Astronomers have spotted the afterglow of a collision between two giant planets in a distant star system. The collision is thought to have been so violent that it vaporized both planets, creating a cloud of hot gas and dust that is still glowing today. The collision was spotted in a star system called ASASSN-21qj, which … Read more
The explosions of stars, known as supernovae, can be so bright they outshine their host galaxies. They take months or years to fade away, and sometimes, the gaseous remains of the explosion slam into hydrogen-rich gas and temporarily get bright again — but could they remain luminous without any outside interference? That’s what Dan Milisavljevic, … Read more
The ALMA telescope in Chile has transformed how we see the universe, showing us otherwise invisible parts of the cosmos. This array of incredibly precise antennas studies a comparatively high-frequency sliver of radio light: waves that range from a few tenths of a millimeter to several millimeters in length. Recently, scientists pushed ALMA to its … Read more
Astronomers from the Institute for Computational Cosmology at Durham University and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, have found evidence that the faintest satellite galaxies orbiting our own Milky Way galaxy are amongst the very first galaxies that formed in our Universe. Scientists working on this research have described the finding as “hugely exciting” explaining that … Read more
