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Now Even Further: Ancient Galaxy is Latest Candidate for Most Distant
It seems that every few months or so comes a new discovery of a new “most distant galaxy ever found.” It’s not really a surprise that new benchmarks are reached with such an amazing frequency as our...
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New Online Astronomy Course from CosmoQuest
For those of you who’d like to brush up on your Astronomy knowledge, or never took Astronomy 102, CosmoQuest has a new online course offering for you! Following the success of the initial 101-level...
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A Virtual Galactic Smash-Up!
An online simulator for galactic collisions (Adrian Price-Whelan/Columbia University) Have you ever had the desire to build your own galaxies, setting your own physical parameters and including as...
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The Brightest Galaxies in the Universe Were Invisible… Until Now
Hubble images of six of the starburst galaxies first found by ESA’s Herschel Space Observatory (Keck data shown below each in blue) Many of the brightest, most actively star-forming galaxies in the...
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Do We Really Need Dark Matter?
Hubble mosaic of massive galaxy cluster MACS J0717.5+3745, thought to be connected by a filament of dark matter. Credit: NASA, ESA, Harald Ebeling (University of Hawaii at Manoa) & Jean-Paul Kneib...
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Hubble Census Unveils Galaxies Shining Near Cosmic Dawn
This new image of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF) 2012 campaign reveals a previously unseen population of seven faraway galaxies, which are observed as they appeared in a period 350 million to 600...
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Astronomers Find a “Spine” Along Spiral Arms of the Milky Way
Researchers have identified the first 'bone' of the Milky Way - a long tendril of dust and gas that appears dark in this infrared image from the Spitzer Space Telescope. Running horizontally along...
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Behold: The Largest Known Spiral Galaxy
This composite of the giant barred spiral galaxy NGC 6872 combines visible light images from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope with far-ultraviolet data from NASA's GALEX and...
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How Big Are Galaxies?
Galaxy size comparison chart by astrophysicist Rhys Taylor I’m going to refrain from the initial response that comes to mind… actually, no I won’t — they’re really, really, really big!!!! </Kermit...
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Ancient Galaxy ‘Bursting’ with Stars
The galaxy HFLS3 appears as a small red dot in these Herschel submillimeter images (main image, and panels on right). Subsequent observations with ground-based telescopes, ranging from optical to...
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Astronomers Refine Distances to our Closest Spiral-Galaxy Neighbors
M31 and M33 are the nearest spiral-galaxy analogues to our own Milky Way, and distances for those galaxies are important since they help constrain the expansion rate and age of the Universe (image...
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Jets Boost — Not Hinder — Star Formation in Early Galaxies, New Study Suggests
An artist’s conception of jets protruding from an AGN. Image Credit: ESO Understanding the formation of stars and galaxies early in the Universe’s history continues to be somewhat of an enigma, and a...
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Stars, Galaxies, and Comet ISON Grace a New Image from Hubble
Comet ISON seen against a background of stars and galaxies (Source: hubblesite.org) This image of the steadily-approaching Comet ISON, made from observations with the Hubble Space Telescope on April...
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How Do Black Holes Get Super Massive?
A binary black hole pair with an accretion disk inclined 45 degrees. One can see the concentric rings before they are accreted onto the black holes. Source: Nixon et al. Since their discovery,...
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When do Black Holes Become Active? The Case of the Strangely-Shaped Galaxy...
Mrk 273 as seen by the Hubble Space Telescope. Image Credit: NASA The Hubble image above shows a strange galaxy, known as Mrk 273. The odd shape – including the infrared bright center and the long...
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Weekly Space Hangout – September 13, 2013: Voyager is Out, LADEE Launches (a...
Once again, we have gathered together the forces of space journalism to report on the big news stories of the week. And there were lots of big stories indeed, with the launch of NASA’s LADEE mission...
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Stars in this Jam-Packed Galaxy are 25 Times Closer Together than in the...
Galaxy M60-UCD1 is an ultra-compact dwarf galaxy, and is packed with an extraordinary number of stars. Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MSU/J.Strader et al, Optical: NASA/STScI Meet galaxy M60-UCD1. This is not...
View ArticleVirtual Star Party – October 6, 2013
Another wonderful Virtual Star Party, this time with 6 astronomers broadcasting their view of the night sky live. We had amazing views of Saturn, the Ring Nebula, M27, and M17 the Swan Nebula (also...
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Virtual Star Party – October 13, 2013
We’ve got a pretty bright Moon, but that just means we’ve got another target for the Virtual Star Party. Tonight we had beautiful views of the Moon from David Dickinson and Cory Schmitz, and then some...
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Virtual Star Party – October 20, 2013: In Space, Nobody can Hear You...
Sunday’s Virtual Star Party felt like a reunion, with Mike Phillips, Gary Gonella, and Roy Salisbury supplying images and Scott Lewis co-hosting. We were joined by newcomer James McGee streaming a...
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