Image: Star-forming filaments

The plane of the Milky Way is rich in star-forming regions, such as the one pictured in this stunning scene by ESA's Herschel space observatory. To the far-infrared eye of Herschel, this region reveals an intricate network ...

Understanding conditions for star formation

Researchers have demonstrated how a gas escapes ice at an extremely cold temperature, providing insight into star formation in interstellar clouds. The mechanism by which hydrogen sulphide is released as gas in interstellar ...

Image: Star formation in the Chamaeleon

A dark cloud when observed with optical telescopes, the Chamaeleon I region reveals itself as an active hub of star formation in this far-infrared image from ESA's Herschel space observatory. Only around 550 light-years away ...

How multiple star systems evolve

Sirius is not a single star at all, but a binary system of two stars. Polaris, the north star, is actually a system of three stars. And Castor, in the constellation of Gemini, actually consists of a whopping six stars. Current ...

How Herschel unlocked the secrets of star formation

Surveying the sky for almost four years to observe the glow of cold cosmic dust embedded in interstellar clouds of gas, the Herschel Space Observatory has provided astronomers with an unprecedented glimpse into the stellar ...

First look at gravitational dance that drives stellar formation

Swirling motions in clouds of cold, dense gas have given, for the first time, an active insight into how gravity creates the compact cores from which stars form in the interstellar medium. The results will be presented today, ...

Dutch astronomers discover recipe to make cosmic glycerol

A team of laboratory astrophysicists from Leiden University (the Netherlands) managed to make glycerol under conditions comparable to those in dark interstellar clouds. They allowed carbon monoxide ice to react with hydrogen ...

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