News
News
Keck Observatory Donor Salon Talk: Correcting the Twinkle with Adaptive Optics, with Dr. Antonin Bouchez
Guest Speaker Dr. Antonin Bouchez Head of Adaptive Optics Development at Keck Observatory Temperature and pressure variations in the Earth’s atmosphere cause stars to appear to twinkle, and the images formed by all telescopes to be slightly blurred. This is true even on Maunakea, which has some of the clearest and most stable atmospheric conditions […]
Read More >
Faintest Known Star System Orbiting the Milky Way Discovered from Hawaiʻi
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – A team of astronomers led by the University of Victoria and Yale University has detected an ancient star system traveling around our galaxy named Ursa Major III / UNIONS 1 (UMa3/U1) – the faintest and lowest-mass Milky Way satellite ever discovered, and possibly one of the most dark matter-dominated systems known. The […]
Read More >
A Hundred Million Suns
The Most Complete Portrait of a Supernova Ever Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Accounts of supernovae – exploding stars – go back thousands of years, and while we know today these events create the building blocks of life itself, there are still unanswered questions about the conditions that cause a star to explode. Researchers from the Weizmann […]
Read More >
WASP-69b: New Images Reveal Exoplanet’s Comet-Like Tail is Surprisingly Longer Than Previously Observed
Maunakea, Hawai‘i – New data from W. M. Keck Observatory on Maunakea, Hawaiʻi Island confirms exoplanet WASP-69b, known for its escaping atmosphere, is forming a comet-like tail that is even longer than previously observed. Named WASP-69b, scientists have studied this Jupiter-sized planet in the past, focusing on its escaping atmosphere and observing only a small […]
Read More >
Space Oddity: Uncovering the Origin of the Universe’s Rare Radio Circles
Written by Michelle Franklin, APR Director of Communications, Physical Sciences at University of California, San Diego Maunakea, Hawai‘i– It’s not every day astronomers say, “What is that?” After all, most observed astronomical phenomena are known: stars, planets, black holes and galaxies. But in 2019 the newly completed ASKAP (Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder) telescope picked […]
Read More >
W. M. Keck Observatory Appoints Rich Matsuda as Director
International search confirms local-born executive to lead the Observatory Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – The W. M. Keck Observatory today announced the appointment of Rich Matsuda as its next director, effective January 1, 2024. “With the support of our Board of Directors, our Observatory has been making a pivot for the last several years, turning toward a […]
Read More >
Strange New Luminous Fast Blue Optical Transient has Astronomers in Awe
Maunakea, Hawai‘i – Astronomers are baffled by a series of strange, extremely bright repetitive flares that lasted for months – the first phenomenon of its kind ever seen. This mysterious and rare event is consistent with a Luminous Fast Blue Optical Transient (LFBOT). Typically, LFBOTs explode once and fade within a few days. However, this […]
Read More >
Swinburne and W. M. Keck Observatory Form Historic Scientific Partnership to Unlock New Era of Space Discovery for Australia and the U.S.
Swinburne University of Technology has become the first organization outside of the United States to join the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaiʻi as a scientific partner. The new scientific partnership builds on Swinburne’s 15-year association with the Observatory through a strategic agreement with Caltech under which Swinburne researchers have been able to demonstrate outstanding […]
Read More >
Uranus Aurora Discovery Offers Clues to Habitable Icy Worlds
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – The presence of an infrared aurora on the cold, outer planet of Uranus has been confirmed for the first time by University of Leicester astronomers. The discovery could shed light on the mysteries behind the magnetic fields of the planets of our solar system, and even on whether distant worlds might support life. Using […]
Read More >
Record-breaking Fast Radio Burst is Most Distant Ever Detected
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Scientists have discovered an eight-billion-year-old fast radio burst (FRB) – the most ancient and distant located to date. A global team that includes UC Santa Cruz Professor of Astronomy J. Xavier Prochaska, an expert in spectroscopy, and was led by Macquarie University’s Stuart Ryder and Swinburne University of Technology’s Associate Professor Ryan […]
Read More >
