Gemini North Telescope – Astronomy Now

A captivating view of the Heron Galaxy as a gravitational tug of war plays out

13 December 2019 Astronomy Now

Two interacting galaxies, distorted in an ongoing gravitational tug of war, present a captivating vista as observed by the Gemini North telescope in Hawaii, taking on the shape of a graceful heron in the northern sky.

Exoplanet traced to home star in binary system

5 September 2019 Astronomy Now

Using a technique known as speckle imaging, astronomers have pinned down the orbit of an exoplanet in a binary star system.

Persistence – and adaptive optics – track Io volcanoes

16 August 2019 Astronomy Now

Using adaptive optics, researchers have been monitoring Jupiter’s tortured moon Io for the past five years, gaining new insights into its persistent volcanism.

Observatories resume operations amid protests

12 August 2019 Astronomy Now

After a month-long shutdown due to protests and demonstrations, observatories in Hawaii hope to resume observations.

Uranus stinks. No, really, it does

26 April 2018 Astronomy Now

Astronomers using a powerful spectrometer attached one of the world’s largest telescopes have discovered that Uranus smells like rotten eggs thanks to hydrogen sulphide in its upper atmosphere.

Earth-based views of Jupiter to enhance Juno flyby

30 June 2017 Astronomy Now

Telescopes in Hawaii have obtained new images of Jupiter and its Great Red Spot, which will assist the first-ever close-up study of the Great Red Spot, planned for July 10.

Massive galaxy discovered made almost entirely of dark matter

26 August 2016 Astronomy Now

An international team of astronomers has discovered a massive galaxy that consists of 99.99 percent dark matter. Even though it is relatively nearby, astronomers had missed the galaxy, named Dragonfly 44, for decades because it is very dim. The galaxy lies about 300 million light-years away in the constellation Coma.

Freezing effects of Jupiter’s shadow on Io’s volcanic gases revealed

3 August 2016 Astronomy Now

A team of scientists has documented atmospheric changes on Io, Jupiter’s volcanically active satellite, as the giant planet casts its shadow over the moon during daily eclipses. Io’s thin atmosphere collapses as the sulfur dioxide gas emitted from volcanoes freezes when shaded by Jupiter. The atmosphere reforms when Io moves out of eclipse and the ice sublimates.

Evidence of water clouds found in spectrum of coldest brown dwarf

7 July 2016 Astronomy Now

Since its detection in 2014, the brown dwarf known as WISE 0855 has fascinated astronomers. Only 7.2 light-years from Earth, it is the coldest known object outside of our solar system. Now, a team led by astronomers has succeeded in obtaining strong evidence for the existence of clouds of water or water ice — the first such clouds detected outside our solar system.

The sleeping giant in elliptical galaxy NGC 4889

11 February 2016 Astronomy Now

The placid appearance of NGC 4889 can fool the unsuspecting observer. But the elliptical galaxy, pictured here in front of hundreds of background galaxies, and deeply embedded within the Coma galaxy cluster in this new image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, harbours a dark secret. At its heart lurks one of the most massive black holes ever discovered.