News
Distant Quasar Providing Clues to Early-Universe Conditions
Astronomers using the National Science Foundation’s Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) have made an image revealing tantalizing details of a quasar nearly 13 billion light-years from Earth — an object that may provide important clues about the physical processes at work in the Universe’s first galaxies. The scientists studied a quasar called PSO...
Even Phenomenally Dense Neutron Stars Fall like a Feather
Einstein’s understanding of gravity, as outlined in his general theory of relativity, predicts that all objects fall at the same rate, regardless of their mass or composition. This theory has passed test after test here on Earth, but does it still hold true for some of the most massive and dense objects in the known universe, an aspect of nature...
Trio of Infant Planets Discovered around Newborn Star
Over the past several years, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) has transformed our understanding of protoplanetary disks — the gas- and dust-filled planet factories that encircle young stars. The rings and gaps in these disks provide intriguing circumstantial evidence for the presence of planets. Other phenomena, however,...