An international team of astronomers announced the discovery of a rare molecule -- phosphine -- in the clouds of Venus. On Earth, this gas is only made industrially or by microbes that thrive in oxygen-free environments. Astronomers have speculated for... Continue Reading →
Data from NASA instruments aboard the ESA (European Space Agency) Rosetta mission have helped reveal that comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko has its own far-ultraviolet aurora. It is the first time such electromagnetic emissions in the far-ultraviolet have been documented on a celestial... Continue Reading →
Open star cluster NGC 7380 is still embedded in its natal cloud of interstellar gas and dust popularly known as the Wizard Nebula. Seen on the left, with foreground and background stars along the plane of our Milky Way galaxy it lies some 8,000 light-years... Continue Reading →
While appearing as a delicate and light veil draped across the sky, this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope actually depicts a small section of the Cygnus supernova blast wave, located around 2,400 light-years away. The name of the supernova remnant comes from... Continue Reading →
In a landmark study, scientists using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have mapped the immense envelope of gas, called a halo, surrounding the Andromeda galaxy, our nearest large galactic neighbor. Scientists were surprised to find that this tenuous, nearly invisible halo... Continue Reading →
A small but evolving dent in Earth's magnetic field can cause big headaches for satellites. Earth's magnetic field acts like a protective shield around the planet, repelling and trapping charged particles from the Sun. But over South America and the... Continue Reading →
As of March 2020, our Mars Odyssey spacecraft has captured these six views of the Martian moon Phobos. The orbiter's infrared camera, the Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS), is used to measure temperature variations that provide insight into the physical properties and... Continue Reading →
In the center of this serene stellar swirl is likely a harrowing black-hole beast. The surrounding swirl sweeps around billions of stars which are highlighted by the brightest and bluest. The breadth and beauty of the display give the swirl... Continue Reading →
The end of the universe as we know it will not come with a bang. Most stars will very, very slowly fizzle as their temperatures fade to zero. "It will be a bit of a sad, lonely, cold place," said... Continue Reading →
Scents of Science 