The universe is expanding, but how fast exactly? The answer appears to depend on whether you estimate the cosmic expansion rate—referred to as the Hubble's constant, or H0—based on the echo of the Big Bang (the cosmic ...
Astronomy
Apr 4, 2023
19
575
The first stars of the universe were monstrous beasts. Comprised only of hydrogen and helium, they could be 300 times more massive than the sun. Within them, the first of the heavier elements were formed, then cast off into ...
Astronomy
Dec 23, 2023
3
133
Scientists have discovered the oldest black hole yet, a cosmic beast formed a mere 470 million years after the Big Bang.
Astronomy
Nov 11, 2023
3
154
After drawing both praise and skepticism, the team of astronomers who discovered NGC 1052-DF2 – the very first known galaxy to contain little to no dark matter – are back with stronger evidence about its bizarre nature.
Astronomy
Mar 28, 2019
214
987
Our familiar, warm, yellow sun is a relative rarity in the Milky Way. By far the most common stars are considerably smaller and cooler, sporting just half the mass of our sun at most. Billions of planets orbit these common ...
Planetary Sciences
May 29, 2023
7
811
The Milky Way houses 8,292 recently discovered stellar streams—all named Theia. But Theia 456 is special.
Astronomy
Jan 15, 2021
9
6082
Scientists who study the cosmos have a favorite philosophy known as the "mediocrity principle," which, in essence, suggests that there's really nothing special about Earth, the sun or the Milky Way galaxy compared to the ...
Astronomy
Jun 3, 2022
7
2334
Scientists have known for some time that galaxies can grow by the merging of smaller galaxies, but the ancestry of our own Milky Way galaxy has been a long-standing mystery. Now, an international team of astrophysicists has ...
Astronomy
Nov 13, 2020
6
2552
Astronomers have discovered evidence for thousands of black holes located near the center of our Milky Way galaxy using data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.
Space Exploration
May 31, 2018
0
49
One firebolt after another illuminates a stilt-house settlement where the Catatumbo river flows into Venezuela's Lake Maracaibo, the lightning capital of the world.
Environment
Sep 23, 2021
0
9
