Stellar dynamics is the research area within astrophysics that investigates the gravitational interactions, phase-space evolution, and collective behavior of stellar systems such as star clusters, galactic disks, and spheroidal components. It employs N-body simulations, kinetic theory (e.g., the Boltzmann and Vlasov equations), and perturbation methods to study relaxation processes, resonances, instabilities, and secular evolution driven by both collisional and collisionless effects. Stellar dynamics underpins quantitative models of mass distributions, dark matter inference from stellar kinematics, formation and survival of bound structures, and the dynamical impact of central massive black holes and external tidal fields on stellar systems.
The massive globular star cluster Omega Centauri has puzzled astronomers for decades. It should be filled with black holes left behind by exploding stars, yet evidence for them is scarce. Now, astronomers using archival data ...
Astronomy
Jul 13, 2026
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Scale in the universe is hard to understand from a purely human perspective. Many times, the math just doesn't sit well with our brains, which evolved to capture and process data about the world around us rather than grok ...
Astronomy
Jul 6, 2026
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Imagine standing in the emptiest place the universe has to offer, a stretch of cosmic ocean so vast that light takes tens of millions of years to cross it, and yet still finding company. That is the puzzle behind a new study ...
Astronomy
Jul 1, 2026
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The subject of today's NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image is an ancient inhabitant of our galaxy. This sparkling scene features a globular cluster: a collection of tens of thousands to millions of stars, all tightly bound ...
Astronomy
Jun 26, 2026
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Lurking at the heart of the Milky Way, Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*) is a supermassive black hole four million times the mass of the sun, surrounded by a puzzling collection of young, massive stars whose orbits have long defied ...
The Gaia mission has allowed researchers to understand the motions of stars like never before, even revealing possible interactions between our solar system and nearby stars. Planetary Science Institute Senior Scientist Nathan ...
Astronomy
Jun 25, 2026
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Nearly every massive galaxy observed hosts a supermassive black hole at its center. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has discovered that some of these supermassive black holes may even be too big for the galaxy they're found ...
Astronomy
Jun 25, 2026
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A Yale-led team of astronomers has found a third galaxy devoid of dark matter—located alongside the other two in a formation that has never been seen before. Astronomers have followed a faint, cosmic trail of gas to a third ...
Astronomy
Jun 16, 2026
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When stars like our sun age, they puff up into red giants. Their bubbling outer mass gradually escapes into space, and their remaining cores contract into white dwarfs. Since most stars end their lives this way, the universe ...
Astronomy
Jun 15, 2026
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Picture the Milky Way not as a silent pinwheel of stars but as something that quietly sings. Scattered through it are millions of pairs of dead stars, mostly white dwarfs, whirling around each other and stirring ripples in ...
Astronomy
Jun 15, 2026
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