Astronomy

Astronomy

Extrasolar Planet News: Superplanet or brown dwarf?

New observations of an oddball planetary system 150 light-years from Earth suggest that some planets either are superheavy, more than 17 times as massive as Jupiter, or that they form from disks of gas and dust that encircle not just a single star, but two starlike objects.

Astronomy

Belt Tightening: Icy orbs are surprisingly small

Objects in the distant reservoir of comets known as the Kuiper belt are intrinsically much brighter, and therefore smaller, than previously thought.

Astronomy

First Light: Faint object may be youngest star detected

Peeking into the dusty core of a dark cloud seemingly devoid of stars, astronomers have found a faintly glowing body that could be the earliest glimmerings ever recorded from a newborn star.

Astronomy

More moons for Saturn

With the discovery of two additional moons, the ringed planet now has a retinue of 24 known satellites orbiting it.

Astronomy

What a blast!

Astronomers have glimpsed a rare, long-lived neutron-star explosion that may represent the burning of carbon just beneath the surface of this superdense star.

Astronomy

Renegade stars in sun’s neighborhood

Some stars in the neighborhood of the sun may be renegades from the center of our galaxy.

Astronomy

Messy Findings: Planets encounter a violent world

Some young planets continue to take a beating hundreds of millions of years after they've formed.

Astronomy

Planet Signs? Sifting a dusty disk

Infrared spectra of a disk of debris surrounding the young star Beta Pictoris reveals three distinct bands of dust, suggesting the location of a possible planet flanked by belts of asteroids or comets.

Astronomy

More space sugar

Astronomers have found a second, colder source of the simple sugar glycoaldehyde in a dust and gas cloud 26,000 light-years from Earth.

Astronomy

Big Smash: Galaxy clusters in collision

Astronomers have unveiled the most detailed image ever taken of the collision of two clusters of galaxies.

Astronomy

Sky Lights: Picture might show an extrasolar planet

A faint point of red light may be the first picture ever taken of a planet outside the solar system.

Astronomy

Crashing Genesis

Scientists are trying to salvage the fragile samples of the solar wind collected by the Genesis spacecraft, which crashed to Earth on Sept. 8 after its parachutes failed to open.