Through some of the very first scientific observations with the brand-new Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) in Arizona, astronomers has found that a recently discovered tiny companion galaxy to our Milky Way, named the Hercules Dwarf Galaxy, has truly exceptional properties: while basically all of its known peers in the realm of these tiny dwarf galaxies are rather round, this galaxy at a distance o... read full post picked by AutumnLotus 1 year ago

The Hubble Space Telescope has found a large galaxy 10.6 billion light-years away from Earth that is stuffing itself with smaller galaxies caught like flies in a web of gravity. The galaxy is so far away that astronomers are seeing it as it looked in the early formative years of the Universe, only 2 billion years after the Big Bang. picked by 2manyusernames 2 years ago

Astronomers have argued for years over whether massive galaxies form from scratch, or by chunking together smaller galaxies. Lately, evidence is building for the latter theory, and a new study adds to the growing picture of galaxy formation as a clumpy affair. picked by AutumnLotus 3 months ago

In the early 1900s, Edwin Hubble made the startling discovery that our Milky Way galaxy is not alone. It is just one of many galaxies, or "island universes," as Hubble dubbed them, swimming in the sea of space. Now, a century later, NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer is helping piece together the evolution of these cosmic species. picked by AutumnLotus 1 year ago

Newborn stars shine like celestial sparklers in a new portrait of the nearby Triangulum Galaxy – the most detailed ultraviolet image of a galaxy ever taken. Astronomers will use the image, taken by NASA's Swift telescope, to create an "age map" of the galaxy's components to understand how galaxies evolve over time. picked by AutumnLotus 9 months ago

Recently, two groups of astronomers were able to see two classes of unique galaxies from the early universe. One group glimpsed galaxies that looked old even when the universe was young, suggesting they must have been some of the first galaxies to form after the birth of the universe. The other group found galaxies dating from the strongest burst of star formation in the universe. picked by AutumnLotus 8 months ago

Astronomers have identified a type of galaxy that represents a "missing link" in our understanding of the Universe. Spiral and elliptical galaxies used to be known exclusively as "blue" and "red", respectively. But two studies show that one in five galaxies is a red spiral. picked by AutumnLotus 1 week ago

Galaxies tend to give birth to their stars on the road, while travelling down intergalactic highways towards cosmic cities called galaxy clusters, new Spitzer Space Telescope observations reveal. Galaxies in relatively empty regions of the universe flock towards densely populated galaxy clusters, attracted there by the clusters' gravity. picked by AutumnLotus 10 months ago

Astronomers have glimpsed the largest cluster of galaxies ever seen in the distant, early universe. The discovery of this far-off group, estimated to contain as much mass as a thousand large galaxies, offers further proof of the existence of the enigmatic force called dark energy. picked by AutumnLotus 3 months ago

UC Irvine scientists have discovered a cluster of galaxies in a very early stage of formation that is 11.4 billion light years from Earth – the farthest of its kind ever to be detected. These galaxies are so distant that the universe was in its infancy when their light was emitted. picked by AutumnLotus 8 months ago

Dubbed SDSSJ0737+3216, the just discovered galaxy is 100 times lighter than our own Milky Way and is the smallest galaxy ever identified at that distance. It is about half the size and approximately one-tenth the "weight" of typical small galaxies found closer to Earth. picked by julea 1 year ago

Orphaned stars are being born in a vast tail of material stretching behind a faraway galaxy. The finding is evidence that orphaned stars — those not orbiting the center of a galaxy in normal fashion — are much more common than thought. picked by AutumnLotus 1 year ago

Edwin Hubble once called IC 10 “one of the most curious objects in the sky,” and new observations of the extremely faint, lightweight dwarf galaxy are giving scientists new clues about how populations of stars are born. picked by AutumnLotus 1 year ago

A furious rate of star formation discovered in a distant galaxy shows that galaxies in the early universe developed either much faster or in a different way from what astronomers have thought. The galaxy is forming the equivalent of 4,000 Suns a year. This is a thousand times more violent than our own Milky Way galaxy. picked by AutumnLotus 12 months ago

An international team of scientists has discovered seven dwarf galaxies orbiting Earth's home galaxy, the Milky Way. picked by braveheart 2 years ago

Astronomers from Arecibo Observatory radio telescope in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, have detected for the first time the molecules methanimine and hydrogen cyanide – two ingredients that build life-forming amino acids – in a galaxy some 250 million light years away. picked by AutumnLotus 11 months ago

A new image from NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer shows baby stars sprouting in the backwoods of a galaxy -- a relatively desolate region of space more than 100,000 light-years from the galaxy's bustling center. picked by AutumnLotus 8 months ago

Now that the bright Moon has left the evening sky, it's a good time to turn our attention to one of the most amazing sky objects which is passing almost directly over our heads this week between 7:30 and 8:00 p.m. This object was known as the "little cloud" to the Persian astronomer Abd-al-Rahman Al-Sufi. picked by AutumnLotus 1 year ago

The orbiting X-ray telescopes XXM-Newton and Chandra have caught a pair of galaxy clusters merging into a giant cluster. The discovery adds to existing evidence that galaxy clusters can collide faster than previously thought. picked by AutumnLotus 1 year ago

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has captured a new image of the galaxy NGC 1132 which is, most likely, a cosmic fossil – the aftermath of an enormous multi-galactic pile-up, where the carnage of collision after collision has built up a brilliant but fuzzy giant elliptical galaxy far outshining typical galaxies. picked by AutumnLotus 10 months ago