Science Daily

Astronomers have used the NASA/ESA James Webb Space Telescope to confirm that supermassive black holes can starve their host galaxies of the fuel they need to form new stars.

Physicists propose that a mysterious force known as early dark energy could solve two of the biggest puzzles in cosmology and fill in some major gaps in our understanding of how the early universe evolved.

Astronomers have directed NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to examine the outskirts of our Milky Way galaxy. Scientists call this region the Extreme Outer Galaxy due to its location more than 58,000 light-years away from the Galactic Center. (For comparison, Earth is approximately 26,000 light-years from the center.)

Astronomers have achieved a major breakthrough in solar physics by successfully producing detailed maps of the Sun's coronal magnetic fields. This milestone promises to enhance our understanding of the Sun's atmosphere and how its changing conditions lead to impacts on Earth's technology-dependent society. The corona, or the Sun's outer atmosphere, greatly influences solar winds and space weather events like solar flares and coronal mass ejections. However, the magnetic forces that drive these events and the corona are challenging to measure.

Mold can survive the harshest of environments, so to stop harmful spores from growing on future space stations, a study suggests a way to prevent its spread.

In a new study, astronomers report novel evidence regarding the limits of planet formation, finding that after a certain point, planets larger than Earth have difficulty forming near low-metallicity stars.

An AI-powered tool can distinguish dark matter's elusive effects from other cosmic phenomena, which could bring us closer to unlocking the secrets of dark matter.

A team models the atmospheres of distant planets using neural networks.

Researchers have discovered compelling evidence suggesting that the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy, known as Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), is likely the result of a past cosmic merger. The study builds on recent observations from the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT), which captured the first direct image of Sgr A* in 2022.

A research team has discovered a small planet that displays peculiar orbital motion. The shimmying planet, located 455 light-years from Earth, shows that planetary systems can be considerably more complex than researchers have previously thought.

It's 7 billion years ago, and the universe's heyday of star formation is beginning to slow. What might our Milky Way galaxy have looked like at that time? Astronomers have found clues in the form of a cosmic question mark, the result of a rare alignment across light-years of space.

Around 4 billion years ago, an asteroid hit the Jupiter moon Ganymede. Now, a researcher realized that the Solar System's biggest moon's axis has shifted as a result of the impact, which confirmed that the asteroid was around 20 times larger than the one that ended the age of the dinosaurs on Earth, and caused one of the biggest impacts with clear traces in the Solar System.

Over billions of years, the universe's stars and galaxies shined their light into space, leaving behind an imperceptibly faint night light known as the cosmic optical background. NASA's New Horizons spacecraft has traveled to the edge of Earth's solar system and captured the most accurate measurement of this glow to date.