The Ant Nebula, as imaged by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, resembles the head and body of a garden ant. In reality, it’s the result of a dying sun-like star and complex interactions of material at its heart. Credit: NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

An international team of astronomers have discovered an unusual laser emission that suggests the presence of a double star system hidden at the heart of the “spectacular” Ant Nebula. The extremely rare phenomenon is connected to the death of a star and was discovered in observations made by European Space Agency’s (ESA) Herschel space observatory.

When low- to middleweight stars like our Sun approach the end of their lives they eventually become dense, white dwarf stars...

Illustration of the quantum entanglement achieved between the two clouds of atoms starting from a single Bose-Einstein condensate. Credit: Iagoba Apellaniz. UPV/EHU

Scientists have achieved, in an experiment, quantum entanglement between 2 Bose-Einstein condensates, spatially separated from each other. Quantum entanglement was discovered by Schrödinger and later studied by Einstein and other scientists in the last century. The groups of entangled particles lose their individuality and behave as a single entity. Any change in one of the particles leads to an immediate response in the other, even if they are spatially separated...

A NASA artist’s impression of Earth as a frigid “‘snowball” planet. New research from the University of Washington indicates that aspects of an otherwise habitable-seeming exoplanet planet’s axial tilt or orbit could trigger such a snowball state, where oceans freeze and surface life is likely impossible. Credit: NASA

Aspects of an otherwise Earthlike planet’s tilt and orbital dynamics can severely affect its potential habitability – even triggering abrupt “snowball states” where oceans freeze and surface life is impossible, according to new research from astronomers at the University of Washington...

Chiral molecule. Credit: Palitel and Naaman

A new study published in Science by Professors Yossi Paltiel of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Ron Naaman from the Weizmann Institute of Science describes a breakthrough technology with the power to create drugs with fewer unwanted side effects. The most important molecules in biology are chiral molecules. “Chiral,” the Greek word for “hand,” describes molecules that look almost exactly alike and contain the same number of atoms but are mirror images of one another – i.e. some “left-handed” and others are “right-handed.” This different “handedness” is crucial and yields different biological effects.

Understanding chiral differences was made painfully clear by the drug thalidomide...