Category Astronomy/Space

Neutron star mergers are a treasure trove for new physics signals, with implications for determining the true nature of dark matter, according to research from Washington University in St. Louis.

On Aug. 17, 2017, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO), in the United States, and Virgo, a detector in Italy, detected gravitational waves from the collision of two neutron stars. For the first time, this astronomical event was not only heard in gravitational waves but also seen in light by dozens of telescopes on the ground and in space.

Physicist Bhupal Dev in Arts & Sciences used observations from this neutron star merger — an ev...

Open any astronomy textbook to the section on white dwarf stars and you’ll likely learn that they are “dead stars” that continuously cool down over time. New research published in Nature is challenging this theory, with the University of Victoria (UVic) and its partners using data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite to reveal why a population of white dwarf stars stopped cooling for more than eight billion years.

“We discovered the classical picture of all white dwarfs being dead stars is incomplete,” says Simon Blouin, co-principal investigator and Canadian Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics National Fellow at UVic.

“For these white dw...

A team of astronomers has shed new light on the fascinating and complex process of planet formation. The research brings together observations of more than 80 young stars that might have planets forming around them, providing astronomers with a wealth of data and unique insights into how planets arise in different regions of our galaxy.

In a series of studies, a team of astronomers has shed new light on the fascinating and complex process of planet formation. The stunning images, captured using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT) in Chile, represent one of the largest ever surveys of planet-forming discs...

It takes more than a galaxy merger to make a black hole grow and new stars form: machine learning shows cold gas is needed too to initiate rapid growth — new research finds.

When they are active, supermassive black holes play a crucial role in the way galaxies evolve. Until now, growth was thought to be triggered by the violent collision of two galaxies followed by their merger, however new research led by the University of Bath suggests galaxy mergers alone are not enough to fuel a black hole — a reservoir of cold gas at the centre the host galaxy is needed too.

The new study, published this week in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society is believed to be the first to use machine learnin...