Space Exploration News – Latest Headlines

Mapping the exotic matter inside neutron stars

Do neutron stars contain exotic matter in the form of dense deconfined quark matter?

August 2, 2016 Read more

Is Earthly life premature from a cosmic perspective?

The universe is 13.8 billion years old, while our planet formed just 4.5 billion years ago. Some scientists think this time gap means that life on other planets could be billions of years older than ours. However, new theoretical work suggests that present-day life is actually premature from a cosmic perspective.

August 1, 2016 Read more

Ancient eye in the sky

An international team of researchers have discovered an extremely rare, double source plane gravitational lensing system, in which two distant galaxies are simultaneously lensed by a foreground galaxy. The team dubbed the system 'Eye of Horus'. Such a rare system is a unique probe of fundamental physics of galaxies and cosmology.

July 26, 2016 Read more

Astronomers discover dizzying spin of the Milky Way galaxy's 'halo'

Astronomers have discovered for the first time that the hot gas in the halo of the Milky Way galaxy is spinning in the same direction and at comparable speed as the galaxy's disk, which contains our stars, planets, gas, and dust. This new knowledge sheds light on how individual atoms have assembled into stars, planets, and galaxies like our own, and what the future holds for these galaxies.

July 25, 2016 Read more

Growing large-volume protein crystals bigger, better in space

Flown on a SpaceX rocket to the International Space Station, an experiment shows that large-volume protein crystals, needed for some experiments in drug design, can be grown bigger and better in space than on Earth.

July 25, 2016 Read more

A new key to understanding molecular evolution in space

Scientists have revealed temperature-dependent energy-state conversion of molecular hydrogen on ice surfaces, suggesting the need for a reconsideration of molecular evolution theory.

July 22, 2016 Read more

Dark energy measured with record-breaking map of 1.2 million galaxies

A team of hundreds of physicists and astronomers have announced results from the largest-ever, three-dimensional map of distant galaxies. The team constructed this map to make one of the most precise measurements yet of the dark energy currently driving the accelerated expansion of the Universe.

July 14, 2016 Read more

Surprising neutrino decoherence inside supernovae

Theory to explain collective effects of neutrinos inside supernovae strengthened.

July 12, 2016 Read more

Study explains why galaxies stop creating stars

A team of astronomers examined around 70,000 galaxies to address an important unsolved mystery in astrophysics.

July 9, 2016 Read more

Astronomers find evidence for 'direct collapse' black hole

Astronomers have discovered evidence for an unusual kind of black hole born extremely early in the universe. They showed that a recently discovered unusual source of intense radiation is likely powered by a 'direct-collapse black hole', a type of object predicted by theorists more than a decade ago.

July 7, 2016 Read more

Dead X-ray satellite reveals 'quiet' center of massive galaxy cluster

Scientists find gas at center of Perseus cluster travels much more slowly than expected.

July 7, 2016 Read more

Astronomers find evidence of water clouds in first spectrum of coldest brown dwarf

Difficult spectroscopic observations reveal properties of a nearby brown dwarf, the coldest known object outside of our solar system.

July 7, 2016 Read more

Let there be light; a team of super bright galaxies in the early Universe

Astronomers have shed further light on the evolution of the early Universe with the discovery of a 'team' of super bright galaxies.

July 5, 2016 Read more

Making astrophysical simulations more accurate

New research work may result in better simulations of large astrophysical events such as supernova explosions. This work also raises hopes of finding out more about how atomic nuclei behave in neutron stars.

July 5, 2016 Read more

Astronomers release spectacular survey of the distant Universe

Astronomers have released spectacular new infrared images of the distant Universe, providing the deepest view ever obtained over a large area of sky.

June 30, 2016 Read more

A new method for identifying black holes (w/video)

Techniques connect solutions to Einstein's equations directly with observations.

June 30, 2016 Read more

Universe becoming cleaner as cosmic dust gets mopped up by stars, astronomers reveal

Brand new images from the Herschel telescope give unprecedented insight into the lives of stars and galaxies.

June 29, 2016 Read more

A water detection technique to shortlist potentially-habitable exoplanets

To help detect suitable candidates, identify the range of atmospheric conditions on planets with water and shed light on how planetary magnetic fields originate and evolve, the HOTMOL project is devising new tools relying on spectro-polarimetry.

June 27, 2016 Read more