Press Releases
Showing 1 to 24 of 2124.
NASA’s Webb Provides Another Look Into Galactic Collisions
2024.09.18
Smile for the camera! An interaction between an elliptical galaxy and a spiral galaxy, collectively known as Arp 107, seems to have given the spiral a happier outlook thanks to the two bright “eyes” and the wide semicircular “smile.” The region has been observed before in infrared by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope in 2005, however […]
NASA’s Hubble Finds More Black Holes than Expected in the Early Universe
2024.09.17
With the help of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, an international team of researchers led by scientists in the Department of Astronomy at Stockholm University has found more black holes in the early universe than has previously been reported. The new result can help scientists understand how supermassive black holes were created. Currently, scientists do not […]
NASA Completes Spacecraft to Transport, Support Roman Space Telescope
2024.09.17
The spacecraft bus that will deliver NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope to its orbit and enable it to function once there is now complete after years of construction, installation, and testing. Now that the spacecraft is assembled, engineers will begin working to integrate the observatory’s other major components, including the science instruments and the […]
Hubble Examines a Spiral Star Factory
2024.09.13
This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features a spiral galaxy in the constellation Virgo named NGC 5668. It is relatively near to us at 90 million light-years from Earth and quite accessible for astronomers to study with both space- and ground-based telescopes. At first glance, it doesn’t seem like a remarkable galaxy. It is around […]
NASA’s Webb Peers into the Extreme Outer Galaxy
2024.09.12
Astronomers have directed NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to examine the outskirts of our Milky Way galaxy. Scientists call this region the Extreme Outer Galaxy due to its location more than 58,000 light-years away from the Galactic Center. (For comparison, Earth is approximately 26,000 light-years from the center.) A team of scientists used Webb’s NIRCam […]
Kyle Helson Finds EXCITE-ment in Exoplanet Exploration
2024.09.10
Almost a decade ago, then-grad student Kyle Helson contributed to early paperwork for NASA’s EXCITE mission. As a scientist at Goddard, Helson helped make this balloon-based telescope a reality: EXCITE launched successfully on Aug. 31. Name: Kyle HelsonTitle: Assistant Research ScientistOrganization: Observational Cosmology Lab (Code 665), via UMBC and the GESTAR II cooperative agreement with […]
NASA’s Hubble, Chandra Find Supermassive Black Hole Duo
2024.09.09
Like two Sumo wrestlers squaring off, the closest confirmed pair of supermassive black holes have been observed in tight proximity. These are located approximately 300 light-years apart and were detected using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory. These black holes, buried deep within a pair of colliding galaxies, are fueled by infalling […]
Hubble Examines a Busy Galactic Center
2024.09.06
This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image features the spiral galaxy IC 4709 located around 240 million light-years away in the southern constellation Telescopium. Hubble beautifully captures its faint halo and swirling disk filled with stars and dust bands. The compact region at its core might be the most remarkable sight. It holds an active galactic […]
NASA’s Hubble, MAVEN Help Solve the Mystery of Mars’ Escaping Water
2024.09.05
Mars was once a very wet planet as is evident in its surface geological features. Scientists know that over the last 3 billion years, at least some water went deep underground, but what happened to the rest? Now, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) missions are helping unlock that mystery. […]
NASA’s Webb Reveals Distorted Galaxy Forming Cosmic Question Mark
2024.09.04
It’s 7 billion years ago, and the universe’s heyday of star formation is beginning to slow. What might our Milky Way galaxy have looked like at that time? Astronomers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have found clues in the form of a cosmic question mark, the result of a rare alignment across light-years of […]
NASA’s Mini BurstCube Mission Detects Mega Blast
2024.09.03
The shoebox-sized BurstCube satellite has observed its first gamma-ray burst, the most powerful kind of explosion in the universe, according to a recent analysis of observations collected over the last several months.
Hubble Zooms into the Rosy Tendrils of Andromeda
2024.08.30
Clusters of stars set the interstellar medium ablaze in the Andromeda Galaxy about 2.5 million light-years away. Also known as M31, Andromeda is the Milky Way’s closest major galaxy. It measures approximately 152,000 light-years across and, with almost the same mass as our home galaxy, is headed for a collision with the Milky Way in […]
Roman Profile: Rob Zellem, Roman Space Telescope Communications Scientist
2024.08.29
Rob Zellem was interested in astronomy as far back as he can remember. But the moment that cinched his plan to become a NASA astronomer came in high school, when he saw a Hubble Space Telescope image of the Pillars of Creation.
Hubble Observes An Oddly Organized Satellite
2024.08.29
Andromeda III is one of at least 13 dwarf satellite galaxies in orbit around the Andromeda galaxy, or Messier 31, the Milky Way’s closest grand spiral galactic neighbor. Andromeda III is a faint, spheroidal collection of old, reddish stars that appears devoid of new star formation and younger stars. In fact, Andromeda III seems to […]
Hubble Traces Star Formation in a Nearby Nebula
2024.08.28
NGC 261 blooms a brilliant ruby red against a myriad of stars in this new image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Discovered on Sept. 5, 1826 by Scottish astronomer James Dunlop, this nebula is located in one of the Milky Way’s closest galactic companions, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). The ionized gas blazing from within […]
Hubble Pinpoints a Dim, Starry Mini-galaxy
2024.08.27
A glittering collection of stars shines against a background of much more distant galaxies in this view from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope of the Pegasus Dwarf spheroidal galaxy, also known as Andromeda VI. The Andromeda galaxy, also known as Messier 31, is the Milky Way’s closest grand spiral galaxy neighbor, and is host to at […]
Solar Panels for NASA’s Roman Space Telescope Pass Key Tests
2024.08.26
NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope’s Solar Array Sun Shield has successfully completed recent tests, signaling that the assembly is on track to be completed on schedule. The panels are designed to power and shade the observatory, enabling all the mission’s observations and helping keep the instruments cool. The Roman team has two sets of […]
Hubble Captures Unique Ultraviolet View of a Spectacular Star Cluster
2024.08.26
Roughly 210,000 light-years away, the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) is one of our Milky Way galaxy’s closest neighbors. In fact, this small galaxy is one of the Milky Way’s “satellite” galaxies, which orbit our home spiral galaxy. Nested within the SMC is this spectacular star cluster, known as NGC 346. Its hot stars unleash a […]
Webb Finds Early Galaxies Weren’t Too Big for Their Britches After All
2024.08.26
It got called the crisis in cosmology. But now astronomers can explain some surprising recent discoveries. When astronomers got their first glimpses of galaxies in the early universe from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, they were expecting to find galactic pipsqueaks, but instead they found what appeared to be a bevy of Olympic bodybuilders. Some […]
Hubble Reaches a Lonely Light in the Dark
2024.08.23
A splatter of stars glows faintly at almost 3 million light-years away in this new image from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Known as the Tucana Dwarf for lying in the constellation Tucana, this dwarf galaxy contains a loose bundle of aging stars at the far edge of the Local Group, an aggregation of galaxies including […]
Hubble Finds Structure in an Unstructured Galaxy
2024.08.22
This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image features the nearby dwarf irregular galaxy Leo A, located some 2.6 million light-years away. The relatively open distribution of stars in this diminutive galaxy allows light from distant background galaxies to shine through. Astronomers study dwarf galaxies like Leo A because they are numerous and may offer clues to […]
NASA’s EXCITE Mission Prepared for Scientific Balloon Flight
2024.08.22
Scientists and engineers are ready to fly an infrared mission called EXCITE (EXoplanet Climate Infrared TElescope) to the edge of space. EXCITE is designed to study atmospheres around exoplanets, or worlds beyond our solar system, during circumpolar long-duration scientific balloon flights. But first, it must complete a test flight during NASA’s fall 2024 scientific ballooning campaign from Fort Sumner, […]
Hubble Peers Into the Center of a Star-forming Powerhouse
2024.08.21
This view from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope plunges into the center of spiral galaxy Messier 33 (M33), also known as the Triangulum Galaxy. Located within the triangle-shaped constellation Triangulum and about half the size of our Milky Way galaxy, M33 is the third-largest member of our Local Group of galaxies after the Andromeda galaxy (M31) […]
How Students Learn to Fly NASA’s IXPE Spacecraft
2024.08.21
The large wall monitor displaying a countdown shows 17 seconds when Amelia “Mia” De Herrera-Schnering tells her teammates “We have AOS,” meaning “acquisition of signal.” “Copy that, thank you,” Alexander Pichler replies. The two are now in contact with NASA’s IXPE (Imaging X-Ray Polarimeter Explorer) spacecraft, transmitting science data from IXPE to a ground station […]
Showing 1 to 24 of 2124.