Astronomers Discover Ancient Galactic Collision that Reshaped the Milky Way
A team of astronomers found evidence of a cataclysmic collision between the Milky Way and a dwarf galaxy some 8 to 10 billion years ago. The astronomers refer to this galactic crash as a ‘defining event’ in the early history of the Milky Way. They say the collision between our galaxy, and what is being […]
Astronomers Snap First Baby Picture of Newborn Exoplanet
An international group of astronomers has captured what is being called the first confirmed image of a planet forming near a young dwarf star. The group, led by scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany, found the newborn planet making its way through a protoplanetary disk of dust and gas that […]
Oumuamua: It’s a Comet, It’s an Asteroid, No, wait, It’s a Comet
An odd rocky cigar-shaped object called Oumuamua made news late last year when it was determined to be of interstellar origin. It was touted as the solar system’s first visitor from another star system. Some scientists first pegged Oumuamua as a comet soon after its discovery. A few months later studies indicated that it was […]
Volcanic Activity Created Martian Geological Oddity
Scientists have long been puzzled by a mysterious formation located near the equator of Mars called Medusae Fossae. A new study from a pair of scientists – Lujendra Ojha and Kevin Lewis – at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore suggests that the large deposit of soft rock was probably formed as a result of violent volcanic eruptions that […]
Pre-Solar System Dust Found in the Atmosphere
A research team led by the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa’s School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology say they have discovered the remains of the formation of the solar system in some interstellar dust. The dust particles, which were gathered in Earth’s atmosphere by NASA aircraft, are thought to have been cast off from […]
Astronomers Detect Nanodiamonds in Three Baby Star Systems
Astronomers have detected swirls of diamonds, hundreds of thousands of times smaller than a grain of sand, in the protoplanetary or circumstellar disks of three baby star systems in the Milky Way – V892 Tau, HD 97048, and MWC 297. After conducting a series of observations with the US National Science Foundation’s Green Bank Telescope […]
Asteroid May Have Immigrated From Another Solar System to Ours
An odd cigar-shaped object name Oumuamua made news late last year when it was determined to be of interstellar origin. It was touted as the solar system’s first visitor from another star system. A new study published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters details the discovery of what scientists are calling the […]
How Will Our Sun Die?
Scientists say our Sun has been shining for about the last 4.6 billion years. They also say the Sun is expected to have enough hydrogen to fuel nuclear fusion in its core to allow it to continue shining as it has for about another 5 billion years. Along with creating solar energy, the Sun’s hydrogen […]
First Detection of Helium in an Exoplanet Atmosphere
Scientists say for the first several hundred thousand years or so after the Big Bang, there were virtually only two elements in the universe, hydrogen, and helium. A hydrogen atom is made of only one proton and one electron, and a helium atom has two each of protons, electrons, and neutrons. Hydrogen and then helium are […]
Calculations Show Mercury Has a Thin but Dense Crust
Mercury is the closest planet to the Sun, and very little is really known about this hot rocky orb. So far, only two space probes have ever studied Mercury. NASA’s Mariner 10 flew past the planet three times between 1973 and 1974. The flybys allowed scientists to map about half the planet, discover its thin […]