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Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory - Mt. Hopkins, AZ

From its establishment in 1966 as the Smithsonian Mount Hopkins Observatory, FLWO has hosted a world-class suite of telescopes designed for a wide variety of purposes. The largest visible-light ...
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Astronomers Discover Rare Distant Object in Sync with Neptune

This object, called 2020 VN40, is the first confirmed body that orbits the sun once for every ten orbits Neptune completes. Cambridge, MA — A team of astronomers led by the Center for Astrophysics | ...
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The Tilt in our Stars: The Shape of the Milky Way's Halo of Stars is Realized

New data throws out the textbook picture of a spherical stellar halo and reinforces a dynamic origin story of two galaxies that collided billions of years ago. Cambridge, Mass. – A new study has ...
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M87* One Year Later: Proof of a Persistent Black Hole Shadow

CfA astronomers helped lead a study discovering changes in the bright ring around M87's black hole, confirming the theoretical understanding of the variable and turbulent flow of material around black ...
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First atmosphere detected on a habitable-zone rocky world

In a major milestone in the search for life on other planets, astronomers have detected, for the first time, an atmosphere surrounding an Earth-like, rocky planet orbiting within the habitable zone of ...
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Event Horizon Telescope Makes Highest-Resolution Black Hole Detections from Earth

The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) Collaboration has conducted test observations achieving the highest resolution ever obtained from the surface of the Earth, by detecting light from the centers of ...
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Billions of Celestial Objects Revealed in Gargantuan Survey of the Milky Way

Cambridge, MA – A new astronomical survey is a portrait of gargantuan proportions. It shows the staggering number of stars bristling among the wispy bands of dust in our home galaxy, the Milky Way.
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Mystery Solved: Dust Cloud Led to Betelgeuse's 'Great Dimming'

The star Betelgeuse became visibly darker in 2019 and 2020, puzzling astronomers. New images show that the star was partially concealed by a cloud of dust, solving the mystery of the "Great Dimming" ...
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Astronomers Unveil Strong Magnetic Fields Spiraling at the Edge of Milky Way’s Central Black Hole

CfA astronomers led two new EHT studies that have produced the first polarized light image of the supermassive black hole at the heart of the Milky Way Galaxy. Cambridge, MA--A new image from the ...
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Ready for its Close-up: New Technology Sharpens Images of Black Holes

Using new computational algorithms, scientists have measured a sharp ring of light predicted to originate from photons whipping around the back of a supermassive black hole. Cambridge, MA – When ...
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Alien Planet Found Spiraling to its Doom around an Aging Star

Cambridge, Mass. – For the first time, astronomers have spotted an exoplanet whose orbit is decaying around an evolved, or older, host star. The stricken world appears destined to spiral closer and ...
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AI Helps Astronomers Discover a New Type of Supernova

Astronomers have discovered what may be a massive star exploding while trying to swallow a black hole, offering an explanation for one of the strangest supernovae ever seen. Cambridge, MA - ...