While observing a newborn star, astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) telescope discovered twin jets of matter blasting out into space at record-breaking speed. These surprisingly forceful molecular 'winds' could help refine our understanding of how stars impact their cloudy nurseries and shape their emerging stellar systems.
Aug 20th, 2013
Read more
In the time it takes you to complete a single workday, or get a full night's sleep, a small fireball of a planet 700 light-years away has already completed an entire year.
Aug 19th, 2013
Read more
A new collaboration aims to learn how dark energy is driving the accelerated expansion of the universe.
Aug 15th, 2013
Read more
CSIRO scientists have written software that could guide spacecraft to Alpha Centauri, show that the planet Nibiru doesn't exist... and prove that the Earth goes around the Sun.
Aug 15th, 2013
Read more
In two NASA-funded studies biofilms grown aboard the International Space Station bound space shuttle were compared with those grown on the ground. The study results show for the first time that spaceflight changes the behavior of bacterial communities.
Aug 15th, 2013
Read more
Just how stars and black holes in the Universe are able to form from rotating matter is one of the big questions of astrophysics. Now, a new publication by HZDR physicists in Physical Review Letters shows how magnetic fields can also cause turbulences within "dead zones," thus making an important contribution to our current understanding of just how compact objects form in the cosmos.
Aug 15th, 2013
Read more
An international team of astronomers led by BoMee Lee has established that mature-looking galaxies existed much earlier than previously known, about 11.5 billion years ago.
Aug 14th, 2013
Read more
Observations with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory have revealed a massive cloud of multimillion-degree gas in a galaxy about 60 million light years from Earth. The hot gas cloud is likely caused by a collision between a dwarf galaxy and a much larger galaxy called NGC 1232.
Aug 14th, 2013
Read more
Radio astronomers use pulsar with strong magnetic field to investigate supermassive black hole.
Aug 14th, 2013
Read more
A research team has succeeded in precisely measuring the expansion velocity of a shockwave of the supernova remnant W44.
Aug 13th, 2013
Read more
Scientists used laser-cooled ions in so-called 'ion Coulomb crystals'. They were able to show for the first time how symmetry breaking can be generated in a controlled manner and how the occurrence of defects can then be observed.
Aug 12th, 2013
Read more
The evening of 12 August and morning of 13 August see the annual maximum of the Perseids meteor shower. This year prospects for watching this natural firework display are particularly good.
Aug 9th, 2013
Read more
Gemini Observatory's latest instrument, a powerful infrared camera and spectrograph at Gemini South, reveals its potential in a series of striking on-sky commissioning images released today.
Aug 9th, 2013
Read more
Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have solved a 40-year mystery on the origin of the Magellanic Stream, a long ribbon of gas stretching nearly halfway around our Milky Way galaxy.
Aug 8th, 2013
Read more
Europa, the ice-covered moon of the planet Jupiter, may be able to support life. NASA has commissioned a team of expert scientists to consider the science goals for a landed spacecraft mission to the surface of Europa, and to investigate the composition and geology of its icy shell and the potential for life within its interior ocean.
Aug 7th, 2013
Read more
Quasars are active black holes -- primarily from the early universe. Using a special method where you observe light that has been bent by gravity on its way through the universe, a group of physics students from the Niels Bohr Institute have observed a quasar whose light has been deflected and reflected in six separate images. This is the first time a quasar has been observed with so many light reflections.
Aug 7th, 2013
Read more
A new analysis of cosmic microwave background radiation data by researchers with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has taken the furthest look back through time yet - 100 years to 300,000 years after the Big Bang - and provided tantalizing new hints of clues as to what might have happened.
Aug 7th, 2013
Read more
ESO's Very Large Telescope has captured an intriguing star-forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud - one of the Milky Way's satellite galaxies. This sharp image reveals two distinctive glowing clouds of gas: Red-hued NGC 2014, and its blue neighbour NGC 2020. While they are very different, they were both sculpted by powerful stellar winds from extremely hot newborn stars that also radiate into the gas, causing it to glow brightly.
Aug 7th, 2013
Read more