The shredded remnants of the first supernova ever recorded by humans — which appeared in the sky more than 1,800 years ago and vanished within eight months — rise from the cosmic grave in a stunning new image from the National Science Foundation’s NOIRLab. Tinged blood red and swirling around an invisible center of mass, … Read more
For the first time, astronomers have spotted enormous, galaxy-scale shock waves rattling the “cosmic web” that connects nearly all known galaxies. These cosmic waves could reveal clues about how the largest objects in the universe were sculpted. The discovery was made by stitching and stacking thousands of radio telescope images together, which revealed the soft … Read more
The asteroid Ryugu, which orbits the sun between Earth and Mars, contains many of the building blocks for life, a new analysis finds. The study, published Feb. 23 in the journal Science, is one of the first peeks at the samples from Ryugu brought back by Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft in 2020. The mission is only … Read more
Researchers have finally pinpointed the likely origin of mysterious heartbeat-like signals spat out by the sun during solar flares. The findings could help us learn more about how potentially damaging solar storms are unleashed, a new study shows. Solar radio bursts are streams of electromagnetic radiation — made up mainly of radio waves, as well … Read more
If wormholes exist, they could magnify the light of distant objects by up to 100,000 times — and that could be the key to finding them, according to research published Jan. 19 in the journal Physical Review D. Wormholes are theoretical funnel-shaped portals through which matter (or perhaps spacecraft) could travel great distances. To imagine … Read more
Astronomers have spotted a runaway supermassive black hole, seemingly ejected from its home galaxy and racing through space with a chain of stars trailing in its wake. According to the team’s research, which was published April 6 in The Astrophysical Journal Letters (opens in new tab), the discovery offers the first observational evidence that supermassive … Read more
The elusive “Planet Nine,” which may or may not lurk in the outer reaches of the solar system, could be surrounded by a small swarm of potential moons, a new study reveals. What’s more, these moons could be the key to finding the missing planet. Planet Nine, if it exists, lurks beyond the orbit of … Read more
For the first time, scientists have discovered a double-star system that is doomed to explode in a fiery “kilonova,” a precious-metal-creating blast caused by the merger of two stellar corpses. The kilonova — which will send gold, silver, platinum and other new heavy elements careening into space — won’t happen for millions of years. But … Read more
The moon exerts a previously unknown tidal force on the “plasma ocean” surrounding Earth’s upper atmosphere, creating fluctuations that are similar to the tides in the oceans, a new study suggests. In the study, published Jan. 26 in the journal Nature Physics, scientists used more than 40 years of data collected by satellites to track … Read more
Using a new machine-learning algorithm, scientists have picked up eight extraterrestrial signals that seem to bear the hallmarks of technology. The research, published Jan. 30 in the journal Nature Astronomy, doesn’t claim to have really found proof of intelligent aliens; a brief follow-up search for the signals detected in the study turned up only silence. … Read more
