Astrophysics

Brightest Galaxy Ever Seen With Gravity Lens Shines in Hubble Photo

6 Feb 2012

A fluke of astrophysics has revealed what scientists are calling the brightest galaxy ever seen through a cosmic "zoom lens," NASA officials say.

NASA Spacecraft Reveals New Observations of Interstellar Matter

5 Feb 2012

In a series of science papers appearing in the Astrophysics Journal , scientists report finding 74 oxygen atoms for every 20 neon atoms in the interstellar wind. In our own solar system, there are 111 oxygen atoms for every 20 neon atoms.

Millisecond pulsar paradox: Stellar astrophysics helps explain behavior of fast rotating neutron stars in binary systems

2 Feb 2012

Pulsars are among the most exotic celestial bodies known. They have diameters of about 20 kilometers, but at the same time roughly the mass of our sun. A sugar-cube sized piece of its ultra-compact matter on Earth would weigh hundreds of millions of tons. A sub-class of them, known as millisecond pulsars, spin up to several hundred times per second around their own axes. Previous studies reached ...