New Celestial Map Gives Directions for GPS
Many of us have been rescued from unfamiliar territory by directions from a Global Positioning System (GPS) navigator. GPS satellites send signals to a receiver in your GPS navigator, which calculates your position based on the location of the satellites and your distance from them. view more (2009-10-30)
Vanderbilt astronomers participate in new search for dark energy
The most ambitious attempt yet to trace the history of the universe has seen "first light." The Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS), part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III (SDSS-III), took its first astronomical data on the night of Sept. 14-15 at the Sloan Foundation telescope in New Mexico. view more (2009-10-02)
Precise Radio-Telescope Measurements Advance Frontier Gravitational Physics
Scientists using a continent-wide array of radio telescopes have made an extremely precise measurement of the curvature of space caused by the Sun's gravity, and their technique promises a major contribution to a frontier area of basic physics. view more (2009-09-02)
Dark Energy From the Ground Up: Make Way for BigBOSS
Several ways have been proposed to examine dark energy, in hopes of finding out just what it is. One of them, "supernovae" for short, certainly works: it's how dark energy was discovered in the first place. Other independent techniques, such as weak gravitational lensing and baryon acoustic oscillation, also promise great power but are... view more... (2009-08-07)
Erratic Black Hole Regulates Itself
New results from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory have made a major advance in explaining how a special class of black holes may shut off the high-speed jets they produce. These results suggest that these black holes have a mechanism for regulating the rate at which they grow. view more (2009-03-26)
Colors of Quasars Reveal a Dusty Universe
The vast expanses of intergalactic space appear to be filled with a haze of tiny, smoke-like "dust" particles that dim the light from distant objects and subtly change their colors, according to a team of astronomers from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-II). view more (2009-02-26)
Astronomers discover link between supermassive black holes and galaxy formation
A pair of astronomers from Texas and Germany have used a telescope at The University of Texas at Austin's McDonald Observatory together with Hubble Space Telescope and many other telescopes around the world to uncover new evidence that the largest, most massive galaxies in the universe and the supermassive black holes at their hearts grew together... view more... (2009-02-03)
Milagro detects cosmic ray hot spots
The University of Maryland-led Milagro collaboration, comprised of scientists from 16 institutions across the United States, has discovered two nearby regions with an unexpected excess of cosmic rays. view more (2008-11-25)
Mystery of missing hydrogen
Something vital is missing in the far distant reaches of the Universe: hydrogen - the raw material for stars, planets and possible life. view more (2008-11-24)
Serendipitous observations reveal rare event in life of distant quasar
A bit of serendipity has given astronomers a surprise view of a never-before-observed event in the birth of a galaxy. view more (2008-10-22)
First detection of magnetic field in distant galaxy produces a surprise
Using a powerful radio telescope to peer into the early universe, a team of California astronomers has obtained the first direct measurement of a nascent galaxy's magnetic field as it appeared 6.5 billion years ago. view more (2008-10-02)
BOSS: the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey
The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) uses a 2.5-meter telescope with a wider field of view than any other large telescope, located on a mountaintop in New Mexico called Apache Point and devoted solely to mapping the universe. view more (2008-09-22)
Accretion Discs Show Their True Colours
Quasars are the brilliant cores of remote galaxies, at the hearts of which lie supermassive black holes that can generate enough power to outshine the Sun a trillion times. view more (2008-07-25)
Polarizing filter allows astronomers to see disks surrounding black holes
For the first time, a team of international researchers has found a way to view the accretion disks surrounding black holes and verify that their true electromagnetic spectra match what astronomers have long predicted they would be. view more (2008-07-24)
Radio Telescopes Reveal Unseen Galactic Cannibalism
Radio-telescope images have revealed previously-unseen galactic cannibalism -- a triggering event that leads to feeding frenzies by gigantic black holes at the cores of galaxies. Astronomers have long suspected that the extra-bright cores of spiral galaxies called Seyfert galaxies are powered by supermassive black holes consuming material.... view more... (2008-06-24)
Galaxies gone wild!
Interacting galaxies are found throughout the Universe, sometimes as dramatic collisions that trigger bursts of star formation, on other occasions as stealthy mergers that result in new galaxies. view more (2008-04-24)
Cosmic engines surprise XMM-Newton
XMM-Newton has been surprised by a rare type of galaxy, from which it has detected a higher number of X-rays than thought possible. The observation gives new insight into the powerful processes shaping galaxies during their formation and evolution. view more (2008-04-08)
New population of faint protogalaxies discovered
Astronomers have found a new population of faint protogalaxies by taking the most sensitive spectroscopic survey ever of a time when the universe was only 15% of its present age. view more (2007-11-29)
RIT Study Confirms Supermassive Black Holes Produce Powerful Galaxy-Shaping Winds
Supermassive black holes can produce powerful winds that shape a galaxy and determine their own growth, confirms a group of scientists from Rochester Institute of Technology. view more (2007-11-01)
Hubble spies shells of sparkling stars around quasar
New images taken with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope - part of a research project led by UC Riverside's Gabriela Canalizo - have revealed the wild side of an elliptical galaxy, nearly two billion light-years away, that previously had been considered mild-mannered. view more (2007-10-26)
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