Category Archives: "Science"

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This artist’s illustration depicts 2025 MN45 — the fastest-rotating asteroid with a diameter over 500 meters that scientists have ever found. The asteroid is shown surrounded by many other asteroids, depicting its location within the main asteroid belt. The Sun and Jupiter are shown in the distance. 2025 MN45 is 710 meters (0.44 miles) in diameter, and it completes a full rotation every 1.88 minutes. The discovery was made using data from NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory, jointly funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science.

NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory Spots Record-Breaking Asteroid in Pre-Survey Observations

First peer-reviewed paper using LSST Camera data identifies an asteroid, nearly the size of eight football fields, rotating every two ...
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A region of space mostly filled with background galaxies, with one prominent star at upper left. A large blob of purple haze occupies much of the field. Within the purple region, an unremarkable area is outlined with a dashed white circle.

NASA’s Hubble Examines Cloud-9, First of New Type of Object

A team using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has uncovered a new type of astronomical object — a starless, gas-rich, dark-matter cloud considered a “relic” ...
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Image labeled Fomalhaut system, Hubble Space Telescope. A grainy orange oval ring tilts slightly from upper right to lower left. At two o'clock, a white box outlines the ring's edge and white lines extend to a larger pullout box at lower right. Two spots inside the larger box are marked with dashed white circles and labeled cs1 2012 and cs2 2023. Inside the ring is a black circle with a white star symbol in the middle.

NASA’s Hubble Sees Asteroids Colliding at Nearby Star for First Time

Like a game of cosmic bumper cars, scientists think the early days of our solar system were a time of ...
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Bright reds, yellows and orange points of lights are scattered on a black background Some are obviously galaxies with small pinwheel shape and others are just points of light. In the Center is a bright blue glowing object next to a fainter orange one.

Bright Blue Cosmic Outbursts Likely Caused by Large Black Holes Shredding Massive Companions

In 2024, astronomers discovered the brightest Luminous Fast Blue Optical Transient (LFBOT) ever observed. LFBOTs are extremely bright flashes of ...
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llustration labeled “artist’s concept” at right bottom corner. At left bottom corner, a partially illuminated, lemon-shaped exoplanet appears against a black background. This planet is most brightly illuminated at its elongated tip on its right side. On the left side, which is wider, the planet trails off into the darkness of the background. The planet is colored in varying, mottled shades of red, light pink, and fuchsia. Most of the pink occurs closest to the tip, while most of the fuchsia is at the top and bottom edges. At right top corner, a white beam emanates diagonally, oriented from 10 o’clock to 4 o’clock, from either side of a small, glowing, white star.

NASA’s Webb Observes Exoplanet Whose Composition Defies Explanation

Scientists using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have observed a rare type of exoplanet, or planet outside our solar system, whose ...
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A scattering of white points, each representing a galaxy. Fuzzy circles colored orange, yellow-green, and blue show voids of various sizes where there are few galaxies.

NASA’s Roman Telescope Will Observe Thousands of Newfound Cosmic Voids

Our universe is filled with galaxies, in all directions as far as our instruments can see. Some researchers estimate that ...
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a bright light is in the center of the image is surrounded by a greenish glow on a dark black background.

Gemini North Color Images Reveal Greenish Glow of Comet 3I/ATLAS

Gemini North captured new images of Comet 3I/ATLAS after it reemerged from behind the Sun on its path out of ...
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An illustration of the Solar system with the Sun in bright orange and yellow at the center and a light blue Earth in the foreground – all on a blue background.

Two Eyes on the Sun: Unveiling Solar Dynamics with Coordinated Observations

In October 2022, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope and the European Space Agency (ESA) ...
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Gemini South Celebrates 25th Anniversary With Stunning Snapshot of the Butterfly Nebula

Gemini South Celebrates 25th Anniversary With Stunning Snapshot of the Butterfly Nebula

To celebrate 25 years since the completion of the International Gemini Observatory, students in Chile voted for the Gemini South ...
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Mosaic titled “Red Giant Echoes with Roman,” which shows 11 artist’s concepts of stars, including the Sun and 10 red giants of various radii against a black background. The illustrations are organized roughly into three rows with the grid size of the largest red giant star, located in the bottom right, the equivalent of two rows. Each star is depicted as a bright and blotchy orb. Starting with the mosaic’s smallest star, the Sun, in the top left corner and shifting to the right before moving to the next row, the illustrations become gradually larger and change from shades of light orange to red-orange. Each star’s radius is placed at the bottom of its grid. From left to right, the four light orange stars in the top row are listed with the following radii: Sun, Radius 1.0; Radius 6.3; Radius 7.0, and Radius 7.8. The second row has three orange stars and reads: Radius 8.8; Radius 9.7; and Radius 10.7. The third has four red-orange stars and reads: Radius 11.8; Radius 15.0; Radius 20.1; and Radius 33.7.

NASA’s Roman Could Bring New Waves of Information on Galaxy’s Stars

A team of researchers has confirmed stars ring loud and clear in a “key” that will harmonize well with the ...
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Webb First to Show 4 Dust Shells ‘Spiraling’ Apep, Limits Long Orbit

Webb First to Show 4 Dust Shells ‘Spiraling’ Apep, Limits Long Orbit

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has delivered a first of its kind: a crisp mid-infrared image of a system of ...
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Ua ʻŌhiʻa Lani: An Image to Celebrate Gemini North’s 25th Anniversary features a red-orange background dotted by stars. Tall dark pillars of gas and dust rise in the foreground.

Students in Hawai‘i Name Mesmerizing Image Ua ʻŌhiʻa Lani for the International Gemini Observatory’s 25th Anniversary

To celebrate 25 years since the completion of the International Gemini Observatory, students in Hawai‘i voted for the Gemini North ...
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