The Milky Way's tiny but tough galactic neighbor

In the new ESO image, Barnard's Galaxy glows beneath a sea of foreground stars in the direction of the constellation of Sagittarius (the Archer). At the relatively close distance of about 1.6 million light-years, Barnard's ...

The world in grains of interstellar dust

Understanding how dust grains form in interstellar gas could offer significant insights to astronomers and help materials scientists develop useful nanoparticles.

Prospecting for interstellar oil

We have developed a new method to look for carbon compounds in space, akin to prospecting for oil on Earth. Our method is published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Stardust from red giants

Some of the Earth's building material was stardust from red giants, researchers from ETH Zurich have established. They have also explained why the Earth contains more of this stardust than the asteroids or the planet Mars, ...

How Herschel unlocked the secrets of star formation

Surveying the sky for almost four years to observe the glow of cold cosmic dust embedded in interstellar clouds of gas, the Herschel Space Observatory has provided astronomers with an unprecedented glimpse into the stellar ...

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