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    Category Astronomy/Space

    New Small Laser Device can help Detect Signs of Life on other Planets

    January 18, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Photo of the Orbitrap mass analyzer from the prototype instrument. Photo courtesy of Lori Willhite and Ricardo Arevalo.

    Mini-analyzer may revolutionize how astrobiology discoveries are made on faraway moons and planets. As space missions delve deeper into the outer solar system, the need for more compact, resource-conserving and accurate analytical tools has become increasingly critical — especially as the hunt for extraterrestrial life and habitable planets or moons continues.

    A University of Maryland-led team developed a new instrument specifically tailored to the needs of NASA space missions...

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    How did the Butterfly Nebula get its Wings? It’s complicated

    January 18, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    A color rendition of NGC 6302, the Butterfly Nebula, created from black-and-white exposures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2019 and 2020. In the violet-colored regions, strong stellar winds are actively reshaping the nebular wings over the past 900 years. The other features range in age from 1200 to 2300 years.Bruce Balick/University of Washington/Joel Kastner/Paula Baez Moraga/Rochester Institute of Technology/Space Telescope Science Institute

    Something is amiss in the Butterfly Nebula. When astronomers compared two exposures of this planetary nebula that had been taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2009 and 2020, they saw dramatic changes in the material within its ‘wings...

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    Hubble finds Hungry Black Hole Twisting captured Star into Donut Shape

    January 17, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    This sequence of artist’s illustrations shows how a black hole can devour a bypassing star. 1. A normal star passes near a supermassive black hole in the center of a galaxy. 2. The star’s outer gasses are pulled into the black hole’s gravitational field. 3. The star is shredded as tidal forces pull it apart. 4. The stellar remnants are pulled into a donut-shaped ring around the black hole, and will eventually fall into the black hole, unleashing a tremendous amount of light and high-energy radiation.
    Credits: NASA, ESA, Leah Hustak (STScI)

    Black holes are gatherers, not hunters. They lie in wait until a hapless star wanders by...

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    How do Rocky Planets really form?

    January 17, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Scientists unveil a unified theory for rocky planet formation. A new theory for how rocky planets form could explain the origin of so-called “super-Earths” – a class of exoplanets a few times more massive than the Earth that are the most abundant type of planet in the galaxy.

    Further, it could explain why super-Earths within a single planetary system often wind up looking strangely similar in size, as though each system were only capable of producing a single kind of planet.

    “As our observations of exoplanets have grown over the past decade, it has become clear that the standard theory of planet formation needs to be revised, starting with the fundamentals...

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