Astrophysicists

A now iconic collage showing 22 individual well-known PNe, artistically arranged in a spiral pattern by order of approximate physical size. Credit: ESA/Hubble and NASA, ESO, NOAO/AURA/NSF from an idea by the corresponding author and Ivan Bojičić and rendered by Ivan Bojičić with input from David Frew and the author.Two astrophysicists from the Laboratory for Space Research (LSR) at The University of Hong Kong (HKU) have finally solved a 20-year-old astrophysical puzzle concerning the lower-than-expected amounts of the…

Image of the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex, the closest star-forming region to Earth. This study reveals that the newly born stars in Rho Ophiuchi have not yet begun to drift apart and that the progenitor cloud is still holding them together. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Klaus Pontoppidan (STScI)A newly developed technique for estimating age reveals surprising findings about the formation and drifting apart of young stars.A team of astrophysicists led by Núria Miret-Roig from the University of Vienna found that two methods…

Princeton researchers have found that the M87* black hole expels energy outward, contributing to the formation of massive jets. This discovery, rooted in Einstein’s theory of relativity, challenges traditional views of black holes and could be further tested with advanced telescopes. The study opens new avenues in understanding black hole dynamics, though it stops short of definitively explaining the source of the jets’ power. Credit: SciTechDaily.com A team of Princeton astrophysicists has now determined conclusively…

Astrophysicists have discovered why spiral galaxies like the Milky Way are rare in the Supergalactic Plane, a dense region in our Local Universe. The research, led by Durham University and the University of Helsinki, used the SIBELIUS supercomputer simulation to show that galaxies in dense clusters on the Plane often merge, transforming spiral galaxies into elliptical ones. This finding, which aligns with telescope observations and supports the standard model of the Universe, helps explain a long-standing cosmic anomaly…

Early in her astronomy Ph.D. program, Aomawa Shields found herself without words. She had an undergraduate degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology but had left science for 11 years—a full solar cycle—and now she was back. It was her turn to present scientific findings to her peers, but Shields, who also had an M.F.A. in acting, developed a terrible case of stage fright. Getting ready for her talk, she was too shaky to tie her shoes. “I guess that was the closest thing I’ve ever had to a panic attack,”…

This illustration depicts a pair of stars in close orbit. Credit: ESO/L. CalçadaAstrophysicists from Northwestern University and the University of California San Diego have identified the tightest binary system ever observed among ultracool dwarfs.The two stars are in such proximity that they complete a revolution around each other in less than one Earth day, meaning that each star’s “year” lasts a mere 20.5 hours.The newly found system, LP 413-53AB, consists of a pair of ultracool dwarfs, which are very low-mass stars…

By Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe April 27, 2023A simulated visualization depicts the scenario of large-scale heating around a galaxy protocluster, using data from supercomputer simulations. This is believed to be a similar scenario to that observed in the COSTCO-I protocluster. The yellow area in the center of the picture represents a huge, hot gas blob spanning several million light years. The blue color indicates cooler gas, which located in the outer regions of the protocluster and the…

A team of scientists studying lensed ‘Einstein rings’ of light from the distant universe have found that signatures in the rings indicate the kind of dark matter that inhabits the background galaxies.First Full-Color Images From Webb Space TelescopeSpecifically, the researchers looked at lensed images of HS 0810+2554, a distant quasar, and found the presence of wave-like dark matter. Their research ispublished today in Nature Astronomy.“In our work, we test a prediction made by wave-like dark matter for the first time…

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Perhaps when you think of scientific research in Africa you think of the continent's amazing natural resources, buried out of sight under soil or rocks. Or maybe your mind goes to its ancient history of human evolution. But there's another important, huge expanse that's garnering attention among…

Artistic illustration of kilonova. Credit: Robin Dienel/Carnegie Institution for Science)When neutron stars collide they produce an explosion that, contrary to what was believed until recently, is shaped like a perfect sphere. Although how this is possible is still a mystery, the discovery may provide a new key to fundamental physics and to measuring the age of the Universe. The discovery was made by astrophysicists from the University of Copenhagen and has just been published in the journal Nature.Kilonovae — the giant…