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Astronomy & Space news
Why are the stars around our galaxy's black hole missing their companions?
A new study suggests that the young stars orbiting the Milky Way's central black hole may have a surprisingly ordinary origin. But the black hole's influence may be what makes their origin look more exotic than it really ...
Japan's Hayabusa2 achieves first-ever laser ranging experiment with an asteroid
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA) Hayabusa2 spacecraft reached another milestone this summer, a first for space agencies. On Sunday, July 5, the probe conducted the first successful laser-ranging experiment ...
Space Exploration
3 hours ago
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Rubin observatory peers deep into the famous COSMOS field
The COSMOS field, or Cosmic Evolution Survey Deep Field, is one of the most famous patches of the universe observed by astronomers. Located in the constellation Sextans, this region was photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope ...
Astronomy
12 hours ago
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Scientists discover a strange new form of ice that could help explain the interiors of Neptune and Uranus
Scientists have discovered that there is ice deep inside planets like Neptune and Uranus and want to find out what form it takes and how it behaves. They cannot dig for it and transport it all the way back to Earth, so they ...
How big can the universe's first starbursts get?
As our telescopes have improved and we've been able to peer farther back in time, we've begun finding more fascinating features of the universe. But one thing we haven't found for sure is Population III (Pop III) stars. These ...
Astronomy
Sep 11, 2026
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What's carving active gullies on Mars? It's not water
Scientists were shocked when they received the first images of Martian gullies. They were even more shocked as those gullies appeared to change over time. Their similarities to gullies seen on Earth were uncanny, but all ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 11, 2026
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Release of open AI model trained on 17 years of lunar data maps ice, craters and volcanoes
NASA is bringing artificial intelligence to the study of the moon, helping researchers transform how they analyze its surface. In an ongoing collaboration with IBM Research and several academic institutions, NASA has launched ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 11, 2026
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eROSITA's second data release catalog delivering most comprehensive high-energy census of the cosmos to date
The eROSITA (extended ROentgen Survey with an Imaging Telescope Array) telescope, the primary instrument aboard the Russian-German Spektr-RG space observatory, was developed by the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial ...
Astronomy
Sep 11, 2026
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A new surface atlas of Phobos will help MMX mission collect its samples
Thanks to JAXA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and its sample-return capabilities, we're on the cusp of receiving our first sample from the Martian system—not from Mars itself, but from its largest moon, Phobos. ...
Space Exploration
Sep 11, 2026
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Continuous video of black hole radio observations challenges shock wave theory
For years, scientists have relied primarily on radio imaging from techniques like very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) to study jets from the active galactic nuclei of supermassive black holes. This allows for the detection ...
A galaxy with almost no stars? New Cloud-9 observations strengthen the case
Astronomers have taken one of the deepest looks yet at Cloud-9, a candidate "dark galaxy," and found no trace of stars. The paper outlining this discovery was posted to the arXiv preprint server on Aug. 21.
Asteroid Ryugu's dust reveals nitrogen's slow concentration into complex molecules
Nitrogen is a key ingredient in the biomolecules that form the building blocks of life. Yet as an unbonded gas, it is far more likely to drift into space than to lock itself into solid compounds, making it difficult for astronomers ...
Mercury is shrinking more than we thought
Mercury's surface is riddled with wrinkles, evidence of a once-larger planet that has shrunk over time. A new study finds that Mercury may have contracted 10% to 30% more than previously thought—a loss of nearly 12 miles ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 10, 2026
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Scientists want to 3D print houses on Mars with the help of yeast
Mars is a terrible place to build a house. It's bitterly cold, blasted by radiation and a near vacuum. Not to mention that the building materials, even for a modest shelter, could spend months hurtling through space before ...
Space Exploration
Sep 10, 2026
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Sun's largest sunspots may have potential to trigger superflares
The sun is capable of great things. In massive eruptions, it repeatedly hurls particles and radiation into space. This solar bombardment can be dangerous for technical infrastructure on Earth: For example, satellites and ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 10, 2026
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BepiColombo measures Mercury's particle bombardment up close
The joint BepiColombo mission of the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) is settling into orbit around Mercury after an eight-year journey. In early September, BepiColombo's two orbiters, ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 10, 2026
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'Fingerprints' inside the sun could reveal if it once swallowed a planet
It is thought the sun may have engulfed a super-Earth-sized planet early in its history. Now, a new study has gone a step further, suggesting that such an event may have left behind detectable clues inside the sun that could ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 10, 2026
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Ancient Swedish Goths had surprisingly accurate calendars
On a mostly flat plain an hour north of Stockholm lies a collection of large burial mounds dating from an ancient culture at least 2,500 years old. These people were not Vikings; they were northern Germanic Goths, pagan polytheists ...
Astronomy
Sep 10, 2026
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A wandering black hole caught feeding on the run
Astronomers have found the first direct evidence that a wandering black hole can feed itself by dragging gas along in its wake as it moves through its galaxy. It's the first direct evidence of an accretion channel long predicted ...
JWST discovers that Chariklo's invisible rings are changing
Until just over a decade ago, ring systems were thought to be exclusive to the giant planets of the solar system, such as Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. However, in 2013, a small body barely 250 kilometers (155 miles) ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 9, 2026
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