NASA's WISE Space Telescope Jettisons Its Cover

(PhysOrg.com) -- Engineers and scientists say the maneuver went off without a hitch, and everything is working properly. The mission's "first-light" images of the sky will be released to the public in about a month, after ...

Citizen scientists spot closest young brown dwarf disk yet

Brown dwarfs are the middle child of astronomy, too big to be a planet yet not big enough to be a star. Like their stellar siblings, these objects form from the gravitational collapse of gas and dust. But rather than condensing ...

New comet NEOWISE graces the skies

A comet visiting from the most distant parts of our solar system is putting on a spectacular nighttime display. The comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE made its once-in-a-lifetime close approach to the sun on July 3 and will cross outside ...

The many infrared 'personalities' of the Sculptor galaxy

(PhysOrg.com) -- The Sculptor galaxy is shown in different infrared hues, in this new mosaic from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. The main picture is a composite of infrared light captured with all four ...

Stellar waltz with dramatic ending

Astronomers at the University of Bonn and their colleagues from Moscow have identified an unusual celestial object. It is most likely the product of the fusion of two stars that died a long time ago. After billions of years ...

Gamma-ray blazars in the sky

When the supermassive black holes at the center of galaxies accrete material, they can eject powerful jets of charged particles at speeds approaching that of light. These particles in turn emit radiation across the electromagnetic ...

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