In 2009 a giant star 25 times more massive than the sun simply vanished. OK, it wasn't quite that simple. It underwent a period of brightening, increasing in luminosity to a million suns, just as if it was ready to explode ...
Astronomy
Oct 4, 2023
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28
The Giant Magellan Telescope begins the four-year process to fabricate and polish its seventh and final primary mirror, the last required to complete the telescope's 368 square meter light collecting surface, the world's ...
Astronomy
Sep 26, 2023
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388
As the next generation of giant, high-powered observatories begin to come online, a new study suggests that their instruments may offer scientists an unparalleled opportunity to discern what weather may be like on far-away ...
Astrobiology
Jul 27, 2023
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107
A spectacular new image released today by the European Southern Observatory gives us clues about how planets as massive as Jupiter could form. Using ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT) and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter ...
Astronomy
Jul 25, 2023
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333
When a NASA spacecraft successfully knocked an asteroid off course last year it sent dozens of boulders skittering into space, images from the Hubble telescope showed on Thursday.
Planetary Sciences
Jul 23, 2023
1
21
The search for planets outside our solar system—exoplanets—is one of the most rapidly growing fields in astronomy. Over the past few decades, more than 5,000 exoplanets have been detected and astronomers now estimate ...
Planetary Sciences
Jul 1, 2023
1
70
Astronomers using W. M. Keck Observatory on Maunakea, Hawaiʻi Island have discovered one of the lowest-mass planets whose images have been directly captured. Not only were they able to measure its mass, but they were also ...
Astronomy
Jun 23, 2023
0
252
To sit under the vast expanse of stars is to imagine swimming across shining, stellar rivers, creeks and tributaries. But to sit here also is to feel that lump in your throat and skip in your heart, realizing everything you ...
Astronomy
Apr 21, 2023
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85
Of the many different kinds of stars, asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars, usually slightly larger and older than our own sun, are known producers of interstellar dust.
Astronomy
Apr 6, 2023
0
17
Astronomers have made a rare discovery in the early universe involving two actively feeding supermassive black holes—or quasars—just 10,000 light-years apart from each other, that are on the verge of a colossal collision.
Astronomy
Apr 5, 2023
1
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