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“Black Widow” Star Devours Its Rapidly Circling Companion
Finding Represents the Shortest-period Black Widow Binary Found to Date Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – In black widow star systems, a rapidly spinning dead star, called a pulsar, blasts its lower-mass orbiting companion with radiation, slowly evaporating it. Like their namesake spiders, the pulsars take advantage of their companions before destroying them, in this case by harnessing […]
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Astronomers Discover Widest Separation of Brown Dwarf Pair to Date
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – A team of astronomers has discovered a rare pair of brown dwarfs that has the widest separation of any brown dwarf binary system found to date. “Because of their small size, brown dwarf binary systems are usually very close together,” said Emma Softich, an undergraduate astrophysics student at the Arizona State University […]
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Surprisingly High Fraction of Dead Galaxies Found in Ancient Galactic City
Why Cluster’s Galaxies are Unlike Those in All the Other Known Protoclusters is a Mystery, says UC Riverside-led Team Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – An international team of astronomers led by researchers at the University of California, Riverside (UCR), has discovered a massive cluster of young galaxies forming in the early universe. With the help of W. […]
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Saturn’s High-altitude Winds Generate Extraordinary Aurorae, Study Finds
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Space scientists have discovered a never-before-seen mechanism fueling huge planetary aurorae at Saturn. A University of Leicester-led team has found that Saturn is unique among planets observed to date in that some of its aurorae are generated by swirling winds within its own atmosphere, and not just from the planet’s surrounding magnetosphere. […]
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Puffy Planets Lose Atmospheres, Become Super-Earths
Finding Represents First Detections of Atmospheric Loss in “Mini-Neptunes” Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Astronomers have identified two different cases of “mini-Neptune” planets that are losing their puffy atmospheres and likely transforming into super-Earths. Radiation from the planets’ stars is stripping away their atmospheres, driving hot gas to escape like steam from a pot of boiling water. […]
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Newly-Found Planets On The Edge Of Destruction
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Three newly-discovered planets have been orbiting dangerously close to stars nearing the end of their lives. Out of the thousands of extrasolar planets found so far, these three gas giant planets first detected by the NASA TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite) Mission, have some of the shortest-period orbits around subgiant or giant […]
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Astronomers Witness a Dying Star Reach Its Explosive End
Two Hawai’i Telescopes Capture a Massive Star Moments Before Going Supernova Haleakalā and Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – For the very first time, astronomers have imaged in real time the dramatic end to a red supergiant’s life, watching the massive star’s rapid self-destruction and final death throes before it collapsed into a Type II supernova. Using two […]
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Rocky Exoplanets Are Even Stranger Than We Thought
A New Astrogeology Study Suggests That Most Nearby Rocky Exoplanets Are Quite Unlike Anything in Our Solar System Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Astronomers have discovered thousands of planets orbiting stars in our galaxy – known as exoplanets. However, it’s difficult to know what exactly these planets are made of, or whether any resemble Earth. To try to […]
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Infant Planet Discovered by UH-Led Team Using Maunakea Telescopes
Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – One of the youngest planets ever found around a distant infant star has been discovered by an international team of scientists led by University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa faculty, students, and alumni. Thousands of planets have been discovered around other stars, but what sets this one apart is that it is newly-formed […]
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A Crystal Ball Into Our Solar System’s Future
Giant Gas Planet Orbiting a Dead Star Gives Glimpse Into the Predicted Aftermath of our Sun’s Demise Maunakea, Hawaiʻi – Astronomers have discovered the very first confirmed planetary system that resembles the expected fate of our solar system, when the Sun reaches the end of its life in about five billion years. The researchers detected the […]
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