Astronomers have recently reported detection of such a compact object of about 2.35 solar masses in the globular cluster NGC 1851 in our home galaxy Milkyway. Because this is at the lower end of “black hole mass-gap", this compact object...
A new image of the “FS Tau star system” taken by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) has been released on 25 March 2024. In the new image, jets emerge from the cocoon of a newly forming star to blast across...
Stars have a life cycle spanning a few million to trillions of years. They are born, undergo changes with the passage of time and finally meet their end when fuel runs out to become a very dense remanent body....
''....astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one...
ISRO has successfully launched the satellite XPoSat which is world’s second ‘X-ray Polarimetry Space Observatory’. This will carry out research in space-based polarisation measurements of X-ray emission from various cosmic sources. Earlier, NASA had sent ‘Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer...
In the last 500 million years, there have been at least five episodes of mass extinctions of life-forms on the Earth when more than three-quarters of the existing species got eliminated. The last such large-scale life extinction occurred due...
NASA’s first asteroid sample return mission, OSIRIS-REx, launched seven years ago in 2016 to near-Earth asteroid Bennu has delivered the asteroid sample that it collected in 2020 to Earth on 24th September 2023. After releasing the asteroid sample into...
Launched on 30th July 2020, Perseverance rover has successfully landed on the Mars surface at Jezero Crater on 18th February 2021, after travelling almost seven months from Earth. Designed specially to collect sample of rocks, Perseverance is the biggest and the best rover ever...
Of the several comets discovered in 2021, the comet C/2021 A1, called Comet Leonard after it’s discoverer Gregory Leonard, may become visible to the naked eye on 12 December 2021 when it comes closest to the Earth (at the distance of...
A “sibling” of Earth’s galaxy Milky Way is discovered which was torn apart by Andromeda galaxy billions of years ago
Our planet Earth is part of the solar system which comprises eight planets, numerous comets and asteroids which orbit the...
Astrobiology suggest that life is abundant in the universe and the primitive microbial life forms (beyond earth) could be found earlier than intelligent forms. The search for the extra-terrestrial life involves looking for biological signatures in the vicinity of...
Solar wind, the stream of electrically charged particles emanating from the outer atmospheric layer corona of Sun, poses threat to life form and electrical technology based modern human society. Earth’s magnetic field provide protection against the incoming solar wind...
Radio frequency based deep space communication faces constraints due to low bandwidth and increasing need of high data transmission rates. Laser or optical based system has potential to break the communication constraints. NASA has tested laser communications against extreme...
Fast Radio Burst FRB 20220610A, the most powerful radio burst ever observed was detected on 10 June 2022. It had originated from a source that existed 8.5 billion years ago when the universe was just 5 billion years old...
Discovery of the first exoplanet candidate in X-ray binary M51-ULS-1 in the spiral galaxy Messier 51 (M51), also called the Whirlpool Galaxy using transit technique by observing dips in brightness at X-ray wavelengths (instead of optical wavelengths) is pathbreaking and a game changer because it...
James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has taken near-infrared and mid-infrared images of the star-forming region NGC 604, located nearby in the neighbourhood of home galaxy. The images are most detailed ever and offer unique opportunity to study high concentration...
Half a century after iconic Apollo Missions which allowed twelve men to walk on the Moon between 1968 and 1972, NASA is set to embark on ambitious Artemis Moon Mission designed not only to create long term human presence on...
Europa, one of the largest satellites of Jupiter has a thick water-ice crust and a vast subsurface saltwater ocean beneath its icy surface hence suggested to be one of the most promising places in the solar system to harbour...
The researchers have studied the turbulence in Sun’s corona using radio signals sent to Earth by the ultra-low-cost Mars orbiter when the Earth and Mars were in conjunction on the opposite sides of the Sun (the conjunction usually happens...
Astronomers usually get to hear from the far-off galaxies through high energy radiations like X-rays. It is extremely uncommon to receive relatively lower energy UV radiation from ancient galaxies like AUDs01. Such low energy photons usually get absorbed on...
One of the most beautiful things about mother Earth is presence of an atmosphere. Life on Earth would not have been possible without the lively sheet of air that completely embraces Earth from all around. In the early phase...
Astronomers have detected the oldest (and the most distant) black hole from the early universe which dates from 400 million years after the big bang. Surprisingly, this is about a few million times the mass of Sun. Under the...
Total solar eclipse will be observed in North America continent on Monday 8th April 2024. Beginning Mexico, it will move across the United States from Texas to Maine, ending in Canada’s Atlantic coast.
In the USA, while the partial solar...
Between 1958 and 1978, USA and former USSR sent 59 and 58 moon missions respectively. The lunar race between the two ceased in 1978. End of cold war and collapse of former Soviet Union and subsequent emergence of new...
Scientists have successfully taken first ever picture of the shadow of a black hole providing direct observation of its immediate environment
Image taken from "EHTC, Akiyama K et al 2019, 'First M87 Event Horizon Telescope Results. I. The Shadow of...
