Astronomy
- Space
A spherical star cluster has surprisingly few heavy elements
A globular cluster in the nearby Andromeda galaxy challenges conventional wisdom about how galaxies form.
- Space
The asteroid Bennu’s brittle boulders may make grabbing a sample easier
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is about to collect a bit of asteroid Bennu. Here’s why it’s good that new research suggests its boulders are brittle.
- Space
The first black hole image helped test general relativity in a new way
The Event Horizon Telescope’s iconic image of the black hole at the center of galaxy M87 once again shows Einstein was right.
- Astronomy
The Milky Way’s most massive star cluster may have eaten a smaller cluster
Observations of newfound stars suggest how the gathering of stars at the galaxy’s core grew so big.
- Space
Stellar winds hint at how planetary nebulae get their stunning shapes
Observations of red giant stars reveal that planets or even other stars may influence the shape of a nebula’s cloud of dust and gas.
- Space
Neutrinos could reveal how fast radio bursts are launched
Highly magnetized stellar corpses called magnetars may be the source of two different cosmic enigmas: fast radio bursts and high-energy neutrinos.
- Space
Dark matter clumps in galaxy clusters bend light surprisingly well
Cosmologists have found one more way to be confused by dark matter.
- Space
A weirdly warped planet-forming disk circles a distant trio of stars
The bizarre geometry of a disk of gas and dust around three stars in the constellation Orion could be formed by “disk tearing” or a newborn planet.
- Physics
Record-breaking gravitational waves reveal that midsize black holes do exist
The biggest merger of two black holes so far raises questions about how the pair of objects came to be.
- Astronomy
Check out the first-ever map of the solar corona’s magnetic field
Solar physicists watched waves in the sun’s corona to map the whole corona’s magnetic field. Future observers could use the same technique to predict solar eruptions.
- Astronomy
In a first, astronomers spotted a space rock turning into a comet
Scientists have caught a space rock in the act of shifting from a Kuiper Belt object to a comet. That process won’t be complete until 2063.
- Astronomy
Hubble watched a lunar eclipse to see Earth from an alien’s perspective
Hubble observed sunlight filtering through Earth’s atmosphere during a lunar eclipse to see what a habitable exoplanet’s atmosphere might look like.
