Neutron stars -- the compressed remains of massive stars gone supernova -- are the densest "normal" objects in the known universe. (Black holes are technically denser, but far from normal.) Just a single sugar-cube worth of neutron-star material would...
Tracing back a ghostly particle to a shredded star, scientists have uncovered a gigantic cosmic particle accelerator. The subatomic particle, called a neutrino, was hurled towards Earth after the doomed star came too close to the supermassive black hole...
Not long after the Big Bang, the first generations of stars began altering the chemical make-up of primitive galaxies, slowly enriching the interstellar medium with basic elements such as oxygen, carbon, and nitrogen. Finding the earliest traces of these...
Once a black hole forms, its intense gravitational field produces a surface beyond which even light cannot escape, and it appears black to outsiders. All the details of the complex mix of matter and energy in its past are...
Fifty potential planets have been confirmed by a new machine learning algorithm developed by University of Warwick scientists.
For the first time, astronomers have used a process based on machine learning, a form of artificial intelligence, to analyze a sample of...
An international team of researchers has imaged newly forming jets of plasma from a massive black hole with unprecedented accuracy. Radio images made with a combination of telescopes in space and on the ground resolve the jet structure merely...
To date astronomers have discovered over 4,000 planets orbiting other stars. Statistically, there should be over 100 billion planets in our Milky Way galaxy. They come in a wide range of sizes and characteristics, largely unimagined before exoplanets were...
Are we alone in the universe?
It is one of the most profound questions posed in modern astronomy. But although our understanding of the cosmos has grown significantly, the question remains unanswered. We know that Earth-like planets are common, as...
Like crystal balls for the universe's deeper mysteries, galaxies and other massive space objects can serve as lenses to more distant objects and phenomena along the same path, bending light in revelatory ways.
Gravitational lensing was first theorized by Albert...
While on COVID lockdown, a University of Sydney honours student has written a research paper on a star system dubbed one of the "exotic peacocks of the stellar world".
Only one in a hundred million stars makes the cut to be classified...
Astronomers using the Green Bank Telescope have made the first definitive interstellar detection of benzonitrile, an intriguing organic molecule that helps to chemically link simple carbon-based molecules and truly massive ones known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. This discovery is...