Sign of life in Venus’ cloud? Maybe not
In September, a team led by astronomers in the United Kingdom announced that they had detected the chemical phosphine in the thick clouds of...
Tidal dwarf galaxy findings reveal how stars form
A lot is known about galaxies.
We know, for instance, that the stars within them are shaped from a blend of old star dust and...
Ancient Mars was more like Iceland than Idaho
New study indicates that, more than 3 billion years ago, seasons in Gale Crater on Mars were probably something like those in Iceland.
The ancient...
Astronomers estimate Titan’s largest sea is 1,000 feet deep
Far below the gaseous atmospheric shroud on Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, lies Kraken Mare, a sea of liquid methane.
Cornell astronomers have estimated that sea...
The 7 rocky planets orbiting TRAPPIST-1 may be made of similar stuff
The TRAPPIST-1 star system is home to the largest batch of roughly Earth-size planets ever found outside our solar system.
Discovered in 2016 some 40...
Astronomers discover first cloudless, Jupiter-like exoplanet
Astronomers at the Center for Astrophysics at Harvard & Smithsonian have detected the first Jupiter-like planet without clouds or haze in its observable atmosphere.
The...
A habitat at Ceres could be the gateway to the outer solar system
In the near future, humanity stands a good chance of expanding its presence beyond Earth.
This includes establishing infrastructure in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), on...
Excess X-rays from neutron stars could lead to discovery of new particle
A team of scientists including a University of Michigan researcher have found that mysterious X-rays detected from nearby neutron stars may be the first...
Scientists map over half a billion celestial objects in the universe
More than 690 million celestial objects have been catalogued, photographed and are now available online for exploration by the public, thanks to an international...
Scientists find most distant quasar to date
A team of astronomers including a University of Michigan researcher has observed a luminous quasar 13.03 billion light-years from Earth—the most distant quasar discovered...