NGC 6240 as seen by the Hubble Space Telescope. Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration, and A. Evans (University of Virginia, Charlottesville/NRAO/Stony Brook University)

Researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder have completed an unprecedented “dissection” of twin galaxies in the final stages of merging. The new study, led by CU Boulder research associate Francisco Müller-Sánchez, explores a galaxy called NGC 6240. While most galaxies in the universe hold only one supermassive black hole at their center, NGC 6240 contains two – and they’re circling each other in the last steps before crashing together.

The research reveals how gases ejected by those spiraling black holes, in combination with gases ejected by stars in the galaxy, may have beg...

A schematic of the HERMES instrument showing the light path of how star light from the telescope AAT is split into four different channels. Credit: The Australian Astronomical Observatory (AAO)

An Australian-led group of astronomers working with European collaborators has revealed the “DNA” of more than 340,000 stars in the Milky Way, which should help them find the siblings of the Sun, now scattered across the sky. This is a major announcement from an ambitious Galactic Archaeology survey, called GALAH, launched in late 2013 as part of a quest to uncover the formulation and evolution of galaxies. When complete, GALAH will investigate more than a million stars.

The GALAH survey used the HERMES spectrograph at the Australian Astronomical Observatory’s (AAO) 3...

DARKNESS (the DARK-speckle Near-infrared Energy-resolved Superconducting Spectrophotometer) can detect planets around the nearest stars. Credit: Image courtesy of University of California – Santa Barbara

Physicists and astronomers commission the most advanced superconducting camera in the world. Somewhere in the vastness of the universe another habitable planet likely exists. And it may not be that far – astronomically speaking – from our own solar system. Distinguishing that planet’s light from its star, however, can be problematic. But an international team led by UC Santa Barbara physicist Benjamin Mazin has developed a new instrument to detect planets around the nearest stars. It is the world’s largest and most advanced superconducting camera...

This is a conceptual image of spin current flow in a superconductor. Credit: Jason Robinson

Researchers have shown that certain superconductors – materials that carry electrical current with zero resistance at very low temperatures – can also carry currents of ‘spin’. The successful combination of superconductivity and spin could lead to a revolution in high-performance computing, by dramatically reducing energy consumption.

Spin is a particle’s intrinsic angular momentum, and is normally carried in non-superconducting, non-magnetic materials by individual electrons. Spin can be ‘up’ or ‘down’, and for any given material, there is a maximum length that spin can be carried...