Astronomy and Planetary Science Thread

The EHTC studied the spectacular flare observed during its second campaign on M87, involving over 25 ground-based and space-based telescopes. The authors report the first observation in over a decade of a high-energy gamma-ray flare.

View: https://twitter.com/ehtelescope/status/1867627534395093008


Additional information at: https://eventhorizontelescope.org/blog/m87s-powerful-jet-unleashes-rare-gamma-ray-outburst
 
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has confirmed a type of planet exists unlike anything in the solar system.

They’re dubbed a “Super-Venus” world, and one of these exoplanets – a planet which orbits another star from our Sun – is described in a paper published in Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The new analysis revealed an atmosphere which was unexpected. It was neither hydrogen-rich, nor water-rich. It was, instead, rich in carbon dioxide (CO2).

GJ 1214 b, therefore, is neither a Super-Earth nor a Sub-Neptune, but a Super-Venus.

Related paper:

 
Strange “right-handed” neutrinos may be responsible for all the matter in the universe, according to new research.

Researchers at the Penn State Extraterrestrial Intelligence (PSETI) Center have been awarded a three-year, $480,000 grant under the NASA Exoplanets Research Program to search for radio and laser signals from alien civilizations. The project is led by Pinchen Fan, a doctoral student in astronomy, astrophysics and astrobiology, under the supervision of her adviser, Jason Wright, professor of astronomy and astrophysics and director of the PSETI Center.
 
Marsquakes May Resolve One Of The Solar System’s Most Enduring Mysteries

The contrast between two clusters of marsquakes has led two scientists to suspect the internal structure of the Red Planet is quite different between the northern and southern hemispheres. If so, this would be crucial, possibly decisive, evidence in the long-running debate as to why the Martian southern hemisphere is far higher than the north.



The most likely cause, the pair propose, is differences in the temperature of material the seismic waves passed through, with the mantle beneath the highlands being hotter.

A difference like this could not be the product of some ancient asteroid, Sun and Tkalčić argue. Instead, what we see at the surface reflects convection flows within Mars having transferred heat to the southern side.


Related paper:


A giant galaxy measuring 3.3 million light-years across has been found by astronomers using a radio telescope array in South Africa.

One of the largest galaxies ever found, the behemoth is about 1.44 billion light-years away and reckoned to be 32 times the size of our Milky Way galaxy.


Related paper:

 
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Dead galaxies, live signals: Astronomers uncover a fast radio burst’s surprising location

Astronomers studying the origins of enigmatic fast radio bursts (FRBs) have made a groundbreaking discovery that could transform our understanding of the universe’s most powerful and mysterious signals. The Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment Fast Radio Burst (CHIME/FRB) collaboration has pinpointed the location on the sky of a repeating FRB, known as FRB 20240209A, outside a dead galaxy, a finding unprecedented in FRB science. The researchers believe the FRB may have originated in a cluster of old, dead stars orbiting the dead galaxy.


Related paper:

 
Approximately 41 000 years ago, Earth’s magnetic field briefly reversed during what is known as the Laschamp event. During this time, Earth’s magnetic field weakened significantly—dropping to a minimum of 5% of its current strength—which allowed more cosmic rays to reach Earth’s atmosphere.

Scientists at the Technical University of Denmark and the German Research Centre for Geosciences used data from ESA’s Swarm mission, along with other sources, to create a sounded visualisation of the Laschamp event. They mapped the movement of Earth’s magnetic field lines during the event and created a stereo sound version which is what you can hear in the video.
The soundscape was made using recordings of natural noises like wood creaking and rocks falling, blending them into familiar and strange, almost alien-like, sounds. The process of transforming the sounds with data is similar to composing music from a score.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Tc7XI0iUYU

Swarm detects tidal signatures of our oceans
22/01/2025

A study using data from ESA’s Swarm mission suggests that faint magnetic signatures created by Earth’s tides can help us determine magma distribution under the seabed and could even give us insights into long-term trends in global ocean temperatures and salinity.

Swarm is a constellation of three satellites that study Earth’s geomagnetic field. This magnetic field that extends from Earth’s interior into space is thought to be produced largely by an ocean of liquid iron in the planet’s outer core. Other sources of magnetism include magnetised rocks in the crust.

And although we might not normally think of oceans as generating magnetism, the salty sea water is a moderate electrical conductor. This means that as tides flow across Earth’s magnetic field, they generate weak electric currents, which in turn induce small magnetic signals – that can be detected from space.

With its satellites flying at an altitude between 462 km and 511 km, Swarm measures Earth’s magnetic field more accurately than ever before. It can detect faint tidal signatures and distinguish them from other stronger magnetic field sources from Earth’s interior.

“This study shows that Swarm can provide data on properties of the entire water column of our oceans.” says Anja Strømme, ESA’s Swarm Mission Manager.

Swarm’s data can also provide insights into the distribution of magma, which could in future support better understanding of events such as the Hunga-Tonga volcanic eruption of 2022.

The study of these signatures made the front cover of the world’s oldest scientific journal, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A, and was conducted by a team from the University of Cologne and the Technical University of Denmark.

Swarm gets better with age

The mission, launched in 2013, was only meant to fly for four years but is now in its 12th year. Anja adds: “This is one of the benefits of flying missions for longer than originally planned. So, by flying as long as the scientific output is of excellent quality and resources allow, you can tackle scientific questions that weren’t originally envisaged.”

Swarm is, however, slowly nearing the natural end of its lifespan as drag gradually brings the satellites physically closer to Earth. This has enabled the mission’s instruments – the satellites carry state-of-the-art sensors including magnetometers that measure the strength, magnitude and direction of the magnetic field – to capture faint signals that would be more difficult to detect from the higher orbits at the start of the mission.

 
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Some recent discoveries about strange new structures discovered within Earth's mantle, from Anton Petrov:


0:00 Discoveries inside mantle that make no sense
1:40 Previous discoveries
3:40 Plate tectonic theories questioned
4:30 Discoveries from this study and why it's a mystery
5:50 What are these though?
7:55 Conclusions
 
Spectra from a carbon dioxide world: Astronomers unlock the atmospheric secrets of a 'new class of planet'

Peering with unprecedented detail at the Milky Way Galaxy, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has allowed a team of astronomers co-led by a University of Arizona researcher to unlock answers about the composition of the most abundant type of planet in the galaxy. In the process, the researchers have unveiled a "new class of planet," according to Everett Schlawin, an assistant research professor at the U of A Steward Observatory.



Ohno then used theoretical models to run a plethora of "what if" scenarios about the atmosphere of the planet. His models confirmed that, of all these possibilities, GJ1214 b's atmosphere is likely carbon-dominated, like a "super-Venus" – "an entirely new class of planet," as Schlawin put it.

The atmospheric signature detected in this work is very small, Schlawin said.

 
Cool Worlds Lab: Earth-Like Exoplanets Just Got Even More Earth-Like:

View: https://youtu.be/fCoreDnvb1M?si=mijH-8NSIaSB6Fia


New research from the Cool Worlds Lab! Check out our explainer of this important new paper to be published in Nature Astronomy soon. Edited by Jorge Casas

Related paper:

 
"Related - 'Kearths' and superhabitability, with links."

Thank you, I'd missed this...

OT: Centauri Dreams seems to be one of the few sites which does not 'Ctrl-Scroll' zoom for ease of accessibility.
I'm a tad sensitive about such following a retinal bleed which blocked fovea of my dominant eye.
Not 'diabetic', mind, but snot-clogged 'Eustons', such I zagged when should have zigged, collided with door-frame. Three monthly intra-ocular injections have mostly resolved, more to go.....
 
"Related - 'Kearths' and superhabitability, with links."

Thank you, I'd missed this...

OT: Centauri Dreams seems to be one of the few sites which does not 'Ctrl-Scroll' zoom for ease of accessibility.
I'm a tad sensitive about such following a retinal bleed which blocked fovea of my dominant eye.
Not 'diabetic', mind, but snot-clogged 'Eustons', such I zagged when should have zigged, collided with door-frame. Three monthly intra-ocular injections have mostly resolved, more to go.....
Good luck!
 
And I thought the recent storm and red warning that we had for winds over 100 miles an hour on Friday when our fence got torn down that planet makes that seem pail in comparison.
 
Astronomers have found evidence for what might be a planet with about half the mass of the Moon orbiting the pulsar PSR J0337+1715 – this would make it the least massive planet we have ever detected outside our Solar System. The pulsar and the objects that orbit it are already some of the most extreme and extraordinary we know, so any potential planet must have undergone an extraordinary journey of survival.


Related paper:

 
So far with TRAPPIST-1 planets on Fraser Cain's YouTube chanel. Detailed interview with a specialist, PhD candidate Megan Gialluca. Her enthusiasm is infectious. The vid's 73 minutes, so you might not have the spare time to watch it all. I'll summarize it as I watch it myself, updating this post along the way.

TL;DR: 'Bare rock' is the most likely - but not certain - explanation for b, more to come on c and the rest. There's still a lot more to discover and confirm, which will take time requiring repeated observations over years to come.

One big problem is 'stellar contamination.' TRAPPIST-1 is an active red dwarf and can have coverage of 30% in spots or faculae, so what could be interesting results in the light reflected off planets or possibly filtered through their (potential) atmospheres may in fact be the star just being weird.

At 27:00 there's a sum-up of the possible atmostpheres for b and c. b most likely has none, c could be somewhat hot Mars-like but with a thin O2-dominated atmosphere and a smidgen or CO2. O2 would not be indicative of life but the planets would have lost a lot of water and other volatiles in past ages and the O2 is a remnant of the water molecules split by stellar radiation. It would be a 'post-greenhouse' world (my term).

At 35:15 d is smaller that the roughly earth-mass b and c and consequently less likely to hold onto an atmosphere. Gialluca's quite excited by it though because it's on the inner boundary of the habitable zone - but is it just inside or just outside? Finding out will help us in understanding the HZ (or HZs, as there are different definitions).

40:00 e, f, g, h - far, far too soon to tell. Apparently something 'exciting' - to an astronomer - may be published soon on e. Then she talks about upcoming observation cycles with JWST.

At 43:30 an explanation of what stellar contamination is. At 53:00 the star actually flares ~3.6 times per day, which is a LOT - ten times what was predicted from Kepler 2 mission.

About 1:00:00, cunning means of mitigating contamination. Then why it's so exciting to be working on this, at this time.

At 1:05:20 notes on life detection and biosignatures - there are going to be a lot of false positives and ambiguous results, so temper your enthusiasm when you see the news of a possible detection. This leads to discussion about the impotance of good science communication and also learning to live with uncertainty.

BTW, she mentions 'HWO' - that's the Habitable Worlds Observatory, a follow-on to JWST. We glimpse some concepts for that at 1:10:15 just before the end and a reminder that you can see more about it on Patreon.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8H4EnbKkgU&t=3s&ab_channel=FraserCain
 
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Scientific American: Newfound Asteroid May Hit Earth in 2032, Scientists Say [Jan 30]

While we can’t say for sure where YR24 would strike our planet, we can geographically constrain where Earth would possibly take the hit based on the projected impact date of December 22, 2032, says Daniel Bamberger, an amateur astronomer in Germany, who has calculated the asteroid’s possible impact corridor. The area under threat is a swath extending from the Pacific Ocean through northern South America, the Atlantic Ocean, sub-Saharan Africa, the Arabian Sea and parts of South Asia. “We knew we would one day find such an object with a reasonably high chance of impact,” he says.
 
More on the spaceberg
 
Anton Petrov has put out a video about astronomers discovering exoplanets being eaten by their parent stars:


0:00 Planetary leftovers far far away
1:20 TESS discovery that's really bizarre
4:00 Ring left by planetary leftovers
6:05 Kepler discovery observed with JWST
7:10 What these icy discoveries mean
8:05 Conclusions and implications
 
Quantum machine simulates universe's potential false vacuum decay

Physicists have performed a simulation they say sheds new light on an elusive phenomenon that could determine the ultimate fate of the universe.

Pioneering research in quantum field theory around 50 years ago proposed that the universe may be trapped in a false vacuum—meaning it appears stable but in fact could be on the verge of transitioning to an even more stable, true vacuum state.

While this process could trigger a catastrophic change in the universe's structure, experts agree that predicting the timeline is challenging, but it is likely to occur over an astronomically long period, potentially spanning millions of years.

They used a 5,564-qubit quantum annealer, a type of quantum machine designed by D-Wave Quantum Inc. to solve complex optimization problems—which involve finding the best solution from a set of possible solutions—by harnessing the unique properties of quantum-mechanical systems.

In the paper, published in Nature Physics, the team explain how they used the machine to mimic the behavior of bubbles in a false vacuum.


Related paper:

 
Using data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission, scientists have found a huge exoplanet and a brown dwarf. This is the first time a planet has been uniquely discovered by Gaia’s ability to sense the gravitational tug or ‘wobble’ the planet induces on a star. Both the planet and brown dwarf are orbiting low-mass stars, a scenario thought to be extremely rare.



When the next batch of Gaia data is released in 2026, it will contain 5.5 years of mission data that could uncover hundreds – if not thousands – of planets and brown dwarfs around nearby stars. That will give us new insights into how these different objects form, and Gaia is paving the way for a new era of astrometric discovery, leading to a deeper understanding of the diverse planetary systems that populate our galaxy.

ESA Research Fellow Matthew Standing is an exoplanet expert. “This discovery is an exciting tip-of-the-iceberg for the exoplanet discoveries we can expect from Gaia in the future,” he explains. “The discovery of Gaia-4b is an important breakthrough in the use of Gaia astrometry for exoplanet detection, complimenting the other exoplanet detection methods used by ESA’s Cheops and the upcoming Plato mission.”


Related paper:


Related video:

View: https://youtu.be/UsCQ2aS-Qe4
 
Quantum machine simulates universe's potential false vacuum decay

Related paper:

Yikes

Space exploration concepts

New dish

Astronomy

Space in the news

solar sails...heliophysics
 
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While y'all are doing all that deep science reading, I'm here at laundromat alone watching YouTubes while eating chocolate doughnuts since I'm the only person making laundry machine noise.

Unusual Findings From Disintegrating Planets Around 2 Distant Stars​

Feb 3, 2025
Hello and welcome! My name is Anton and in this video, we will talk about planets that are observed falling apart in real time

0:00 Planetary leftovers far far away
1:20 TESS discovery that's really bizarre
4:00 Ring left by planetary leftovers
6:05 Kepler discovery observed with JWST
7:10 What these icy discoveries mean
8:05 Conclusions and implications

 
While y'all are doing all that deep science reading, I'm here at laundromat alone watching YouTubes while eating chocolate doughnuts since I'm the only person making laundry machine noise.

Unusual Findings From Disintegrating Planets Around 2 Distant Stars​


I posted that video yesterday;).
 
I posted that video yesterday;).
Ah, okay, just blame my missing that on my messy health, "Brain Fog" is a known and documented and written about component.
As part of that, although I really enjoy spaceflight and astronomy, my ability to remember details of them ain't what it used to be.
There are days where the most I'm good for is enjoying the astronomical images and the grand and glorious beauty of this universe.
 
The GeologyHub channel has a video about the potential 2032 impact site location by the 2024 YR4 asteroid:


There is a legitimate chance that a regionally destructive asteroid could impact earth on December 22nd, 2032, and we have narrowed down where in the world this might occur. This is all due to the recent discovery of an asteroid referred to as 2024 YR4, which risks a Tunguska style event happening in the not-so-distant future. Today's video will discuss this asteroid, its size, and give a broader context and analysis about what might happen next.
 
Scott Manley has just uploaded a video concerning asteroid 2024YR4 and its potential impact on Earth in 2032 (I'll be 60 in 2032):


My take on Asteroid 2024 YR4, which currently has a 2.3% chance of colliding with the Earth in 2032, an event that's likely comparable to a multi megaton nuclear weapon. The odds are still good that it'll miss, but the chances may look worse before they get better, and there's a real chance we can't honestly know the answer by April when it gets too faint to observe until 2028.But this won't be the end of the world, and might be an opportunity to put the capabilities of DART into real world use.
 
we have serious problem in Physic
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wp8zHG1g7bc


0:00 Hubble tension and history of dark energy
2:00 Bizarre discoveries ever since
2:25 Measuring distance with the cosmic ladder
3:10 Cepheid variables and Type 1A supernovae
4:50 Hubble and JWST confirmations
5:40 CMB observations that are super different
7:10 DESI creates a crisis
8:15 Coma cluster calculations to see if there's a tension
10:00 More JWST discoveries and more issues
10:35 Possible explanations
13:20 Conclusions
 
Gemini North Teams Up With LOFAR to Reveal Largest Radio Jet Ever Seen in the Early Universe

The monster jet spans at least 200,000 light-years and formed when the Universe was less than 10% of its current age


Related paper:

 

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