telescopes

Satellite tracks observed for one hour over the northern Atacama Desert in Chile, October 2025. Credit: F. Kamphues, ESO/M. Kornmesser.

More than a million satellites could make the night sky three times brighter

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A new model has examined how light reflected from satellites and mirrors in space affects astronomical cameras and the brightness of the night sky. The results show that even dim satellites can erase parts of wide-field sky images,
New research suggests identifying extraterrestrial life through patterns among groups of planets, rather than just gases or biological signatures on a single planet. Illustration: Avi Blizovsky via DALEE

A new way to search for extraterrestrial life: Not a single biological signature, but patterns between planets

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New research suggests detecting extraterrestrial life using unusual similarities between groups of nearby planets, rather than relying solely on atmospheric gases or traditional biological signatures
A combination of infrared and X-rays reveals a nascent cluster with hot gas – already a billion years after the Big Bang. From the article in Nature.

Galaxy cluster at the beginning of the universe: Webb and Chandra found hot gas earlier than expected

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The two space telescopes revealed a nascent galaxy cluster (“protocluster”) in which a hot gas cloud emitting X-rays also appears, a sign of “virial heating” and advanced gravitational collapse – already when the universe was about a billion years old.
The Pandora Space Telescope. (NASA Scientific Visualization Studio)

NASA launches tiny space telescope Pandora to study atmospheres of 20 exoplanets

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The telescope will simultaneously measure visible and infrared light to separate “noise” from the host star from the signature of the atmosphere, and will help improve observations by the James Webb Space Telescope.
Lazuli Space Telescope visualization — “A new private space telescope with a mirror approximately 3 meters in diameter, designed for observations in visible light and near infrared.” Credit: Schmidt Sciences.

Eric Schmidt (former Google CEO) will fund a private space telescope larger than Hubble and 3 more ground-based observatories

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The “Schmidt Observatory System” includes the Lazuli Space Telescope and three ground-based facilities, with a target of operation by the end of the decade and an emphasis on open data to the community
VLT image of a stellar remnant creating a shock wave as it moves through space (Credit: ESO / K. Ilkiewicz and S. Scaringi et al.; Background: PanSTARRS)

Astronomers have recorded a mysterious shock wave around a white dwarf — and there is still no full explanation

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Observations by the Very Large Telescope in Chile reveal a “bow shock wave” nebula around a seemingly quiet, diskless binary system, hinting at a magnetic “engine” that is still not understood
Does dark matter change the color of light? Illustration: depositphotos.com

According to a new theory, we've been looking for dark matter the wrong way.

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But the York researchers say the light may change its color slightly depending on the type of dark matter it encounters. If this theory is confirmed, this effect could provide a new way to study the hidden component.
Image credit: Conceptual design for a rectangular space telescope, based on the Diffractive Interfero Coronagraph Exoplanet Resolver (DICER) — an infrared space observatory — and the James Webb Space Telescope. Credit: Leif Svardi/Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Circle vs. Rectangle: Searching for 'Earth 2.0' may be easier with new telescope shape

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Engineers propose changing the way we observe planets outside our solar system to increase resolution in order to identify conditions on small planets, in particular to find Earth-like ones.
A fiery star and planet in space with a powerful solar flare in the background of twinkling stars.

Violent eruptions from Proxima Centauri could endanger life on nearby planets

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New research using the ALMA telescope reveals that frequent and extremely intense bursts of radiation from Proxima Centauri could destroy the atmospheres of nearby planets and make them uninhabitable.
The European Space Agency's (ESA) Gaia satellite reveals the Large Magellanic Cloud in spectacular detail, using radiation mapping instead of photography to show its bright, massive stars and prominent star-forming regions, such as Region 30 Degas. Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC.

The Large Magellanic Cloud: Star mapping changes our view of a nearby galaxy

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The European Space Agency's Gaia satellite creates a precise radiation map of the Large Magellanic Cloud, showing the massive stars and prominent star-forming regions
extraterrestrials Illustration: depositphotos.com

First Contact: Simulating an Intelligent Extraterrestrial Message to Earth

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A new project called Signal in Space simulates how Earth will respond to a signal from aliens and invites the public to help decode an extraterrestrial message (roughly)

Early evidence for extrasolar planets in century-old photographic plates

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From left to right: astronomical photons are emitted from the star, pass through the lens and reach an amplifier containing atoms. An atom hit by an astronomical photon in response emits a large amount of forced photons (in green), which hit the telescope detector and "report" with high precision the direction of impact of the original (astronomical) photon. Most of the spontaneous photons (in red) scatter to the sides and are not absorbed by the detector; Therefore, the noise is low and the separation is not significantly impaired.

A method developed in collaboration with researchers at the Technion is expected to bring about a dramatic improvement in the separation ability of telescopes

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The Cancer Nebula as photographed by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2005

Why is it not possible to photograph distant celestial objects from Earth, and for this purpose telescopes must be sent into space?

Contact Lenses. Photo: shutterstock

Telescope inside the eye - a contact lens will enlarge the image for macular degeneration patients

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A four-legged robot learned to change its movement style to traverse a forest and jump over obstacles

The International Year of Astronomy has begun

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A four-legged robot learned to change its movement style to traverse a forest and jump over obstacles

The largest telescope array in the world

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