This artist’s illustration depicts the destruction of a young planet, which scientists may have witnessed for the first time. Credit: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss

An analysis of X-ray data suggests the first observations of a star swallowing a planet, and may also explain the star’s mysterious dimming. For nearly a century, astronomers have puzzled over the curious variability of young stars residing in the Taurus-Auriga constellation some 450 light years from Earth. One star in particular has drawn astronomers’ attention. Every few decades, the star’s light has faded briefly before brightening again.

In recent years, astronomers have observed the star dimming more frequently, and for longer periods, raising the question: What is repeatedly obscuring the star? The answer, astronomers believe, could sh...

Traditional spanish tapas or italian antipasti.. Martin Cloutier, Mallik Greene, Annie Guerin, Maelys Touya, Eric Wu. The economic burden of bipolar I disorder in the United States in 2015. Journal of Affective Disorders, 2018; 226: 45 DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2017.09.011

An analysis of more than 1,000 people with and without psychiatric disorders has shown that nitrates – chemicals used to cure meats such as beef jerky, salami, hot dogs and other processed meat snacks – may contribute to mania, an abnormal mood state. Mania is characterized by hyperactivity, euphoria and insomnia.

The findings of the Johns Hopkins Medicine study, which was not designed to determine cause and effect, were published July 18 in Molecular Psychiatry...

The image of the planet Neptune on the left was obtained during the testing of the Narrow-Field adaptive optics mode of the MUSE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope. The image on the right is a comparable image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Note that the two images were not taken at the same time so do not show identical surface features.

ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) has achieved first light with a new adaptive optics mode called laser tomography – and has captured remarkably sharp test images of the planet Neptune and other objects. The MUSE instrument working with the GALACSI adaptive optics module, can now use this new technique to correct for turbulence at different altitudes in the atmosphere...