The supermassive black hole (SMBH) at our galaxy's core, Sagittarius A*, is modest in size with only 4.15 million solar-masses. The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) recently released a dramatic submillimeter image of it as seen ...
Astronomy
Jun 24, 2022
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251
Toward the end of 2017, a massive new region of magnetic field erupted on the Sun's surface next to an existing sunspot. The powerful collision of magnetic energy produced a series of potent solar flares, causing turbulent ...
Space Exploration
Jan 17, 2020
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910
Something unexpected is happening on the sun. 2013 is supposed to be the year of Solar Max, the peak of the 11-year sunspot cycle. Yet 2013 has arrived and solar activity is relatively low. Sunspot numbers are well below ...
Space Exploration
Mar 4, 2013
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When our Sun erupts with giant explosions—such as bursts of radiation called solar flares—we know they can affect space throughout the solar system as well as near Earth. But monitoring their effects requires having observatories ...
Space Exploration
Nov 16, 2017
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346
About 17 years ago, J. Martin Laming, an astrophysicist at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, theorized why the chemical composition of the Sun's tenuous outermost layer differs from that lower down. His theory has recently ...
Astronomy
Mar 2, 2021
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(Phys.org) -- Over the years, cosmologists have found ample evidence of just two kinds of black holes: stellar mass black holes and supermassive black holes. The former are considered small by most standards, just several ...
Solar flares can release the energy equivalent of many atomic bombs, enough to cut out satellite communications and damage power grids on Earth, 93 million miles away. The flares arise from twisted magnetic fields that occur ...
Space Exploration
Jan 14, 2015
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1617
When a rare total solar eclipse sweeps across North America on Monday, scientists will be able to gather invaluable data on everything from the sun's atmosphere to strange animal behaviors—and even possible effects on humans.
Space Exploration
Apr 7, 2024
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1692
(PhysOrg.com) -- The Crab Nebula, one of our best-known and most stable neighbors in the winter sky, is shocking scientists with a propensity for fireworks—gamma-ray flares set off by the most energetic particles ever ...
Astronomy
Jan 6, 2011
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0
A new study using data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope gives new insight into an important question: how habitable are planets that orbit the most common type of stars in the Galaxy? The target ...
Astronomy
Oct 30, 2020
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