Category Astronomy/Space

Scale in the universe is hard to understand from a purely human perspective. Many times, the math just doesn’t sit well with our brains, which evolved to capture and process data about the world around us rather than grok the complexities of stellar dynamics and galaxy mergers. But every once in a while, astronomers find something that, if we can wrap our heads around the numbers, gives a sense of just how big the universe is.

That is precisely what a new paper, available on the arXiv preprint server from a group of astronomers led by Z.L...

A Japanese space probe performed a flyby of a near-Earth asteroid on Sunday in a test mission for technology that could help protect the planet from space rocks.

The fridge-sized Hayabusa2 was due to fly within 800 meters (0...

Astronomers have spotted many “red and dead” galaxies in the early universe. These are massive systems that stopped forming stars surprisingly early in cosmic history. Now, they may have found evidence of one in the act of becoming dead: a massive galaxy being stripped of its starforming gas just 1.4 billion years after the Big Bang...

Astronomers have revealed new details about the makeup and age of a visiting comet that was born around a distant star. They conclude that the composition of 3I/Atlas is strikingly different from any object found in our solar system.

A trio of recently published studies shed light on the origins of this exotic comet. 3I/Atlas appears to have been born in a cold environment, possibly around 12 billion years ago.

The comet is an interstellar object (ISO), meaning an asteroid or comet that originated outside the solar system. It is the third such object found, after 1I/ʻOumuamua and 2I/Borisov. It was discovered almost exactly one year ago, traveling inbound on a trajectory that has taken it through the inner solar system and out the other side.

These distant origins make ISOs ...