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For 30 years, a complex mathematical problem hid the true nature of exoplanet atmospheres. Now, a physicist at LMU Munich has solved it. When astronomers look at exoplanets, they don't see surfaces; they see "spectra"—fingerprints of light filtered through the planet's atmosphere. But for decades, the math used to interpret these signals was too simple.

Why are planets with two suns so rare? Physicists have found the culprit: Einstein's theory of General Relativity. Of the more than 6,000 confirmed exoplanets, only 14 have been found orbiting tight binary stars (stars that orbit each other in less than a week). Statistically, there should be hundreds.

Mysterious radio pulses repeating every 21 minutes have puzzled astronomers. A new study reveals the source: a white dwarf spinning in a cosmic dance. Neutron stars are usually the speed demons of the universe, spinning vertically fast to create "pulsars." But recently, astronomers found something impossible: slow pulses, repeating every 18 minutes to 6 hours. Physics says neutron stars shouldn't pulse that slowly.

BepiColombo has detected a magnetic "chorus" around the first planet. It's a form of magnetic birdsong that drives a rain of electrons onto the surface. Magnetic fields are strange creatures. They vibrate, creating "whistler-mode" waves that, when translated to audio, sound like a dawn chorus of chirping birds.

Scientists have finally identified the invisible power source that accelerates particles to create the stunning Northern Lights: Alfvén waves. We've known for a long time that auroras are caused by high-energy particles from space smashing into Earth's atmosphere. But one mystery remained: What accelerates them?

Scientists have developed a new way to "mine" old radio telescope data, uncovering thousands of hidden signals from dwarf stars and potential exoplanets. Modern radio telescopes collect colossal volumes of data. Traditionally, astronomers look at this data one source at a time. It's painstaking work.

Imagine an invisible object millions of times heavier than the sun, tearing through space at 3,000 km/s. New evidence suggests these "cosmic cannons" are real. Last year, we marveled at a fast-moving asteroid. But recent studies confirm something far more terrifying and fascinating might be out there: Supermassive Black Holes ejected from their host galaxies.

They are the galaxy's fastest drifters. Massive stars ejected from their homes, racing through the void. A new study finally reveals how they escaped. Massive stars usually live in clusters or pairs. Yet, astronomers find many of them isolated, speeding through space at unusually high velocities. These are "Runaway Stars."

WOH G64, one of the largest stars known, was fading. Astronomers thought it was dying. They were wrong.WOH G64 is a leviathan. Located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, this red supergiant is so massive it's expected to end in a supernova. But recently, it started behaving strangely. It faded. Its pulse weakened. Dust obscured it.

Computer simulations reveal that our Local Group of galaxies is embedded in a massive, flat sheet of dark matter, solving a decades-old puzzle about galactic motion. For half a century, astronomers have been puzzled. The Local Group—a cluster containing the Milky Way, Andromeda, and dozens of smaller galaxies—is massive. Its gravity should be pulling nearby galaxies inward. Yet, almost everything is moving away from us.

An AI neural network has scanned 100 million archival Hubble images in just days, uncovering hundreds of rare anomalies that humans missed for decades. The Hubble Space Telescope has been observing the cosmos for 35 years. Its legacy archive contains millions of observations.

The Perseverance rover has discovered definitive traces of an ancient beach and evidence of extensive underground water, rewriting the history of habitability on Mars.