Tag: astronomy news

Rush to return humans to the moon could threaten opportunities for astronomy

July 3, 2024 admin

This China National Space Administration (CNSA) handout image released by Xinhua News Agency, shows the lander-ascender combination of Chang’e-6 probe taken by a mini rover after it landed on the moon surface, June 4, 2024. China’s Chang’e 6 probe returned on Earth on Tuesday with rock and soil samples from the little-explored far side of…

Science

Venus has more volcanism than previously known, new analysis finds

May 29, 2024 admin

A computer-generated 3D model of Venus’ surface provided by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory shows the volcano Sif Mons which is exhibiting signs of ongoing activity, in this undated handout image. Using data from NASA’s Magellan mission, Italian researchers detected evidence of an eruption while the spacecraft orbited the planet in the early 1990s. | Photo…

Science

Sun’s magnetic field may form close to the surface: new study

May 23, 2024 admin

The sun sets over the mountains, as a geomagnetic storm continues hitting the Earth, in Ronda, Spain, May 12, 2024. | Photo Credit: Reuters New research indicates the sun’s magnetic field originates much closer to the surface than previously thought, a finding that could help predict periods of extreme solar storms like the ones that…

Science

Could a telescope ever see the beginning of time?

May 14, 2024 admin

A false-color image obtained by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) shows the galaxy JADES-GS-z7-01-QU, the universeÕs earliest-known “dead” galaxy, a galaxy that has stopped star formation, in this undated handout picture obtained by Reuters. | Photo Credit: Reuters The James Webb Space Telescope, or JWST for short, is one of the most advanced telescopes ever…

Science

Astronomers finally detect a rocky planet with an atmosphere

May 10, 2024 admin

An artist’s concept shows the exoplanet 55 Cancri e, also called Janssen, a so-called super-Earth, a rocky planet significantly larger than Earth but smaller than Neptune, along with the star it orbits in this undated illustration released by NASA. | Photo Credit: Reuters Astronomers have searched for years for rocky planets beyond our solar system…

Science

Why NASA’s Mars Sample Return mission has a shaky future

May 1, 2024 admin

A critical NASA mission in the search for life beyond Earth, Mars Sample Return, is in trouble. Its budget has ballooned from US$5 billion to over $11 billion, and the sample return date may slip from the end of this decade to 2040. The mission would be the first to try to return rock samples…

Science

Huge energetic flare from magnetic neutron star detected

April 25, 2024 admin

An artist’s impression of a type of neutron star called a magnetar. Magnetars are the cosmic objects with the strongest magnetic fields ever measured in the universe. | Photo Credit: Reuters Magnetars are among the universe’s most extreme objects – a class of the compact stellar remnants called neutron stars that possess immensely strong magnetic…

Science

Astronomers unravel the mystery of the ‘Dragon’s Egg’ nebula

April 12, 2024 admin

The nebula NGC 6164/6165, also known as the Dragon’s Egg, a cloud of gas and dust surrounding a pair of stars called HD 148937, is seen in this undated handout image taken with the VLT Survey Telescope hosted at the European Southern Observatory’s Paranal Observatory in Cerro Paranal, Chile. | Photo Credit: Reuters Two large…

Science

Cosmic ‘speed camera’ reveals staggering speed of neutron star jets

April 3, 2024 admin

A spinning neutron star periodically swings its radio (green) and gamma-ray (magenta) beams past Earth in this artist’s concept of a black widow pulsar. The pulsar heats the facing side of its stellar partner to temperatures twice as hot as the sun’s surface and slowly evaporates it. | Photo Credit: Reuters How fast can a…

Science

Twisted magnetic field observed around Milky Way’s central black hole

March 28, 2024 admin

The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration, who produced the first ever image of our Milky Way black hole released in 2022, has captured a new view of the massive object at the centre of our Galaxy: how it looks in polarised light. This is the first time astronomers have been able to measure polarisation, a…

Science