Items tagged with telescope
Perched atop Cerro Pachón in Chile, the newly-commissioned Vera C. Rubin Observatory has released some highly exciting first images that offer a stunning preview of its unprecedented capabilities. These initial glimpses showcase the telescope's enormous field of view, speed, and ultra-high-resolution imaging of the...
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This week, astronomers have unveiled the most intricate and vibrant image ever captured of the Sculptor Galaxy (NGC 253) in a stunning thousand-color spectrum. This unprecedented view, thanks to the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) and its Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE)...
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The European Space Agency (ESA) has achieved a rather unusual yet cool feat: successfully creating and maintaining artificial solar eclipses in space with its Proba-3 mission. This all comes down to precise formation maneuvering that enables the two-satellite system to create totality as needed, hence providing solar...
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The world's most powerful solar telescope, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (Editor note: Try saying that one time fast!), is beginning to prove the potential of a new add-on with its first close-up image of the Sun. Located near the summit of Haleakalā in Maui, Hawai'i, the...
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The Gemini South telescope, commissioned over two decades ago, continues to contribute significant astronomical findings. On February 7th, it captured a new image of Asteroid 2024 YR4, which ultimately resulted in a revised projected probability of Earth impact to 1 in 48 by 2032, from the previously estimated 1 in...
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The space telescope Euclid has made a significant discovery, uncovering its first Einstein ring, which scientists believe will pave the way to unraveling the mysteries of the universe's invisible components. As the name suggests, the Einstein ring is named after Albert Einstein, as it's a product of his theory of...
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Researchers from the Curtain node of the International Center for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) have tracked down a possible explanation for the rare astrophysical event known as long-period radio transients. Associate Professor Natasha Hurley-Walker, and Csanad Horvath, an undergraduate student at the time...
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A new image of the Sombrero galaxy from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has astronomers taking their hats off in place of a cosmic bullseye. The galaxy, known as Messier 104 (M104), was discovered in 1781 by French astronomer and comet hunter Pierre Mechain, one of Charles Messier’s colleagues.
In Webb’s image of...
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Astronomers using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope Interferometer (ESO’s VLTI) took the first close-up image of a dying star outside of the Milky Way. The newly imaged star, WH G64, is located within the Large Magellanic Cloud, one of the smaller galaxies that orbit the Milky Way.
While the...
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New observations from the James Webb Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory unveiled that a low-mass supermassive black hole, known as LID-568, appears to eating up matter at over 40 times the theoretical limit. The discovery of the supermassive black hole, thought to be within 1.5 billion years after the Big...
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Researchers from Japan’s National Astronomical Observatory (NAOJ) are throwing shade at the now iconic image of the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way captured by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). The image in question, constructed by another group of researchers from data collected by the EHT...
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A supernova event recorded by Chinese and Japanese astronomers in 1181 is at the heart of a first-of-its-kind 3D animated map, unveiling new secrets of a flowering “zombie star.” Supernova Sn 1181 is one of the few to be documented before the invention of telescopes.
The zombie star in question was first discovered...
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A headless Halloween comet looks to round out an October that's chock-full of celestial delights. Comet 2024 S1 (Atlas) is on track to make its close approach to the Sun on October 28, and is currently visible in the Southern Hemisphere.
October has been a great month for stargazers, with the ability to see an...
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The first chunk of the map created by the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Euclid space mission was revealed at the International Astronautical Congress in Milan, Italy. The extremely large mosaic, composed of 208 gigapixels, contains 260 observations made between March 25 and April 8 2024.
The Euclid space telescope...
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October’s full moon will be a “Supermoon,” also known as the Hunter’s Moon, and is the third of four consecutive supermoons this year. Other names for the upcoming Supermoon are the Travel Moon, the Dying Grass Moon, or the Sanguine or Blood Moon.
According to NASA, the name Hunter’s Moon goes as far back as the...
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A group of astronomers have discovered an exoplanet orbiting the closest single star to Earth’s Sun. The earth-like planet has at least half the mass of Venus, and a year lasts only a little over three Earth days.
Whether it be an alien planet orbiting the K-type star Epsilon Indi A, which is around the same age as...
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A comet that has not been seen from Earth in 80,000 years is about to make its grand return. Comet 2023 A3, also known as Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, will be observable with the naked eye in the northern hemisphere during two viewing periods, with the first being this week.
Back in May of this year, the Eta Aquariids meteor...
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Astronomers using NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope just made a wild discovery of a “blowtorch-like” jet from a supermassive black hole, and it seems to cause stars to erupt along its trajectory.
Currently, an international group of astronomers are awaiting a once-in-a-lifetime event, when a binary system in the...
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NASA’s Webb telescope tells an elliptical and spiral galaxy to say “Cheese!” The image is a composite of images, combining observations from Webb’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) and NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) of a pair of galaxies collectively known as Arp 107.
The pair of galaxies, located 465 million...
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Astronomers have detected the largest pair of black hole jets ever seen. The pair spans 23-million light-years, or the equivalent to lining up 140 Milky Way galaxies back to back.
According to NASA, supermassive black holes are millions to tens of billions times the mass of the Sun. A census using the Hubble Space...
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Hubble may be the older sibling to the more advanced James Webb Space Telescope, but it is still being used to help solve the riddles and mysteries of the universe. Now, along with the Chandra X-ray Observatory, the iconic space telescope unexpectedly unveiled a duo of supermassive black holes within a pair of...
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While the James Webb Space Telescope has been solving the Universe's riddles in the last couple of years, Hubble continues to prove its value. One recent example was a new image comprising more than 500 images from Hubble spanning two decades of the innermost region of Omega Centauri, providing new evidence for the...
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