Cambridge, MA -- Researchers at the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian have observed a new type of binary star that has long been theorized to exist. The discovery finall...

Molecular clouds in the Milky Way are generally very inefficient in forming stars; only about 1% of the available material ends up in a star. Astronomers think one reason is that star-for...

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are bright pulses of emission at radio wavelengths (seen mostly at wavelengths of tens of centimeters) whose physical mechanism(s) are mysterious. The bursts last...

Galaxy clusters are the largest and most recently formed structures in the universe. The closest large cluster of galaxies to us is the Virgo Cluster with about 2000 members. (The Milky W...

Pasadena, CA -- The 2020 Decadal Survey for Astronomy and Astrophysics has recommended federal support for the final construction stages of the Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT) as part of t...

Ultra-diffuse galaxies (UDGs) have very low luminosities, comparatively few stars, and little star-formation activity as compared with normal galaxies of similar sizes. Commonly found in ...

Cambridge, MA -- The 2020 Decadal Survey for Astronomy and Astrophysics has recommended a new series of three Great Observatories — or space-based telescopes — as a top national priority ...

On Thursday, November 4, the National Academy of Sciences released the 2020 Decadal Survey, Pathways to Discovery in Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 2020s. The report identifies the mo...

Planets and their stars form from the same reservoir of nebular material and their chemical compositions should therefore be correlated but the observed compositions of planets do not mat...

Cambridge, MA -- Signs of a planet transiting a star outside of the Milky Way galaxy may have been detected for the first time. This intriguing result, using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observat...