03-hubble-captures-re-energized-planetary-nebula.html Astronomy Mon, 22 Mar 2021 07:44:48 EDT news535617886 In 2020, astronomers added a new member to an exclusive family of exotic objects with the discovery of a magnetar. New observations from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory help support the idea that it is also a pulsar, meaning it emits regular pulses of light. https://phys.org/news/2021-01-chandra-reveal-extraordinary-magnetar.html Astronomy Fri, 08 Jan 2021 12:10:43 EST news529330234 Astronomers have conducted spectroscopic observations of a star-forming region known as IRAS 12272-6240. Results of this observational campaign shed more light on the nature of this massive and complex region. The study was detailed in a paper published June 25 on arXiv.org. https://phys.org/news/2020-07-star-forming-region-iras-probed.html Astronomy Mon, 06 Jul 2020 09:10:05 EDT news513242164 Brown dwarfs are the middle child of astronomy, too big to be a planet yet not big enough to be a star. Like their stellar siblings, these objects form from the gravitational collapse of gas and dust. But rather than condensing into a star's fiery hot nuclear core, brown dwarfs find a more zen-like equilibrium, somehow reaching a stable, milder state compared to fusion-powered stars. https://phys.org/news/2020-06-citizen-scientists-closest-young-brown.html Astronomy Tue, 02 Jun 2020 15:00:01 EDT news510326523 Determined to find a needle in a cosmic haystack, a pair of astronomers time traveled through archives of old data from W. M. Keck Observatory on Mauankea in Hawaii and old X-ray data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory to unlock a mystery surrounding a bright, lensed, heavily obscured quasar. https://phys.org/news/2020-06-astronomers-cosmic-golden-needle-decades.html Astronomy Mon, 01 Jun 2020 10:33:25 EDT news510226374 Allen Lawrence, wrapping up a long career as an electrical engineer, was serious about moving his astronomy hobby beyond the 20-inch telescope he'd hauled to star parties under the dark skies of Texas and Arizona. https://phys.org/news/2020-02-astronomers-reveal-rare-nucleus-nearby.html Astronomy Wed, 05 Feb 2020 15:04:02 EST news500137432 When it comes to galaxies, how fast is fast? The Milky Way, an average spiral galaxy, spins at a speed of 130 miles per second (210 km/sec) in our Sun's neighborhood. New research has found that the most massive spiral galaxies spin faster than expected. These "super spirals," the largest of which weigh about 20 times more than our Milky Way, spin at a rate of up to 350 miles per second (570 km/sec). https://phys.org/news/2019-10-dark-massive-spiral-galaxies-breakneck.html Astronomy Thu, 17 Oct 2019 12:06:50 EDT news490532783 Astronomers have spotted three giant black holes within a titanic collision of three galaxies. Several observatories, including the Chandra X-ray Observatory and other NASA space telescopes, captured the unusual system. https://phys.org/news/2019-09-black-holes-collision.html Astronomy Wed, 25 Sep 2019 16:17:47 EDT news488647053 This striking image was taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3), a powerful instrument installed on the telescope in 2009. WFC3 is responsible for many of Hubble's most breathtaking and iconic photographs. https://phys.org/news/2019-06-image-mature-galaxy-mesmerizes-hubble.html Astronomy Fri, 07 Jun 2019 13:58:51 EDT news479134725 Astronomers at the University of Bonn and their colleagues from Moscow have identified an unusual celestial object. It is most likely the product of the fusion of two stars that died a long time ago. After billions of years circling around each other these so-called white dwarfs merged and rose from the dead. In the near future, their lives could finally end—with a huge bang. The researchers are now presenting their findings in the journal Nature. https://phys.org/news/2019-05-stellar-waltz.html Astronomy Tue, 21 May 2019 09:14:13 EDT news477648841