Related topics: galaxies · stars

New discovery could be a Thorne-Zytkow object

(Phys.org) —Speaking at this year's American Astronomical Society meeting, Hubble Fellow, Emily Levesque reported that she and her colleagues at the University of Colorado have discovered a star that just might qualify ...

Newfound planet is Earth-mass but gassy

An international team of astronomers has discovered the first Earth-mass planet that transits, or crosses in front of, its host star. KOI-314c is the lightest planet to have both its mass and physical size measured. Surprisingly, ...

Scientists find a practical test for string theory

(Phys.org) —Scientists at Towson University in Towson, Maryland, have identified a practical, yet overlooked, test of string theory based on the motions of planets, moons and asteroids, reminiscent of Galileo's famed test ...

Using the Sun to illuminate a basic mystery of matter

Antimatter has been detected in solar flares via microwave and magnetic-field data, according to a presentation by NJIT Research Professor of Physics Gregory D. Fleishman and two co-researchers at the 44th meeting of the ...

Dark energy alternatives to Einstein are running out of room

(Phys.org)—Research by University of Arizona astronomy professor Rodger Thompson finds that a popular alternative to Albert Einstein's theory for the acceleration of the expansion of the universe does not fit newly obtained ...

The farthest supernova yet for measuring cosmic history

In 2004 the Supernova Cosmology Project based at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory used the Hubble Space Telescope to find a tantalizing supernova that appeared to be almost 10 billion light-years distant. But researchers ...

Exocomets may be as common as exoplanets

(Phys.org)—Comets trailing wispy tails across the night sky are a beautiful byproduct of our solar system's formation, icy leftovers from 4.6 billion years ago when the planets coalesced from rocky rubble.

Study: At least one in six stars has an Earth-sized planet

(Phys.org)—The quest for a twin Earth is heating up. Using NASA's Kepler spacecraft, astronomers are beginning to find Earth-sized planets orbiting distant stars. A new analysis of Kepler data shows that about 17 percent ...

Massive outburst in neighbor galaxy surprises astronomers

(Phys.org)—The surprising discovery of a massive outburst in a neighboring galaxy is giving astronomers a tantalizing look at what likely is a powerful belch by a gorging black hole at the galaxy's center. The scientists ...

page 3 from 18