Stars

Prelude to a Supernova: The James Webb Captures a Rare Wolf-Rayet Star

Massive stars are sprinters. It might seem counterintuitive that stars 100 or 200 times more massive than our Sun could…

5 days ago

Even the Calmest Red Dwarfs are Wilder than the Sun

There's something menacing about red dwarfs. Human eyes are accustomed to our benevolent yellow Sun and the warm light it…

6 days ago

Speedrunning Star Formation in the Cygnus X Region

Stars are born in molecular clouds, massive clouds of hydrogen that can contain millions of stellar masses of material. But…

3 weeks ago

The Mass of a Single Star (other than the Sun) has Been Directly Measured for the First Time

How do you measure an object's weight from a distance? You could guess at its distance and therefore derive its…

1 month ago

Hubble’s New View of the Tarantula Nebula

The Tarantula Nebula, also called 30 Doradus, is the brightest star-forming region in our part of the galaxy. It's in…

1 month ago

This Binary System is Destined to Become a Kilonova

Kilonovae are extraordinarily rare. Astronomers think there are only about 10 of them in the Milky Way. But they're extraordinarily…

2 months ago

Binary Dwarf Stars Found Orbiting Each Other Every 20 Hours. They Were Once Almost Touching

A team of astrophysicists has discovered a binary pair of ultra-cool dwarfs so close together that they look like a…

2 months ago

The Donut That Used To Be a Star

The death of a star is one of the most dramatic natural events in the Universe. Some stars die in…

2 months ago

A Black Hole is Savoring its Meal, Feeding on the Same Star Over and Over Again

Something extraordinary happens about every 10,000 to 100,000 years in galaxies like the Milky Way. An unwary star approaches the…

2 months ago

This Star is Blasting Out a Concentrated Jet of Material at 500 km/s

MWC 349A is a star about 3,900 light-years away in the constellation Cygnus. It's huge, about 38 times as massive…

2 months ago