ScienceDaily: Space & Time News

Study of Andromeda's stellar disk indicates more violent history than Milky Way Posted: 08 Jan 2015 03:43 PM PST A detailed study of the motions of different stellar populations in the disk of the Andromeda galaxy has found striking differences from our own Milky Way, suggesting a more violent history of mergers with smaller galaxies in Andromeda's recent past.

Flashes from 'photonic booms' may help illuminate astronomical secrets Posted: 08 Jan 2015 03:42 PM PST 'Photonic booms' may turn out to help illuminate a variety of astronomical objects such as asteroids and the moon.

Astronomers use vanishing neutron star to measure space-time warp Posted: 08 Jan 2015 10:19 AM PST In an interstellar race against time, astronomers have measured the space-time warp in the gravity of a binary star and determined the mass of a neutron star--just before it vanished from view.

Novel vision of the death of massive stars Posted: 08 Jan 2015 08:36 AM PST Scientists have published a compendium of data obtained after the simultaneous research of three supernovas and of their corresponding Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRB). The research enabled contrasting statistically that the supernovas associated with GRB emit greater quantities of nickel compared to those not linked to GRB.

Unusual light signal yields clues about elusive black hole merger Posted: 08 Jan 2015 06:44 AM PST Scientists have found what appear to be two supermassive black holes in the final stages of a merger, a rare event never seen before. The discovery could help shed light on a long-standing conundrum in astrophysics called the "final parsec problem," which refers to the failure of theoretical models to predict what the final stages of a black hole merger look like or even how long the process might take.

Targeting supernovae in our neighborhood of the universe Posted: 08 Jan 2015 05:48 AM PST While many astronomical collaborations use powerful telescopes to target individual objects in the distant universe, a new project is doing something radically different: using small telescopes to study a growing portion of the nearby universe all at once. Since it officially launched in May 2014, the project has detected 89 bright supernovae and counting -- more than all other professional astronomical surveys combined.

Researchers succeed in measuring the temperature at the heart of stars Posted: 08 Jan 2015 05:44 AM PST Researchers have succeeded, for the first time, in measuring the temperature at the heart of certain stars, as well as dating them. In 1926, astrophysicist Sir Arthur Eddington wrote in his work The internal constitution of the stars: “At first sight it would seem that the deep interior of the Sun and stars is less accessible to scientific investigation than any other region of the universe. What appliance can pierce through the outer layers of a star and test the conditions within?” Nearly 90 years later, this question has now gained an answer, thanks to the work of a team of six astrophysicists who have managed to measure the temperature at the heart of specific stars and to estimate their age.