Category Astronomy/Space

Results of study from Ryugu samples.

Micrometeorites originating from icy celestial bodies in the outer Solar System may be responsible for transporting nitrogen to the near-Earth region in the early days of our solar system. That discovery was published today in Nature Astronomy by an international team of researchers, including University of Hawai’i at Manoa scientists, led by Kyoto University.

Nitrogen compounds, such as ammonium salts, are abundant in material born in regions far from the sun, but evidence of their transport to Earth’s orbital region had been poorly understood.

“Our recent findings suggests the possibility that a greater amount of nitrogen compounds than previously recognized was transported near Earth, potentially serving as building blocks for life on o...

The discovery of a planet that is far too massive for its sun is calling into question what was previously understood about the formation of planets and their solar systems, according to Penn State researchers.

In a paper published in the journal Science, researchers report the discovery of a planet more than 13 times as massive as Earth orbiting the “ultracool” star LHS3154, which itself is nine times less massive than the sun. The mass ratio of the newly found planet with its host star is more than 100 times higher than that of Earth and the sun.

The finding reveals th...

The asteroid that causes the Geminid shooting star swarm has also puzzled researchers with its comet-like tail. The infrared spectrum of rare meteorites helped to determine the composition of the asteroid.

Asteroid Phaethon, which is five kilometers in diameter, has been puzzling researchers for a long time. A comet-like tail is visible for a few days when the asteroid passes closest to the Sun during its orbit.

However, the tails of comets are usually formed by vaporizing ice and carbon dioxide, which cannot explain ...

This new Picture of the Month from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope reveals intricate details of the Herbig Haro object 797 (HH797). Herbig-Haro objects are luminous regions surrounding newborn stars (known as protostars), and are formed when stellar winds or jets of gas spewing from these newborn stars form shockwaves colliding with nearby gas and dust at high speeds.

HH 797, which dominates the lower half of this image, is located close to the young open star cluster IC348, which is located near the eastern edge of the Perseus dark cloud complex. The bright infrared objects in the upper portion of the image are thought to host two further protostars.

This image was captured with Webb’s Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam)...