Space Exploration News – Latest Headlines

Jupiter's moon Io has splendid dunes

Study shows new way dunes can form on varied celestial surfaces.

April 19, 2022 Read more

Giant stars undergo dramatic weight loss program

Astronomers have found a slimmer type of red giant star for the first time. These stars have undergone dramatic weight loss, possibly due to a greedy companion. The discovery is an important step forward to understanding the life of stars in the Milky Way.

April 14, 2022 Read more

MAGIC telescopes observe nova explosion shining brightly in gamma rays at extremely high energy

The MAGIC telescopes have observed the nova RS Ophiuchi shining brightly in gamma rays at extremely high energy. The Gamma rays emanate from protons that are accelerated to very high energies in the shock front following the explosion. This suggests that novae are also a source of the ubiquitous cosmic radiation in the universe which consists mainly of protons rich in energy, which race through space at almost the speed of light.

April 14, 2022 Read more

Hubble sheds light on origins of supermassive black holes

Astronomers have identified a rapidly growing black hole in the early universe that is considered a crucial 'missing link' between young star-forming galaxies and the first supermassive black holes.

April 13, 2022 Read more

Hubble confirms largest comet nucleus ever seen

The nucleus is about 50 times larger than found at the heart of most known comets. Its mass is estimated to be a staggering 500 trillion tons, a hundred thousand times greater than the mass of a typical comet found much closer to the Sun.

April 12, 2022 Read more

Astronomers capture surprising changes in Neptune's temperatures

An international team of astronomers have used ground-based telescopes, including the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, to track Neptune's atmospheric temperatures over a 17-year period. They found a surprising drop in Neptune's global temperatures followed by a dramatic warming at its south pole.

April 11, 2022 Read more

Differences between the Moon's near and far sides linked to colossal ancient impact

New research shows how the impact that created the Moon's South Pole - Aitken basin is linked to the stark contrast in composition and appearance between the two sides of the Moon.

April 8, 2022 Read more

Astronomers discover a new type of freak stars covered in helium burning ashes

While normal stars have surfaces composed of hydrogen and helium, the newly discovered stars have their surfaces covered with carbon and oxygen, the ashes of He-burning - a very exotic composition for a star. The situation becomes more puzzling because the new stars have temperatures and radii that indicate they are still burning helium in their cores.

April 8, 2022 Read more

10 new gravitational waves found in LIGO-Virgo's O3a data

Astrophysicists re-examined LIGO-Virgo's O3a data and found 10 additional black hole mergers, all outside the detection threshold of the original analysis. The new mergers hint at exotic astrophysical scenarios that, for now, are only possible to study using gravitational wave astronomy.

April 8, 2022 Read more

The hunt for the gravitational wave background

Scientists show that using gamma rays instead of radio waves yields a clearer view to the pulsars and provides an independent and complementary way to detect gravitational waves.

April 7, 2022 Read more

Astronomers detect galactic space laser

The record-breaking find is the most distant megamaser of its kind ever detected, at about five billion light years from Earth.

April 7, 2022 Read more

Astronomers have spotted the farthest galaxy ever

Named HD1, the galaxy candidate is some 13.5 billion light-years away and scientists have begun to speculate exactly what the galaxy is.

April 7, 2022 Read more

Hubble probes extreme weather on ultra-hot Jupiters

In two new papers, teams of Hubble astronomers are reporting on bizarre weather conditions on these sizzling worlds. It's raining vaporized rock on one planet, and another one has its upper atmosphere getting hotter rather than cooler because it is being 'sunburned' by intense ultraviolet (UV) radiation from its star.

April 6, 2022 Read more

Scientists connect the dots between Galilean moon, auroral emissions on Jupiter

Juno spacecraft discovered clues about mysterious processes creating the dance of the auroral footprints.

April 5, 2022 Read more

Ringing black holes could put general relativity to the test

Gravitational waves could reveal whether general relativity must be modified at the edges of black holes.

April 5, 2022 Read more

Hubble finds a planet forming in an unconventional way

The Hubble Space Telescope has directly photographed evidence of a Jupiter-like protoplanet forming through what researchers describe as an 'intense and violent process'. This discovery supports a long-debated theory for how planets like Jupiter form, called 'disk instability'.

April 4, 2022 Read more

Thermal electrons play key role in determining emissions from gamma-ray-burst afterglows

Theoretical model probes the origins of unexpectedly high-energy radiation from the aftermath of cosmic explosions.

April 4, 2022 Read more

A closer look at Jupiter's origin story

One of the most important open questions in planetary formation theory is the story of Jupiter's origin. Using sophisticated computer modelling, researchers now shed new light on Jupiter's formation history.

April 4, 2022 Read more