Category Astronomy/Space

Newfound black holes in dwarf galaxies shed light on the origin of our galaxy’s supermassive black hole. A team led by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has found a previously overlooked treasure trove of massive black holes in dwarf galaxies. The newly discovered black holes offer a glimpse into the life story of the supermassive black hole at the center of our own Milky Way galaxy.

As a giant spiral galaxy, the Milky Way is believed to have been built up from mergers of many smaller dwarf galaxies...

Nearly half of Sun-size stars are binary. According to University of Copenhagen research, planetary systems around binary stars may be very different from those around single stars. This points to new targets in the search for extraterrestrial life forms.

Since the only known planet with life, the Earth, orbits the Sun, planetary systems around stars of similar size are obvious targets for astronomers trying to locate extraterrestrial life. Nearly every second star in that category is a binary star.

“The result is exciting since the search for extraterrestrial life will be equipped with several new, extremely powerful instruments within the coming years...

Physicists led by the University of Iowa have learned how a type of aurora on Mars is formed.

In a new study, the physicists studied discrete aurora, a light-in-the-sky display that occurs mostly during the night in the red planet’s southern hemisphere. While scientists have known about discrete aurora on Mars-which also occur on Earth – they did not know how they formed...

A unique new instrument, coupled with a powerful telescope and a little help from nature, has given researchers the ability to peer into galactic nurseries at the heart of the young universe.

After the big bang some 13.8 billion years ago, the early universe was filled with enormous clouds of neutral diffuse gas, known as Damped Lyman-α systems, or DLAs. These DLAs served as galactic nurseries, as the gasses within slowly condensed to fuel the formation of stars and galaxies. They can still be observed today, but it isn’t easy.

“DLAs are a key to understanding how galaxie...