Star in closest orbit ever seen around black hole

Astronomers have found evidence of a star that whips around a likely black hole twice an hour. This could be the tightest orbital dance ever seen by a black hole and a companion star in our own Milky Way galaxy.

Dwarf star 200 light-years away contains life's building blocks

Many scientists believe the Earth was dry when it first formed, and that the building blocks for life on our planet—carbon, nitrogen and water—appeared only later as a result of collisions with other objects in our solar ...

A pulsar and white dwarf dance together in a surprising orbit

Searching the universe for strange new star systems can lead to some pretty interesting finds. And sometimes, it can turn up phenomena that contradict everything we think we know about the formation and evolution of stars. ...

G1.9+0.3: Trigger for Milky Way's youngest supernova identified

Scientists have used data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the NSF's Jansky Very Large Array to determine the likely trigger for the most recent supernova in the Milky Way. They applied a new technique that could ...

First discovery of a binary companion for a Type Ia supernovae

A team of astronomers including Harvard's Robert Kirshner and Peter Challis has detected a flash of light from the companion to an exploding star. This is the first time astronomers have witnessed the impact of an exploding ...

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