A distant planet orbiting two red dwarf stars, found by its warping of spacetime, has been confirmed using observations from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The planet’s mass caused what is known as a microlensing event, where light is bent by an object’s gravitational field. This is the first circumbinary planet to be confirmed following detection of a microlensing event.
Astronomers have discovered a vast cloud of high-energy particles called a wind nebula around a rare ultra-magnetic neutron star, or magnetar, for the first time. The find offers a unique window into the properties, environment and outburst history of magnetars, which are the strongest magnets in the universe.
It is known today that merging galaxies play a large role in their evolution, and the formation of elliptical galaxies in particular. However, there are only a few merging systems close enough to be observed in depth. The pair of interacting galaxies seen here — known as NGC 3921 — is one of these systems. But ‘close’ is a relative term: NGC 3921 lies 270 million light-years away.
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