Category Archives: Astronomy

Kepler 56

Planets misaligned in exoplanet system

(Source NASA) – A long-standing puzzle in the study of exoplanets is the formation of hot Jupiters, gas giant planets that snuggly orbit their host star. To explain their short orbital…

Comet ISON

Comet ISON intact, We may still get a good show.

(Source NASA) – A new image of the sunward plunging comet ISON suggests that the comet is intact despite some predictions that the fragile icy nucleus might disintegrate as the…

Free FLoating Planet

Pan-Starrs 1 Telescope images first planet without a sun

An international team of astronomers has discovered an exotic young planet that is not orbiting a star. This free-floating planet, named PSO J318.5-22 was found using the Pan-STARRS 1 (PS1) wide-field survey…

Kepler 7b.

Kepler-Spitzer give first look at clouds on exoplanet

For the first time we now have an idea what the clouds look like on a planet outside our own solar system. This is an amazing find, To think that…

Galaxy M60-UCD1

Chandra finds densest galaxy 54 million light years away.

(NASA) – Astronomers may have found the densest galaxy in the nearby universe. The galaxy, known as M60-UCD1, is located near a massive elliptical galaxy NGC 4649, also called M60,…

deep impact

Communications lost, NASA Deep Impact Mission ended

Last month controllers lost contact with NASA’s Deep Impact mission, several weeks were spent trying to uplink commands to reactivate it’s onboard systems. The last communication with the probe was…

Clusters

Hubble Finds Largest Group of Star Clusters, Clues to Dark Matter

(NASA) – The Hubble Space Telescope has uncovered the largest known population of globular star clusters, an estimated 160,000, swarming like bees inside the crowded core of the giant grouping of galaxies…

voyager exits helosphere

Voyager 1 enters interstellar space, what does it mean to us?

It is official, NASA has announced that the Voyager 1 spacecraft, launched 36 years ago, has exited our solar system and entered interstellar space.  KnowledgeOrb has been reporting on the…