Astronomers report that they have observed the most luminous galaxies ever seen in the Universe, objects so bright that established descriptors such as 'ultra-' and 'hyper-luminous' used to describe previously brightest known galaxies don't even come close.
Research has found new persuasive evidence that could help solve a longstanding mystery in astrophysics: why did the pace of star formation in the universe slow down some 11 billion years ago?
This animation is based on photometric observations made by NASA’s Kepler space telescope. By closely monitoring the star KSN 2011d, located 1.2 billion light-years away, Kepler caught the onset of the early flash and subsequent explosion.
University of Washington astronomers have identified a rare type of supernova
Astronomers have found the largest known solar system, linking together a star and what was thought to be a free-floating 'lonely planet' in orbit some 1 trillion (1 million million) kilometres away from its sun.
Someone hug Interstellar’s science advisor. Just like in the film, a new study finds that a black hole with exactly the right temperature could serve as a cold sun and even support complex lifeforms.
Origin of exploding star that is twice as luminous as any other remains unclear. Seven months after it was first spotted, a puzzle still hangs over the origin of the brightest supernova ever seen.
Like a blinding beacon lighting up the night, a powerful gamma-ray-generating stellar husk has been seen pulsating in a neighboring galaxy.
Astronomers at the University of Maryland, observed the event, which is the closest tidal disruption discovered in about a decade.
Nearly 13.7 billion years ago, the universe was made of only hydrogen, helium and traces of lithium — byproducts of the Big Bang. Some 300 million years later, the very first stars emerged, creating additional chemical elements throughout the universe. Since then, giant stellar explosions, or supernovas, have given rise to carbon, oxygen, iron and the rest of the 94 naturally occurring elements of the periodic table.
A team of European astronomers has used ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) to track down a star in the Milky Way that many thought was impossible. They discovered that this star is composed almost entirely of hydrogen and helium, with only remarkably small amounts of other chemical elements in it. This intriguing composition places it in the “forbidden zone” of a widely accepted theory of star formation, meaning that it should never have come into existence in the first place. The results will appear in the 1 September 2011 issue of the journal Nature.
A University of Sydney researcher was part of an international team of astronomers that has observed an incredibly rare event that occurs once every 10,000 years per galaxy.
Astronomers have discovered 96 new open star clusters hidden by the dust in the Milky Way. These tiny and faint objects were invisible to previous surveys, but they could not escape the sensitive infrared detectors of the world
Using the VISIR instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have imaged a complex and bright nebula around the supergiant star Betelgeuse in greater detail than ever before. This structure, which resembles flames emanating from the star, is formed as the behemoth sheds its material into space.
