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Astronomy TOP STORY

Behold The Helix Nebula As Seen By Four Telescopic Eyes

Helix Nebula

When a star like the Sun runs out of fuel, it expands and its outer layers puff off, and then the core of the star shrinks.

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Astronomy TOP STORIES

Stellar Winds Observed In Unprecedented Detail

Mars Imaged by Hubble

Astronomers present an explanation for the mesmerising shapes of planetary nebulae. The discovery is based on an extraordinary set of observations of stellar winds around ageing stars.

The First Possible Planet Hugging A White Dwarf Star

An international team of astronomers using NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and retired Spitzer Space Telescope has reported what may be the first intact planet found closely orbiting a white dwarf, the dense leftover of a Sun-like star, only 40% larger than Earth.

Unraveling A Spiral Stream Of Dusty Embers From A Massive Binary Stellar Forge

With almost two decades of mid-infrared (IR) imaging from the largest observatories around the world including the Subaru Telescope, a team of astronomers was able to capture the spiral motion of newly formed dust streaming from the massive and evolved binary star system Wolf-Rayet (WR) 112.

Hubble Views Globular Cluster NGC 1805

Many colorful stars are packed close together in this image of the globular cluster NGC 1805, taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

Revealing The Secrets Of High-energy Cosmic Particles

The "IceCube" neutrino observatory deep in the ice of the South Pole has already brought spectacular new insights into cosmic incidents of extremely high energies.

New Hubble Data Suggests There is an Ingredient Missing from Current Dark Matter Theories

Observations by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile have found that something may be missing from the theories of how dark matter behaves.

Massive Halo Finally Explains Stream of Gas Swirling Around the Milky Way

The Milky Way is not alone in its neighborhood. It has captured smaller galaxies in its orbit, and the two largest are known as the Small and Large Magellanic Clouds, visible as twin dusty smears in the Southern Hemisphere.

Hubble Views NGC 7027, The Jewel Bug Nebula

As nuclear fusion engines, most stars live placid lives for hundreds of millions to billions of years.

Misaligned Planet-Forming Rings Around Triple Young Stars

An international team of astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) found a peculiar dust ring system around the young triple star GW Orionis.

Hubble Views NGC 2188

The blue and orange stars of the faint galaxy named NGC 2188 sparkle in this image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

Meathook Galaxy NGC 2442 As Seen By Hubble

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope features the spectacular galaxy NGC 2442, nicknamed the Meathook galaxy owing to its extremely asymmetrical and irregular shape.

NASA's Chandra Opens Treasure Trove of Cosmic Delights

This selection of images of different kinds of light from various missions and telescopes have been combined to better understand the universe.

Heaviest Black Hole Merger Is Among Three Recent Gravitational Wave Discoveries

Scientists observed what appears to be a bulked-up black hole tangling with a more ordinary one.

Zooming In On Dark Matter

Cosmologists have zoomed in on the smallest clumps of dark matter in a virtual universe - which could help us to find the real thing in space.

A Direct View Of Star/Disk Interactions

A team including researchers from the Institute for Astrophysics of the University of Cologne has for the first time directly observed the columns of matter that build up newborn stars.

Hubble Views Edge of Stellar Blast

While appearing as a delicate and light veil draped across the sky, this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope actually depicts a small section of the Cygnus supernova blast wave, located around 2,400 light-years away.

Continuous Infrared Winds Discovered During The Eruption Of A Stellar Mass Black Hole

Until now, these flows of material had been detected only in other wavelength ranges, such as X-rays or the visible, depending on the phase in which the black hole is consuming its surrounding material.