This week in Nature it was announced that complex organic molecules were observed in a young planetary system.
Peribothron
A young star known as G2 has made its closest approach to the supermassive black hole in our galaxy. This has given rise to a term known as peribothron.
Teapot Star
A new star known as a nova has appeared in the constellation Sagittarius (aka the teapot). It’s one of the few novas that is visible with the naked eye.
Go Speed Racer! Go!
We’ve just discovered the fastest star in our galaxy, and it was likely given its speed by a supernova explosion.
Missed It By That Much
About 70,000 years ago Scholz’s star came within 0.8 light years of the Sun.
Sounding Older
We can determine the age of a star by the way sounds move within it.
The Old Ones
Five small planets have been discovered around an ancient star.
Close Encounters of the Stellar Kind
A star known as HIP 85605 is on a collision course with our solar system. Not a collision course as in Armageddon, or When Worlds Collide, but rather on a path to come within 0.04 parsecs of the Sun. That might seem close, but that would make it more than 8,000 times more distant than Earth at its closest approach (8,000 AU). Distant Eris is only 100 AU by comparison. Given that stellar distances are typically measured in light years, and this encounter would be only 50 light days away, that’s remarkably close by astronomical standards. This close encounter won’t occur for another 400,000 years or so. Currently HIP 85605 is about 16 light years away, so we have time to plan for its visit. But it does raise an interesting question as to how such a close encounter could affect our solar system.
It’s Gonna Blow!
Eta Carinae is about 7,500 light years away, and its going to explode any time now. Mind you, “any time now” means sometime over the next ten to twenty thousand years or so. But recently the star been in the news again as an existential threat to our planet. It must be that time of year again.