Category Astronomy/Space

Magnetic fields are ubiquitous throughout the Milky Way galaxy and play a crucial role in all dynamics of interstellar medium. However, questions like how solar-type stars form out of magnetized molecular clouds, whether the role of magnetic fields changes at various scales and densities of molecular clouds, and what factors can change the morphology of magnetic fields in low-mass dense cores still remain unclear.

A new study led by Dr. Eswaraiah Chakali from Prof...

Very high atmospheric CO2 levels can explain the high temperatures on the still young Earth three to four billion years ago. At the time, our Sun shone with only 70 to 80 percent of its present intensity. Nevertheless, the climate on the young Earth was apparently quite warm because there was hardly any glacial ice. This phenomenon is known as the ‘paradox of the young weak Sun...

First three years of survey data uses observations of 226 million galaxies over 1/8 of the sky...

New image made using NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory hints at previously unknown interstellar energy source at the Milky Way center. New research by University of Massachusetts Amherst astronomer Daniel Wang reveals, with unprecedented clarity, details of violent phenomena in the center of our galaxy. The images, published recently in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, document an X-ray thread, G0.17-0.41, which hints at a previously unknown interstellar mechanism that may govern the energy flow and potentially the evolution of the Milky Way.

“The galaxy is like an ecosystem,” says Wang, a professor in UMass Amherst’s astronomy department, wh...