Universe Today

In the 1970’s Vera Rubin didn’t set out to upend modern cosmology.

Asteroids spin. Most of them do so rather slowly, and up until now most theories of asteroid rotation have failed to explain exactly why. A new paper from Wen-Han Zhou at the University of Tokyo and his co-authors might finally be able to fully explain that mystery as well as a few others related to asteroid rotation. Their work was presented at the Joint Meeting of the Europlanet Science Congress and the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Science in late September and could impact our understanding of how best to defend against a potentially hazardous asteroid.

Could scientists find life in the clouds of exoplanet atmospheres? This is what a recently submitted manuscript hopes to address as a team of researchers investigated how the biosignatures of microbes could be identified in exoplanet atmospheres and clouds. This study has the potential to help scientists develop new methods for finding life on exoplanets, either as we know it or even as we don’t know it.

A team led by a University of Maryland astronomer detected large complex organic molecules in ices outside of the Milky Way for the first time, offering a glimpse into the chemistry of the early universe.

We cannot see directly beyond the cosmic microwave background, which means we can't directly observe the first 380,000 years of the Universe. But there are indirect ways we might observe this period.

Satellites orbiting Earth face a constant assault from highly reactive single atom of oxygen which are created when solar radiation splits oxygen molecules in the upper atmosphere. These atoms don't just create drag that pulls spacecraft back to Earth, they also bind to satellite surfaces, causing corrosion that limits most satellites to roughly five year lifespans. A team of engineers at the University of Texas at Dallas have been developing a protective coating using techniques borrowed from microelectronics and optical manufacturing to counter the effects. The process the team have developed enables satellites to withstand conditions even harsher than those found in space. If successful, this coating could not only extend satellite lifetimes but enable spacecraft to operate in very low Earth orbit, a region currently too hostile for most missions.

Astronomers have discovered a clever way to make a single telescope capture sharper details than should be physically possible. The technique involves feeding starlight through a special optical fibre called a photonic lantern. Anyone else thinking of a certain glowing green lantern from a movie? Alas not, instead of special powers, it splits light according to its spatial patterns like separating a musical chords into individual notes. The researchers achieved resolution that has never been achieved before without linking multiple telescopes together. When they tested the technique on a star 162 light-years away, they not only proved it works but stumbled upon an unexpected discovery, that the star's surrounding gas disc is mysteriously lopsided.

The famous Tycho supernova of 1572, witnessed by Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe, didn't explode in empty space as has been assumed. New analysis reveals it detonated inside a planetary nebula, the ghostly shell of gas expelled by an earlier dying star. The evidence lies in two "ear" shaped structures that were sticking out from the remnant's main shell, matching similar features in three other supernovae previously identified as explosions within planetary nebulae. This discovery supports the "core-degenerate" model where a white dwarf star merges with a companion star's core, with the explosion occurring hundreds of thousands of years later while the nebula remains intact. Most strikingly, if Tycho follows this pattern, it suggests that 70-90% of normal Type Ia supernovae may actually be supernovae inside planetary nebulae!

In a recent paper, a team of researchers proposes how humanity may someday relocate its entire civilization near the center of our galaxy to take advantage of the relativistic effects of the supermassive black hole there. They also indicate how other advanced civilizations could have done so already.

How can artificial intelligence (AI) help astronomers identify celestial objects in the night sky? This is what a recent study published in Nature Astronomy hopes to address as an international team of researchers investigated the potential for using AI to conduct astrophysical surveys of celestial events, including black holes consuming stars or even exploding stars themselves. This study has the potential to help astronomers use AI to enhance the field by reducing time and resources that have traditionally been used to scan the night sky.

On Monday, Chinese company LandSpace executed a static-fire test with its 217-foot-tall Zhuque-3, a reusable rocket that China hopes will rival SpaceX. The rocket is on the way to its inaugural test flight expected at some point later this year.

Astronomers have found a new super-Earth only about 20 light years away. At that distance, it's a candidate for direct imaging.

The Universe is a strange place. The X-Ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission (XRISM) orbiting observatory recently highlighted this fact, when it was turned on a pulsar to document its powerful cosmic winds. The discovery comes courtesy of ESA’s Resolve instrument, a soft X-ray spectrometer aboard XRISM. The study looked at neutron star GX 13+1. This is a strong X-ray source located in the constellation Sagittarius, very near the galactic plane towards the core of our galaxy. GX 13+1 is about 23,000 light-years distant.

Driving on the Moon for the first time has got to be an exhilarating experience. But driving the same path on the Moon for the 500th time probably won’t be nearly as exciting to whatever poor astronaut got stuck with that duty for the day. With that in mind, a team of researchers led by PhD student Alec Krawciw and Professor Tim Barfoot of the University of Toronto are working on a way to automate the mundane task of driving goods back and forth from a lunar landing site to a nascent lunar exploration base.

Are we alone? It’s probably one of the, if not the most basic questions of human existence. People have been trying to answer it for millennia in one form or another, but only recently have we gained the tools and knowledge to start tractably trying to estimate whether we are or not. Those efforts take the form of famous tools like the Fermi Paradox and the Drake Equation, but there’s always room for a more nuanced understanding. A new paper in Acta Astronautica from Antal Veres of the Hungarian University of Agriculture introduces a new one - The Solitude Zone.

Threats from space aren’t always obvious, but statistically its only a matter of time before one of them happens. One of the most concerning for many space experts is a massive solar storm, like the one that literally lit telegraph paper on fire when it hit back in 1859. In the last 150 years our technology has improved by leaps and bounds, but that also means it's much more susceptible to damage if another event like the “Carrington Event”, as the storm in 1859 is called. Estimates for potential damage range into the trillions of dollars, with full economic recovery taking well over a decade if something isn’t done to mitigate the damage beforehand. As part of that preparedness, the European Space Agency (ESA) has started requiring the operational crew of new satellites, which would be on the frontlines of any solar storm catastrophe, to simulate how they would handle such an event, as described in a recent press release focused on one of those simulations.

A new study has revealed how phosphorus, a nutrient essential for photosynthesis, surged into ancient oceans and started Earth's first major rise in atmospheric oxygen more than 2 billion years ago.

Acting NASA chief Sean Duffy announces that NASA's plan to land astronauts on the Moon by 2027 is no longer achievable and announces new competitions to develop a lunar lander.

The chemistry of a galaxy changes over time as generations of stars live and die, spreading the results of their nucleosynthesis out into space. But stars with different masses produce different elements, and these stars have different lifespans. That means that over time, the materials readily available for planet formation also change.

Astronomers working with the JWST, along with help from the Hubble, have found a red supergiant star that eventually exploded as a supernova. The discovery helps solve the 'red supergiant problem' that confounds efforts to understand how these stars serve as progenitors that eventually explode as Type II supernova.