Related topics: dark matter · nasa · galaxies · solar system

Eyeball earths

Alien worlds resembling giant eyeballs might exist around red dwarf stars, and researchers are now proposing experiments to simulate these distant planets and see how capable they are of supporting life.

Hubble brings faraway comet into view

(Phys.org) —The NASA Hubble Space Telescope has given astronomers their clearest view yet of Comet ISON, a newly-discovered sun grazer comet that may light up the sky later this year, or come so close to the Sun that it ...

Image: Facing Enceladus

(Phys.org) —A patchwork network of frozen ridges and troughs cover the face of Enceladus, Saturn's most enigmatic of icy moons.

Super-CDMS researchers report possible evidence of WIMPs

(Phys.org) —Researchers working at the Super Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (CDMS) facility, located underground in Minnesota's Soudan Mine, are reporting in a paper uploaded to the preprint server arXiv that they've found ...

Scientists to Io: Your volcanoes are in the wrong place

(Phys.org) —Jupiter's moon Io is the most volcanically active world in the Solar System, with hundreds of volcanoes, some erupting lava fountains up to 250 miles high. However, concentrations of volcanic activity are significantly ...

Out on the pull: Why the moon always shows its face

Technically, Pink Floyd had it wrong. The space-facing side of the moon isn't dark (except at full moon when the Earth is between the sun and the moon). Not that you'd know that, given we always see the same side of our nearest ...

Cassini makes last close flyby of Saturnian moon Rhea

(Phys.org) —NASA's Cassini spacecraft will be swooping close to Saturn's moon Rhea on Saturday, March 9, the last close flyby of Rhea in Cassini's mission. The primary purpose will be to probe the internal structure of ...

Comet Pan-STARRS holds promise for stargazers

A rare bright comet shows up in the northern hemisphere this week, cruising past Earth with promise of spectacular naked-eye viewings of the giant ball of ice and dust streaking the twilight sky with a blazing tail.

Cutting through the spin on supermassive black holes

Astronomers have measured the spin of a black hole buried in the heart of a galaxy located 56 million light years away, and discovered it was spinning quickly – about as quickly as it could go. That was the big news, based ...

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