The search for extraterrestrial intelligence just got a reality check. According to new research presented at the EPSC-DPS2025 Joint Meeting in Helsinki, the closest technological alien civilization to Earth is likely sitting about 33,000 light years away – roughly on the opposite side of our galaxy. Even more sobering: that alien society would need to … Read more

The brightest explosions in space are supposed to be one-time events. This one went off again and again. On July 2, NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope picked up a puzzling signal, later confirmed by Europe’s Very Large Telescope in Chile: a gamma-ray burst (GRB) that lasted a full day and repeated in discrete flashes. Astronomers … Read more

High in the Chilean desert, one of Earth’s most powerful telescopes has captured the birth of a world. Astronomers using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope have directly imaged WISPIT 2b, a young gas giant still glowing from its formation, nestled in the wide gap of a multi-ringed disk around the star WISPIT 2. … Read more

The Hubble Space Telescope has captured the clearest images yet of a rare interstellar visitor speeding through our solar system at an unprecedented 210,000 kilometers per hour, making it the fastest object ever recorded in our cosmic neighborhood. The comet, designated 3I/ATLAS, represents only the third known interstellar interloper detected in our solar system, following … Read more

For the first time, astronomers may have caught a planet forming in real time, watching as it sculpts the swirling gas and dust around its young host star. Using the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope, researchers observed a bright signal nestled within a spiral arm of the star HD 135344B’s protoplanetary disc—right where … Read more

Scientists have witnessed the earliest stages of planet formation ever observed, watching hot minerals crystallize into solid particles around a baby star 1,300 light-years away. This discovery, published in Nature, marks the first time researchers have caught a planetary system at the very moment when planets begin to form—providing a cosmic time machine to study … Read more

A young planet is literally making its star angry. Astronomers have discovered that HIP 67522 b, a gas giant orbiting dangerously close to its 17-million-year-old host star, triggers magnetic eruptions that bombard the planet with six times more radiation than it would normally receive. This cosmic act of self-destruction represents the first confirmed case of … Read more

A stellar detective story hundreds of years in the making has finally reached its conclusion. Astronomers using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope have captured the first visual evidence of a star that died not once, but twice—exploding in a rare double-detonation that left behind a distinctive fingerprint in the cosmic debris. The discovery … Read more

A 60-meter asteroid discovered late last year has astronomers on edge—not because it threatens Earth, but because it might crash into the Moon. Asteroid 2024 YR4, which briefly sparked global concern when its Earth impact probability reached 3%, has been ruled out as a threat to our planet. However, new calculations show a 4% chance … Read more

Two months after launch, Europe’s Biomass satellite has returned its first images—and they’re already revealing hidden secrets beneath some of the world’s most impenetrable forests. The spacecraft’s advanced radar can peer through dense Amazon canopies to measure the carbon locked inside tree trunks and branches, offering scientists an unprecedented tool for tracking how forests store … Read more