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    Category Astronomy/Space

    The Farthest Galaxy in the universe

    December 17, 2020, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    A starfield
    Far far away. Due to the expansion of the universe, even though the galaxy GN-z11 is 13.4 billion years old, the light from it has travelled 32 billion light years to reach us. Image: Pixabay CC-0

    Chemical Signatures give away the distance to the most distant galaxy

    A team of astronomers used the Keck I telescope to measure the distance to an ancient galaxy. They deduced the target galaxy GN-z11 is not only the oldest galaxy but also the most distant. It’s so distant it defines the very boundary of the observable universe itself. The team hopes this study can shed light on a period of cosmological history when the universe was only a few hundred million years old.

    We’ve all asked ourselves the big questions at times: “How big is the universe?” or “How and when did galaxies form?”...

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    Japan space agency finds ample Soil, Gas from Asteroid

    December 15, 2020, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    This Dec. 14, 2020, photo released by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), shows black grains, right, thought to be from Ryugu are inside the sample container of the re-entry capsule of Hayabusa2, in Sagamihara, near Tokyo. Japan’s space agency said Monday it has confirmed the presence of black soil samples inside a capsule that the spacecraft Hayabusa2 brought back from a distant asteroid last week. (JAXA via AP)

    Officials from Japan’s space agency said Tuesday they have found more than the anticipated amount of soil and gases inside a small capsule the country’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft brought back from a distant asteroid this month, a mission they praised as a milestone for planetary research.

    The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency said its staff initially spotted some bla...

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    Exoplanet around Distant Star resembles reputed ‘Planet Nine’ in our solar system

    December 15, 2020, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    This Hubble Space Telescope image shows one possible orbit (dashed ellipse) of the 11-Jupiter-mass exoplanet HD 106906 b. This remote world is widely separated from its host stars, whose brilliant light is masked here to allow the planet to be seen. The planet resides outside its system’s circumstellar debris disk, which is akin to our own Kuiper Belt of small, icy bodies beyond Neptune. The disk itself is asymmetric and distorted, perhaps due to the gravitational tug of the wayward planet. Other points of light in the image are background stars. (Image by NASA, ESA, Meiji Nguyen/UC Berkeley, Robert De Rosa/ESO and Paul Kalas/UC Berkeley and SETI Institute)

    Astronomers confirm bound orbit for planet far from its star, showing that far-flung planets exist...

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    A look at the Sun’s Dusty Environment

    December 12, 2020, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    A look at the sun's dusty environment - Tech Explorist
    arker Solar Probe circles in front of the sun in this artist rendering. (Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins APL, Steve Gribben)

    Researchers from the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) at the University of Colorado Boulder are diving into the dusty environment that surrounds the sun — a search that could help to reveal how planets like Earth come into being.

    The pursuit comes by way of NASA’s Parker Solar Probe, a pioneering mission that has taken scientists closer to Earth’s home star than any spacecraft to date. Over two years, the probe has circled the sun six times, hitting maximum speeds of roughly 290,000 miles per hour.

    In the process, the Parker team has learned a lot about the microscopic grains of dust that lie just beyond the sun’s atmosphere, said David Malas...

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