When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Artist”s conception of a suspected Saturn-size planet near Alpha Centauri A, a sun-like star roughly four light-years from Earth. | Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Robert L. Hurt (Caltech/IPAC) There might be a huge planet lurking near one of the closest stars to …
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There might be a huge planet lurking near one of the closest stars to Earth. NASA‘s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has imaged a possible planet near Alpha Centauri A, a sun-like star that forms part of the triplet Alpha Centauri star group. The mini-cluster is just four light-years from Earth and is a rich ground for astronomers to learn …
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Astronomers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have found strong evidence of a giant planet orbiting a star in the stellar system closest to our own Sun. At just 4 light-years away from Earth, the Alpha Centauri triple star system has long been a compelling target in the search for worlds beyond our solar system. Alpha Centauri, located in the …
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Zoom image will be displayed The Juno spacecraft. (Image credit: NASA) The interstellar object 3I/ATLAS was discovered on July 1, 2025. It is expected to arrive at a distance of 53.6 million kilometers from Jupiter on March 16, 2026. In a new paper (accessible here) that I wrote with the brilliant Adam Hibberd and Adam Crowl, we show that applying …
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If you want to capture the majesty of the Sun, you should probably ask an artist, but if you want to capture its raw power, that’s a job for a robot. While generations of artists have painted or photographed sunsets and poets have written sonnets to the Sun, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe (PSP) just sent back the closest solar snapshots …
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From one perspective, the Sun is a benevolent orb of plasma and its warmth makes Earth habitable and has kept if habitable for billions of years, allowing complex things like human beings to evolve. From another perspective, it’s a malevolent orb that sends deadly UV radiation our way, and sometimes erupts and hurls massive blobs of plasma toward Earth. The …
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