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How sound moves on Mars

Acoustic signals have been important markers during NASA’s Mars missions. Measurements of sound can provide information both about Mars itself—such as turbulence in its atmosphere, changes in its temperature, and its surface conditions—and about the movement of the Mars rovers.

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Planned industrial plant threatens large observatory in Chile

MPE Director and Nobel Laureate Reinhard Genzel is spearheading an open letter signed by nearly 30 eminent international astronomers urging the Chilean government to relocate the proposed INNA industrial complex. The project threatens the world-renowned dark skies over ESO’s Paranal Observatory, the premier site for cutting-edge astronomical research.

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Most normal matter in the universe isn’t found in planets, stars or galaxies: An astronomer explains

If you look across space with a telescope, you’ll see countless galaxies, most of which host large central black holes, billions of stars and their attendant planets. The universe teems with huge, spectacular objects, and it might seem like these massive objects should hold most of the universe’s matter.

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Ten versions of Earth’s future can help us hunt for technosignatures

Searching for technosignatures—signs of technology on a planet that we can see from afar—remains a difficult task. There are so many different factors to consider, and we only have the technological capabilities to detect a relatively small collection of them.

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A blueprint for visiting an interstellar comet

Sometime in 2029, the European Space Agency is scheduled to launch its Comet Interceptor Mission. The Interceptor will wait for a long-period comet to arrive in the inner solar system then set off on a trajectory to rendezvous with it. These objects are ancient and primordial, carrying material largely unaltered by time that holds clues […]

Earlier ultra-relativistic freeze-out could revive a decades-old theory for dark matter

A new theory for the origins of dark matter suggests that fast-moving, neutrino-like dark particles could have decoupled from Standard Model particles far earlier than previous theories had suggested.

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First discoveries from new Subaru Telescope program reveal massive planet and brown dwarf

Astronomers using the Subaru Telescope in Hawaiʻi have discovered a massive planet and a brown dwarf orbiting distant stars. The discoveries are the first results from OASIS (Observing Accelerators with SCExAO Imaging Survey), which combines space-based measurements with the Subaru Telescope’s advanced imaging to find hidden worlds.

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Chlorine and potassium found in supernova remnant at unexpectedly high levels

“Why are we here?” is humanity’s most fundamental and persistent question. Tracing the origins of the elements is a direct attempt to answer this at its deepest level. We know many elements are created inside stars and supernovae, which then cast them out into the universe, yet the origins of some key elements has remained […]

Astronomers find vast spinning filament of galaxies 140 million light-years away

An international team led by the University of Oxford has identified one of the largest rotating structures ever reported: a “razor-thin” string of galaxies embedded in a giant spinning cosmic filament, 140 million light-years away.

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How to catch a comet that hasn’t been discovered yet

There’s been a lot of speculation recently about interstellar visitor 3I/ATLAS—much of which is probably caused by low-quality data given that we have to observe it from either Earth, or in some cases, Mars. In either case, it’s much further away than what would be the ideal. But that might not be the case for […]

Hubble seeks clusters in ‘Lost Galaxy’

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the spiral galaxy NGC 4535, which is situated about 50 million light-years away in the constellation Virgo (the Maiden). Through a small telescope, this galaxy appears extremely faint, giving it the nickname “Lost Galaxy.”

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Astronomers warn satellite growth may contaminate nearly all space telescope data

Light from the half a million satellites that humanity is planning to launch into Earth’s orbit in the coming years could contaminate almost all the images taken by space telescopes, NASA astronomers warned Wednesday.

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Solar wind storms may explain mystery surrounding Uranus’ radiation belts

Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) scientists believe they may have resolved a 39-year-old mystery about the radiation belts around Uranus.

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These two galaxies are tying the knot and producing stars

Galaxies like our Milky Way grew through cascading mergers of smaller galaxies that began billions of years ago. The ancient progenitors of galaxies like ours were small galaxies similar to modern-day dwarf galaxies like the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. Research shows that both dwarf galaxies and ancient galaxies are less massive, have lower metallicity, […]

Simulations reveal how black holes generate intense light from infalling matter

Surprisingly, some of the universe’s brightest objects are black holes. As scorching gas and dust flow around and into a black hole, they glow with fierce intensity across the light spectrum. Now, a team of computational astrophysicists has developed the most comprehensive simulations ever made of how black holes create these dazzling light shows.

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