Star Formation
A Feline in the Heavens: The Smiling Cat Nebula
A stellar nursery sounds like a placid place where baby stars go about their business undisturbed. But, of course, a…
Nancy Grace Roman Could Detect Supermassive Dark Stars
Dark stars are hypothetical objects that might have been present in the early Universe before the first stars and even…
An Unfortunate Planet is Undergoing “Extreme Evaporation,” Melting Under the Extreme Heat From its Star
Astronomers have known something strange is happening at the star FU Ori for decades. The star brightened dramatically about 85…
More Evidence of Massive First Generation Stars
A few days ago I wrote about the search for Population III stars. These stars were the first stars of…
The Tarantula Nebula Shouldn’t Be Forming Stars. What’s Going On?
The Tarantula Nebula is a star formation region in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). Tarantula is about 160,000 light-years away…
Triggered Star Birth in the Nessie Nebula
Star formation is one of the oldest processes in the Universe. In the Milky Way and most other galaxies, it…
It Took Five Years and A Million Images to Make this Atlas of Stellar Nurseries
Star formation is an intricate process governed by a swarm of variables, and it all happens behind a thick veil…
Newborn Star Surrounded By Planet-Forming Disks at Different Angles
One of the great questions about our solar system is: what was it like as it formed? We know that…
Mother of Dragons: Astronomers Peer Inside the “Dragon Cloud”
How did the most massive stars form? Astronomers have debated their origins for decades. One of the biggest problems facing…
When Clouds Collide, Destruction and Creation Go Hand-in-Hand
All stars are born from the collapse of clouds of dust and gas. But triggering star formation is a tricky…