Using modified laws of gravity, researchers from Case Western Reserve University and Weizmann Institute of Science closely predicted a key property measured in faint dwarf galaxies that are satellites of the nearby giant spiral galaxy Andromeda. The Andromeda Galaxy, our large neighbour galaxy. Image Credit & Copyright: Dieter Beer (http://www.starhopper.at) & Patrick Hochleitner (http://www.photonhunter.at) The [continue reading]
In a letter to Nature, an international team of astronomers, including Marc Sarzi from the University of Hertfordshire, report the exciting discovery of a new way to measure the mass of supermassive black holes in galaxies. By measuring the speed with which carbon monoxide molecules orbit around such black holes, this new research opens [continue reading]
Vega, a star astronomers have used as a touchstone to measure other stars’ brightness for thousands of years, may be more than 200 million years older than previously thought. That’s according to new findings from the University of Michigan. Vega, the brightest star in the constellation Lyra. Image Credit: John Monnier (University of Michigan) The [continue reading]
Virginia Tech physicists have discovered a quasar with the most energetic outflow ever seen, a finding that may answer questions about how the mass of a galaxy is linked to its central supermassive black hole mass and why there are so few large galaxies in the Universe. This artist’s impression shows the material ejected [continue reading]
Astronomers have used INTEGRAL and XMM-Newton to look into the neutron star in IGR J17252-3616, a highly obscured X-ray binary system. The data show how the neutron star, which is being fuelled by the stellar wind from its companion, is substantially deflecting the flow of the accreted material. Comparison with numerical simulations provides an [continue reading]
Yale astronomers have caught the Milky Way having a snack. Using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, researchers have discovered a stream, of stars believed to be the remnant of an ancient star cluster slowly being ingested by the Milky Way, Earth’s home galaxy. A map of stars in the outer region of the Milky Way [continue reading]