Category: Universe

  • NASA’s TESS Spacecraft Triples Size of Pleiades Star Cluster

    NASA’s TESS Spacecraft Triples Size of Pleiades Star Cluster

    Astronomers have revolutionized our understanding of a collection of stars in the northern sky called the Pleiades. They used data from NASA’s TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite) and other observatories as NASA explores the secrets of the universe for the…

  • 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 four serpentine spirals of dust, one expanding beyond the next in precisely the same pattern. (The fourth is almost transparent,…

  • Hubble Studies Star Ages in Colorful Galaxy

    Hubble Studies Star Ages in Colorful Galaxy

    Stars of all ages are on display in this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image of the sparkling spiral galaxy called NGC 6000, located 102 million light-years away in the constellation Scorpius. NGC 6000 has a glowing yellow center and glittering…

  • Discovery Alert: ‘Baby’ Planet Photographed in a Ring around a Star for the First Time!

    Discovery Alert: ‘Baby’ Planet Photographed in a Ring around a Star for the First Time!

    The (Proto) Planet: WISPIT 2b The Discovery: Researchers have discovered a young protoplanet called WISPIT 2b embedded in a ring-shaped gap in a disk encircling a young star. While theorists have thought that planets likely exist in these gaps (and…

  • NASA’s Webb Telescope Studies Moon-Forming Disk Around Massive Planet

    NASA’s Webb Telescope Studies Moon-Forming Disk Around Massive Planet

    NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has provided the first direct measurements of the chemical and physical properties of a potential moon-forming disk encircling a large exoplanet. The carbon-rich disk surrounding the world called CT Cha b, which is located 625…

  • Hubble Captures Puzzling Galaxy

    Hubble Captures Puzzling Galaxy

    This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features a galaxy that’s hard to categorize. The galaxy in question is NGC 2775, which lies 67 million light-years away in the constellation Cancer (the Crab). NGC 2775 sports a smooth, featureless center that…

  • NASA’s Webb Explores Largest Star-Forming Cloud in Milky Way

    NASA’s Webb Explores Largest Star-Forming Cloud in Milky Way

    NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has revealed a colorful array of massive stars and glowing cosmic dust in the Sagittarius B2 molecular cloud, the most massive and active star-forming region in our Milky Way galaxy. “Webb’s powerful infrared instruments provide…

  • Hubble Images Celestial Cigar’s Smoldering Heart

    Hubble Images Celestial Cigar’s Smoldering Heart

    This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image reveals new details in Messier 82 (M82), home to brilliant stars whose light is shaded by sculptural clouds made of clumps and streaks of dust and gas. This image features the star-powered heart of…

  • NASA’s Hubble Sees White Dwarf Eating Piece of Pluto-Like Object

    NASA’s Hubble Sees White Dwarf Eating Piece of Pluto-Like Object

    In our nearby stellar neighborhood, a burned-out star is snacking on a fragment of a Pluto-like object. With its unique ultraviolet capability, only NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope could identify that this meal is taking place. The stellar remnant is a…

  • Hubble Surveys Cloudy Cluster

    Hubble Surveys Cloudy Cluster

    This new NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features a cloudy starscape from an impressive star cluster. This scene is in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy situated about 160,000 light-years away in the constellations Dorado and Mensa. With a…