Stars, as physical systems, are self-gravitating, approximately hydrostatic spheres of plasma in which energy is generated predominantly by thermonuclear fusion in their cores and transported outward by radiation and/or convection. Their structure is governed by the equations of stellar structure, balancing gravity, gas and radiation pressure, and energy transport. Stellar properties such as mass, composition, and rotation determine their internal stratification, nucleosynthetic pathways, luminosity, temperature, and evolutionary tracks. Stars interact with their environments via radiation, stellar winds, and mass loss, and they serve as fundamental sites of element synthesis and key components of galactic and cosmological structure.
An international team of astrophysicists from China and Australia has for the first time determined how massive neutron stars are when they are born.
Astronomy
Mar 17, 2025
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Astronomers have revealed new evidence that not just one, but four tiny planets are circling around Barnard's Star, the second-nearest star system to Earth.
Astronomy
Mar 11, 2025
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202
There are plenty of types of stars out there, but one stands out for being just a little weirder than the others. You might even say it's strange. According to a paper from researchers at Guangxi University in China, the ...
Astronomy
Feb 20, 2025
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257
Stars form in regions of space known as stellar nurseries, where high concentrations of gas and dust coalesce to form a baby star. Also called molecular clouds, these regions of space can be massive, spanning hundreds of ...
Astronomy
Feb 20, 2025
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77
When astronomers detected the first known interstellar object, 'Oumuamua, in 2017, it sparked a host of new studies trying to understand the origin and trajectory of the galactic sojourner.
Planetary Sciences
Feb 17, 2025
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112
Using the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), astronomers have observed a supermassive galactic open cluster designated Westerlund 1. Results of the study, published Jan. 28 on the pre-print server arXiv, yield essential details ...
Galaxies are astronomical objects composed of billions or even trillions of stars. Our Earth and solar system are just a tiny part of the Milky Way; it is one of countless galaxies in the universe. These immense systems are ...
Astronomy
Feb 4, 2025
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113
At the 2025 Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, two teams of astronomers—centered at Penn State and MIT—independently announced new discoveries about an extreme form of planetary destruction: apparently rocky planets ...
Astronomy
Jan 23, 2025
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100
Our sun is a lonely star. At least half the stars in our galaxy have binary companions. This was nicely illustrated in the Star Wars movie trilogy where Luke Skywalker watched two suns set on the horizon as seen from his ...
Astronomy
Jan 17, 2025
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110
Astrophysicists led by a team from Trinity College Dublin have—for the first time—imaged a large number of exocomet belts around nearby stars, and the tiny pebbles within them. The crystal-clear images show light being emitted ...
Astronomy
Jan 17, 2025
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