Tag Archives: Distant

Astronomers have detected one of the darkest objects ever seen at a record cosmic distance—only with the assistance of gravity. The discovery is an important step toward the observation of dark matter and the confirmation of the underlying principles of the formation of galaxies. The Smallest Cosmic Shadow Ever Detected The object, nicknamed 𝒱, weighs approximately a million times the …

Dark matter is believed to make up more than 80 percent of all matter in the universe, but what it actually is remains a mystery. Now, astronomers have found something that gives us a major clue. In a pair of new studies published in Nature Astronomy and Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the astronomers report that they’ve found …

“I Heard It Before I Saw It”: This Giant European Antenna in Australia Will Talk to Distant Planets (and change how we explore space)  Rude Baguette ESA inaugurates new deep space antenna in Australia  SpaceNews ESA inaugurates deep space antenna in Australia  European Space Agency The new antenna that could theoretically receive a phone call from Mars  Australian Broadcasting Corporation Cook Government Investment Strengthens …

The outer bands of distant remnants of Hurricane Humberto lashed Bermuda on Tuesday ahead of a more direct pass from the newer and stronger Hurricane Imelda on the tiny British territory. Imelda had maximum sustained winds of 100 mph Wednesday and its center was expected to be near the island by evening, the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said. …

The mission is named for George Carruthers, an engineer and solar physicist who developed an ultraviolet camera placed on the Moon by the Apollo 16 astronauts in 1972. This camera captured the first view of the geocorona, a term coined by Carruthers himself. The 531-pound (241-kilogram) Carruthers observatory was built by BAE Systems, with instruments provided by the University of …

This week’s science news is stuffed with a menagerie of weird and wonderful animal discoveries. Topping the list are Iberian harvester ants (Messor ibericus), which mate with the male ants of a distantly related species (Messor structor) to procreate. That’s odd enough on its own, but now scientists have discovered that the harvester ants don’t even need nearby M. structor …

An SwRI-led team used Webb telescope observations (white) to detect methane gas on the distant dwarf planet Makemake. Sharp emission peaks near 3.3 microns reveal methane in the gas phase above Makemake’s surface. A continuum model (cyan) is overlaid for comparison; the gas emission peaks are identified where the observed spectrum rises above the continuum. An artistic rendering of Makemake’s …

It seems like a terrible time to build an electric vehicle plant in the United States, but Rivian Automotive leaders say they’re confident as the company starts long-delayed work on a $5 billion facility in Georgia. The money-losing California-based company breaks ground Tuesday east of Atlanta despite President Donald Trump’s successful push to roll back electric vehicle tax credits. Starting Sept. 30, buyers …

New research suggests that not all feeding massive black holes sit stably at the heart of their home galaxies. A team of astronomers has discovered a black hole wandering through its home dwarf galaxy, taking its active region with it. Making this discovery even more remarkable is the fact that this is an intermediate-mass black hole, a type of object …

Thanks to a theory put forward by Albert Einstein over 100 years ago and a happy coincidence, astronomers have discovered radiation being pumped out from the core of a quasar — within which a supermassive black hole lurks. The team, led by Matus Rybak of Leiden University, made the discovery while hunting for cold gas in the galaxy RXJ1131-1231, an …