space photography

Rubin Observatory Alert Triggers First Real-Time Follow-Up Observations

Mar 31, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Astronomers have spent years preparing for the moment when the alert stream from the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) would begin driving real…



Rubin Observatory Begins Continuous Monitoring of the Night Sky

Mar 30, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Astronomers have entered a new observational regime with the commissioning of the real-time alert system at the Vera C. Rubin Observatory. During early survey operations,…



Spring in Space: Chandra’s X-ray Views of Six Stellar Nurseries

Mar 30, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Star formation proceeds inside cold molecular clouds where gravity competes with turbulence, radiation pressure, and magnetic fields. These processes regulate how gas fragments into dense…



Hubble Telescope Unexpectedly Observes a Comet Breaking Up

Mar 28, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

In November 2025, the Hubble Space Telescope unexpectedly recorded the early fragmentation phase of the long-period comet C/2025 K1 (ATLAS) shortly after its perihelion passage…



Amateur Astronomer Detects Near-Earth Asteroid Ahead of Major Sky Surveys

Mar 27, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Systematic surveys now dominate the discovery of near-Earth asteroids. Facilities such as Pan-STARRS and ATLAS routinely scan large areas of the sky each night using…



Hubble Captures the Internal Structure of Barred Spiral Galaxy IC 486

Mar 27, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has produced a detailed optical image of the barred spiral galaxy IC 486, revealing the internal stellar distribution, dust lanes,…



NASA’s Perseverance Finds Buried Ancient River Delta on Mars

Mar 26, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Subsurface radar observations acquired by NASA’s Perseverance rover inside Jezero Crater have revealed a previously unknown buried river-delta system beneath the western fan deposits of…



NASA’s IXPE Reveals 2,000-Year-Old Supernova Remnant RCW 86

Mar 26, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Supernova remnants preserve the physical record of stellar explosions long after the original event fades from view. They trace the interaction between expanding shock waves…



James Webb and Hubble Reveal Saturn in Unprecedented Detail

Mar 25, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

The ringed planet Saturn changes slowly. Its seasons stretch across decades. Its storms can last for years. Even its most famous atmospheric structures remain stable…



Chandra Traces the Decline of Black Hole Growth Across Billions of Years

Mar 25, 2026 Soumyadeep Mukherjee

Supermassive black holes dominate the centers of massive galaxies and regulate their evolution through sustained accretion and energetic feedback. Observations over the last two decades…