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    Our closest neighboring galaxy may be being torn apart

    April 16, 2025, Categories  Uncategorized

    Velocities of massive star candidates within the SMC shown as vectors. The colors of the arrows represent the direction of motion. Relative to the LMC, located at the bottom left of the image, most red arrows show movement towards the LMC, whereas most light blue arrows show movement away from the LMC, suggesting they are being pulled apart. (credit: Satoya Nakano)

    Our closest neighboring galaxy may be being torn apart. Is the nearest galaxy to ours being torn apart? Research suggests so. A team led by Satoya Nakano and Kengo Tachihara at Nagoya University in Japan has revealed new insights into the motion of massive stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), a small galaxy neighboring the Milky Way...

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    Einstein Probe catches X-ray odd couple

    February 20, 2025, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Lobster-eye satellite Einstein Probe captured the X-ray flash from a very elusive celestial pair. The discovery opens a new way to explore how massive stars interact and evolve, confirming the unique power of the mission to uncover fleeting X-ray sources in the sky.

    The odd celestial couple consists of a big, hot star, more than 10 times larger than our Sun, and a small compact white dwarf, with a mass similar to our star. Only a handful of these systems have been found so far. And this the first time scientists could track the X-ray light coming from such a curious pair from its initial sudden flare-up to its fading away.

    On 27 May 2024, the Wide-field X-ray Telescope (WXT) on Einstein Probe spotted X-rays coming from within our neighbour galaxy, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC...

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    New study shows Small Magellanic Cloud is actually Two Smaller Galaxies

    December 28, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Top: Intensity-weighted mean velocity map of the SMC from Pingel et al (2022). The single contour indicates an Hi column density of 15×1020⁢cm−2. The center of the SMC used in this work (defined based on the stellar populations observed by Gaia Zivick et al, 2021) is marked with a magenta cross. Spatial bins are overlaid and identified with numbers. Bottom: The average Hi brightness temperature spectra (Tb⁢(vr)) profiles from spatial bins marked at left (black). Each panel includes shaded gray envelopes denoting the 16th through 84th percentile of the Tb⁢(vr) within each spatial bin. We observe that the radial velocity structure of Hi emission features multiple, distinct velocity peaks (and typically two, dominant components). Credit: arXiv (2023). DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2312...
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    Scientists discover one of the most Luminous ‘New Stars’ ever

    October 12, 2017, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Left: the nova system before eruption. Right: the nova system in outburst. Credit: OGLE survey

    Left: the nova system before eruption. Right: the nova system in outburst.
    Credit: OGLE survey

    University of Leicester contributes to best-ever results on a ‘new star’ in a nearby galaxy. Astronomers have today announced that they have discovered possibly the most luminous ‘new star’ ever – a nova discovered in the direction of one of our closest neighboring galaxies: The Small Magellanic Cloud.

    Astronomers used Swift satellite observatory to help understand what was likely the most luminous white dwarf eruption ever seen. A nova happens when an old star erupts dramatically back to life...

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