General Articles

Baffling pulsar leaves astronomers in the dark

Artist’s impression of a pulsar in radio-bright mode. // Credit: ESA/ATG medialab Scientists have found that this object, whose radio emission is known to switch on and off periodically, exhibits the same behavior, but in reverse, when observed at X-ray wavelengths. By ESA, Noordwijk, Netherlands — Published: January 25, 2013 New observations of a highly …

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Telescopes find evidence for asteroid belt around Vega

The data are consistent with the star having an inner warm belt and outer cool belt separated by a gap. By Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C. — Published: January 9, 2013   This artist’s concept illustrates an asteroid belt around the bright star Vega. // Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Astronomers have discovered what …

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Texas Astronomers Measure Most Massive, Most Unusual Black Hole Using Hobby-Eberly Telescope

This image of NGC 1277 was taken with Hubble Space Telescope. This small, flattened galaxy contains one of the most massive central black holes ever found. At 17 billion solar masses, the black hole weighs an extraordinary 14% of the total galaxy mass. [NASA/ESA/Andrew C. Fabian] 28 November 2012 – Mcdonald Observatory news Fort Davis, …

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Planck spots hot gas bridging galaxy cluster pair

Abell-399-401 The Planck satellite has discovered a bridge of hot gas that connects galaxy clusters Abell 399 (lower center) and Abell 401 (top left). The galaxy pair is located about a billion light-years from Earth, and the gas bridge extends approximately 10 million light-years between them. The image shows the two galaxy clusters as seen …

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