Greenbelt MD (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
The Japan-led XRISM (X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission) observatory has captured the most detailed portrait yet of gases flowing within Cygnus X-3, one of the most studied sources in the X-ray sky. Cygnus X-3 is a binary that pairs a rare type of high-mass star with a compact companion - likely a black hole. "The nature of the massive star is one factor that makes Cygnus X-3 so

Oak Ridge TN (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
The universe just got a whole lot bigger - or at least in the world of computer simulations, that is. In early November, researchers at the Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory used the fastest supercomputer on the planet to run the largest astrophysical simulation of the universe ever conducted. The achievement was made using the Frontier supercomputer at Oak Ridge Nat

Los Angeles CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
NASA has officially awarded SpaceX the contract to provide launch services for its highly anticipated Dragonfly mission, part of the New Frontiers Program. This innovative mission will send a rotorcraft lander to Titan, Saturn's largest moon, to explore its unique geologic settings and search for clues about the origins of life. Valued at approximately $256.6 million, the firm-fixed-price

Columbus OH (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
An international team of researchers has made new observations of an unusual supernova, finding the most metal-poor stellar explosion ever observed. This rare supernova, called 2023ufx, originated from the core collapse of a red supergiant star, exploded on the outskirts of a nearby dwarf galaxy. Results of the study showed that observations of both this supernova and the galaxy it was dis

Berkeley CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
Diamond rain? Super-ionic water? These are just two proposals that planetary scientists have come up with for what lies beneath the thick, bluish, hydrogen-and-helium atmospheres of Uranus and Neptune, our solar system's unique, but superficially bland, ice giants. A planetary scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, now proposes an alternative theory - that the interiors of bo

Los Angeles CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
NASA's upcoming mission to Uranus aims to explore the icy moons first photographed by Voyager 2 in 1986, this time seeking evidence of subsurface oceans that could potentially harbor life. Researchers from the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics (UTIG) are developing advanced tools to support the mission, including a computer model designed to detect hidden oceans using data from spacec

London, UK (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
Tracking potentially hazardous asteroids with greater precision may now be achievable thanks to a novel equation for calculating their orbits more accurately. Building on concepts introduced by Sir Isaac Newton and advanced by Albert Einstein's general relativity, researchers have devised a method to pinpoint the positions of minor solar system objects, such as asteroids, Kuiper Belt objec

Los Angeles CA (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
Scientists led by Lowell Observatory's Dr. Teddy Kareta have made remarkable strides in characterizing near-Earth asteroids (NEAs) by combining telescopic observations with fireball camera data. Their study, published in 'The Planetary Science Journal', focuses on asteroid 2022 WJ1, integrating data from the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) in Arizona and meteor observation cameras in Ontario, C

Sydney, Australia (SPX) Nov 25, 2024
New research led by Curtin University has identified what may be the earliest direct evidence of ancient hot water activity on Mars, highlighting the planet's potential habitability in its distant past. The study examined a 4.45 billion-year-old zircon grain from the Martian meteorite NWA7034, commonly referred to as "Black Beauty." Researchers found geochemical signatures indicating the p

Sydney, Australia (SPX) Nov 26, 2024
Scientists have achieved a major milestone in Martian space research by constructing the first complete energy spectrum of high-energy solar protons during a solar eruptive event. This effort sheds light on the radiation environment around Mars and has important implications for future Mars exploration. The research was a collaborative effort involving the University of Science and Technol