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A team of astronomers has claimed that observations of a sun-like star orbiting a small black hole might actually be the indication of something far more exotic—the existence of a boson star, a star composed entirely of dark matter.

The Gaia survey, led by the European Space Agency, provided detailed maps of more than a billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy. While almost all of those stars behaved as expected, there were some surprises. For example, one star in particular was seen orbiting a dark companion.

The star itself was fairly typical, weighing in at 0.93 solar masses and with roughly the same chemical abundance as our own sun...

A team led by researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine, the University of Wisconsin-Madison; Scripps Research and the University of Chicago has identified an antibody that appears to block infection by all dominantvariants of the virus that causes COVID-19, including Omicron, the most recent. Their discovery could lead to more potent vaccines and new antibody-based treatments.

In a study published March 6 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, senior author Dr. Patrick Wilson, the Anne E...

To gaze at the stars is human. To be able to see them in 3D detail is very nearly divine.
Divine vision is what the James Webb Space Telescope has granted Earthbound scientists in a new near-infrared, detailed image of Cassiopeia A (Cas A), a stellar remnant—the clouds of gas, dust and other material left behind when a star dies. Danny Milisavljevic, assistant professor of physics and astronomy in Purdue University’s College of Science, studies supernova remnants and leads a year one research team on the JWST examining Cas A.

“I have spent 17 years studying stars and their ...

Like batteries, fuel cells produce energy through an electrochemical process. Unlike batteries, they don’t run down or require recharging. However, the potential advantages of fuel cells are offset by challenges that include cost, performance and durability.

Michigan Technological University researcher Yun Hang ...