Category Astronomy/Space

Artist’s impression of the ten hot Jupiter exoplanets studied by David Sing and his colleagues. From top left to to lower left these planets are WASP-12b, WASP-6b, WASP-31b, WASP-39b, HD 189733b, HAT-P-12b, WASP-17b, WASP-19b, HAT-P-1b and HD 209458b. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

Astronomers have used Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescope to study the atmospheres of 10 hot, Jupiter-sized exoplanets in detail, the largest number of such planets ever studied. The team was able to discover why some of these worlds seem to have less water than expected—a long-standing mystery.

To date, astronomers have discovered nearly 2000 planets orbiting other stars. Some are known as hot Jupiters, hot, gaseous planets with characteristics similar to those of Jupiter...

Earlier this month the unmanned explorer, Hayabusa 2, passed by Earth to harness the planet’s gravitational pull in a bid to switch its orbital path to continue toward tiny Ryugu asteroid Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-12-japan-asteroid-probe-orbit-space.html#jCp

It is is on its way to rendezvousing with a far away asteroid, in a quest to study the origin of the solar system, authorities said Monday. Earlier this month the unmanned explorer, Hayabusa 2, passed by Earth to harness the planet’s gravitational pull in a bid to switch its orbital path to continue toward tiny Ryugu asteroid.

“The Hayabusa 2… entered the target orbit to travel to the asteroid,” Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said in a statement.
Hayabusa 2 was launched a year ago aboard Japan’s main H-IIA rock...

ALMA prototype-antennas at the ALMA test facility. Credit: ESO

2 separate teams of researchers (one from Mexico, the other Sweden), have incited skepticism among the astronomy community by posting papers on the preprint server arXiv each describing a different large object they observed in the outer edges of the solar system. Both teams made their observations after reviewing data from ALMA—a cluster of radio dishes in the Chilean mountains.

The two ALMA detections on March 20 and April 14, 2014. (Credit: V. H. T. Vlemmings et al., 2015)

One of the objects was found to be near W Aquilae in the night sky—the other adjacent to Alpha Centauri ...