Stars

Astronomers have released a stunningly detailed image captured by the by the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope, revealing the structure of a massive sunspot as it temporarily darkened the Sun’s surface on January 28, 2020.

Planetary nebulae are basically slow-motion explosions in space, expected to expand and then fade over tens of thousands of years. But in an unprecedented show, Hubble has witnessed a nebula fading and shrinking dramatically within just 20 years.

Borexino, a huge underground particle detector in Italy, has picked up a never-before-seen type of neutrino coming from the Sun. These neutrinos confirm a 90-year-old hypothesis and complete our picture of the fusion cycle of the Sun and other stars.

A new NASA release has converted astronomy data into sounds, allowing the listener to hear musical compositions derived from the structure of the cosmos. The process takes data points in images such as galaxies or stars, and assigns them sounds.

Astronomers are a step closer to solving a cosmic mystery, thanks to new Hubble data. Observations show a dwarf galaxy previously found to be missing most of its dark matter is being stripped and slowly torn apart by a larger nearby galaxy.

A team of astronomers has completed a massive survey of the Milky Way’s central bulge, which captured the light fingerprint of over 250 million stars, and could help provide new insights into our galaxy’s history and creation.

A new study has identified 1,004 stars from which aliens could detect signs of life in Earth’s atmosphere by watching as our planet passes across the disk of the Sun. The study could help provide targets for groups searching for alien civilizations.

The star Betelgeuse has dimmed twice in the past year. Now astronomers say they’ve found what may have caused the latest episode – and also discovered that the star is smaller, closer to Earth and further from exploding than previously thought.

Astronomers have witnessed a rare celestial light show – a star being stretched into “spaghetti” by a black hole. More than 200 million light-years from Earth, the dying star was ripped to shreds by immense gravitational forces over six months.

Astronomers have discovered a new exoplanet that belongs in a brand new class – an “ultrahot Neptune.” Known as LTT 9779b, the planet orbits extremely close to its star, and raises questions about how such a system came to be.

NASA has discovered a strange star system where a gas giant planet is tightly orbiting a tiny white dwarf. This the first sighting of such an arrangement, raising questions about how the planet survived the star’s expansive death in the first place.

NASA and NOAA have confirmed that the Sun has entered a new solar cycle, with activity beginning to ramp back up from its minimum in December 2019. This next cycle is forecast to be rather quiet, continuing a long-term trend of reduced activity.