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    Category Astronomy/Space

    Scientists find evidence for Magnetic Reconnection between Ganymede and Jupiter

    January 11, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Colorful arrows and dashed lines of data characterizing the magnetic topology and electron flow direction for two different reconnection scenarios at Danymede's magnetopause
    In June 2021, NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew close to Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon, observing evidence of magnetic reconnection. An SwRI-led team used Juno data to characterize the magnetic topology and electron flow direction for two different reconnection scenarios at Ganymede’s magnetopause. The yellow dashed line indicates Juno’s trajectory. Courtesy of SwRI/Jia et al. (2008)

    Juno spacecraft discovered magnetospheric fireworks as magnetic field lines merge and snap between the gas giant and its largest moon. In June 2021, NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew close to Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon, observing evidence of magnetic reconnection...

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    Scientists find Pair of Black Holes Dining Together in Nearby Galaxy Merger

    January 11, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO); M. Weiss (NRAO/AUI/NSF)

    While studying a nearby pair of merging galaxies using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) – an international observatory co-operated by the U.S. National Science Foundation’s National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) – scientists discovered two supermassive black holes growing simultaneously near the center of the newly coalescing galaxy. These super-hungry giants are the closest together that scientists have ever observed in multiple wavelengths. What’s more, the new research reveals that binary black holes and the galaxy mergers that create them may be surprisingly commonplace in the Universe...

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    NASA’s Webb Telescope reveals Links between Galaxies Near and Far

    January 10, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    A trio of faint objects (circled) captured in the James Webb Space Telescope’s deep image of the galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 exhibit properties remarkably similar to rare, small galaxies called “green peas” found much closer to home. The cluster’s mass makes it a gravitational lens, which both magnifies and distorts the appearance of background galaxies. We view these early peas as they existed when the universe was about 5% its current age of 13.8 billion years. The farthest pea, at left, contains just 2% the oxygen abundance of a galaxy like our own and might be the most chemically primitive galaxy yet identified.
    Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI

    A new analysis of distant galaxies imaged by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope shows that they are extremely young and share some rem...

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    James Webb Telescope reveals Milky Way-like Galaxies in Young Universe

    January 10, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Comparison of same galaxy imaged by Hubble Space Telescope and by James Webb Space Telescope
    The power of JWST to map galaxies at high resolution and at longer infrared wavelengths than Hubble allows it look through dust and unveil the underlying structure and mass of distant galaxies. This can be seen in these two images of the galaxy EGS23205, seen as it was about 11 billion years ago. In the HST image (left, taken in the near-infrared filter), the galaxy is little more than a disk-shaped smudge obscured by dust and impacted by the glare of young stars, but in the corresponding JWST mid-infrared image (taken this past summer), it’s a beautiful spiral galaxy with a clear stellar bar. Credit: NASA/CEERS/University of Texas at Austin

    New images from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) reveal for the first time galaxies with stellar bars — elongated features of stars stre...

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