GRAVITY instrument

The First Close-Up Picture of Star Outside the Milky Way

Like a performer preparing for their big finale, a distant star is shedding its outer layers and preparing to explode…

3 weeks ago

Astronomers are Getting Really Good at Weighing Baby Supermassive Black Holes

In the 1970s, astronomers deduced that the persistent radio source coming from the center of our galaxy was actually a…

10 months ago

Those are Exoplanets. You’re Looking at Actual Exoplanets 63 Light-Years Away!

By combining two exoplanet detection methods for the first time ever, the GRAVITY collaboration has confirmed the existence of a…

4 years ago

Ground-Based Telescope Directly Observes the Atmosphere of an Extrasolar Planet, and Sees Swirling Clouds of Iron and Silicates

We've finally got our first optical look at an exoplanet and its atmosphere, and boy is it a strange place.…

6 years ago