Throughout the week, experts at the NASA Exhibit Booth will deliver science talks about missions including NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (also called “Webb” or “JWST”), Hubble Space Telescope, Chandra X-ray Observatory, TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite), and NICER (Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer), an X-ray telescope on the International Space Station that will be … Read more
The massive planet, likely still glowing from the heat of its formation, lies in the Taurus Molecular Cloud, an active stellar nursery with hundreds of newborn stars some 430 light-years away. The cloud’s relative closeness makes it a prime target for astronomers. But while the cloud offers deep insight into the formation and evolution of … Read more
This newly discovered giant planet falls into the “warm Jupiter” category of exoplanets, meaning it orbits closer to its host star than Jupiter, or even the Earth does. Astronomers have even predicted that it might, under certain circumstances, migrate still further inward toward its star to become a “hot Jupiter.” Hot or not, thanks to … Read more
5 min read NASA’s Compact Infrared Cameras Enable New Science A new, higher-resolution infrared camera outfitted with a variety of lightweight filters could probe sunlight reflected off Earth’s upper atmosphere and surface, improve forest fire warnings, and reveal the molecular composition of other planets. The cameras use sensitive, high-resolution strained-layer superlattice sensors, initially developed at … Read more
The TESS mission is a NASA Astrophysics Explorer operated by MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Launched in 2018, TESS has been scanning almost the entire sky looking for planets beyond our solar system, known as exoplanets. The TESS mission has also uncovered other cosmic phenomena, including star-shredding black holes and stellar oscillations. Read more about TESS discoveries at nasa.gov/tess. Source … Read more
And astronomers can, in a sense, “see” eclipses among other systems of planets orbiting their parent stars. In this case, the eclipse is a tiny drop in starlight as a planet, from our point of view, crosses the face of its star. That crossing, called a transit, can register on sensitive light sensors attached to … Read more
The decades-long hunt for exoplanets – planets around other stars – has so far yielded more than 5,500 that are confirmed to be scattered across the Milky Way, which likely contains hundreds of billions. But the prevailing detection method turns up relatively few “long period” planets, those with years lasting 50 days or more. This … Read more
The recently discovered super-Earth, TOI-715 b, might be making its appearance at just the right time. Its parent star is a red dwarf, smaller and cooler than our Sun; a number of such stars are known to host small, rocky worlds. At the moment, they’re the best bet for finding habitable planets. These planets make … Read more
Details: A team of astronomers analyzed this system using data from NASA’s TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite), which spots “transits,” or instances where planets cross in front of their star as they orbit, blocking a tiny piece of the starlight. Two planets had already been previously discovered in this planetary system, so to see what … Read more
Throughout the week, expert talks at the NASA Exhibit Booth will discuss science from current NASA missions including Webb, Hubble, IXPE (Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer), NICER (Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer), TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite), and Chandra ahead of its 25th anniversary; NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and SPHEREx observatory; the Habitable … Read more