Search results for Kuiper Belt

Astronomy Oct 28, 2025

JWST observations discover large debris disk around nearby M dwarf

An international team of astronomers have employed the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to observe a nearby M-dwarf star known as TWA 20. As a result, they detected a large debris disk around this star. The finding was reported ...

Astrobiology Sep 27, 2025

Icy planetesimal with high nitrogen and water content discovered in white dwarf's atmosphere

University of Warwick astronomers have uncovered the chemical fingerprint of a frozen, water-rich planetary fragment being consumed by a white dwarf star outside our solar system.

Astronomy Sep 18, 2025

Hubble sees white dwarf eating piece of Pluto-like object

In our nearby stellar neighborhood, a burned-out star is snacking on a fragment of a Pluto-like object. With its unique ultraviolet capability, only NASA's Hubble Space Telescope could identify that this meal is taking place.

Astronomy Sep 11, 2025

Discovery of new moon or ring system orbiting mysterious distant planet Quaoar

Astronomers have discovered what they think may be another moon orbiting a distant dwarf planet called Quaoar. This small, icy, egg-shaped planet in the far reaches of our solar system, beyond Neptune, is already known to ...

Astronomy Aug 22, 2025

Asteroid Bennu: A time capsule of materials bearing witness to its origin and transformation over billions of years

Asteroid Bennu—the target of NASA's OSIRIS-REx sample return mission, led by the University of Arizona—is a mixture of materials from throughout, and even beyond, our solar system. Over the past few billion years, its unique ...

Astronomy Jul 29, 2025

The hunt for 'planet nine': Why there could still be something massive at the edge of the solar system

Is there a massive undiscovered planet on the outer reaches of the solar system? The idea has been around since before the discovery of Pluto in the 1930s. Labeled as planet X, prominent astronomers had put it forward as ...

Astronomy Jul 14, 2025

Solar gravitational lens telescope is feasible way to get high resolution pictures of habitable exoplanet, study shows

Sometimes, in order to support an idea, you first have to discredit alternative, competing ideas that could take resources away from the one you care about. In the scientific community, one of the most devastating ways you ...

Astronomy Jul 4, 2025

New Horizons conducts first-ever successful deep space stellar navigation test

As NASA's New Horizons spacecraft traveled through the Kuiper Belt at a distance of more than 5.5 billion miles from Earth, an international team of astronomers used the far-flung probe to conduct an unprecedented experiment: ...

Planetary Sciences Jun 27, 2025

Cryovolcanism and resurfacing on Pluto's largest moon, Charon

What processes during the formation of Pluto's largest moon, Charon, potentially led to it having cryovolcanism, and even an internal ocean? This is what a recent study presented at the 56th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference ...

Astronomy Jun 20, 2025

The solar system's greatest mystery may finally be solved

For years, astronomers have been searching for a mysterious ninth planet lurking in the dark outer reaches of our solar system. Now, a team of researchers have taken a completely different approach to this cosmic detective ...

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