Featured Image: Orbiting Stars Share an Envelope
This beautiful series of snapshots from a simulation shows what happens when two stars in a binary system become enclosed in the same stellar envelope.
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Disrupted Stars in Unusual Galaxies
Tidal disruption events occur when a star passes a little too close to a supermassive black hole, getting torn apart in the process. Does this happen more frequently in an unusual type of galaxy?
Where to Look for Habitability
Where should we hunt for potentially habitable planets? A recent study has generated a catalog of the habitable zones around nearby stars.
Galactic Teamwork Makes Distant Bubbles
What generated the radiation that reionized our universe? The recent discovery of multiple distant galaxies offers evidence for how this process occurred.
Finding Distances to Type Ia Supernovae
What if Type Ia supernovae aren’t as consistent as we thought? A recent study investigates the dependence of these “standard candles” on the metallicity of their environment.
Sizing Up Red-Giant Twins
A pair of red-giant twins may be a key to weighing stars using starquakes in their interiors.
Disintegrating Planetary Bodies Around a White Dwarf
A recent study shows that WD 1145+017, a white dwarf surrounded by disintegrating planetary bodies, has evolved dramatically since its discovery last year.
LIGO Discovers the Merger of Two Black Holes
Big news: LIGO has detected its first gravitational-wave signal! What does this mean for black-hole astrophysics?
Can JWST Follow Up on Gravitational-Wave Detections?
If LIGO finds gravitational waves, could JWST be used in the future to follow up on detections of some compact-object mergers?
Featured Image: Solar Prominence Eruptions
Images of two powerful solar prominence eruptions have helped astronomers model how these eruptions travel away from the Sun.
Kepler-454b: Rocky or Not?
Is the planet Kepler-454b rocky, like a large Earth? Or gaseous, like a small Neptune? A recent study finds out.
Upgrading Fermi Without Traveling to Space
The Large Area Telescope on board the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has received an upgrade that increased its sensitivity by a whopping 40% — and nobody had to travel to space to make it happen.