Category Astronomy/Space

For generations, physicists were sure the laws of physics were perfectly symmetric. Until they weren’t.

Symmetry is a tidy and attractive idea that falls apart in our untidy universe. Indeed, since the 1960s, some kind of broken symmetry has been required to explain why there is more matter than antimatter in the universe—why, that is, that any of this exists at all.

But pinning down the source behind this existential symmetry violation, even finding proof of it, has been impossible.

Yet in a new paper published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, University of Florida astronomers have found the first evidence of this necessary violation of symmetry at the moment of creation...

Scientists used ground-based telescopes to get unprecedented views, thanks to the giant planet’s position in its long orbit around the sun.

For the first time, NASA scientists have strong evidence of a polar cyclone on Uranus. By examining radio waves emitted from the ice giant, they detected the phenomenon at the planet’s north pole...

An international research team led by Professor Long Xiao from the School of Earth Sciences of China University of Geosciences (Wuhan) has discovered the presence of marine sedimentary rocks on the surface of Mars for the first time by comprehensively analyzing the scientific data obtained by the multispectral camera (MSCam) carried by the Zhurong rover...

In the latest issue of the journal Nature, astronomers from Stockholm University reveal the origin of a thermonuclear supernova explosion. Strong emission lines of helium and the first detection of such a supernova in radio waves show that the exploding white dwarf star had a helium-rich companion.

Supernovae of Type Ia are important for astronomers since they are used to measure the expansion of the Universe. However, the origin of these explosions has remained an open question...