Supernova Discovered at UA SkyCenter
Adam Block, host and astrophotographer at the Mt. Lemmon SkyCenter, unexpectedly discovered a supernova - a massive star ending its life in a giant explosion - in a photo obtained with the center's Schulman Telescope for a different purpose. He spotted the supernova in a photo he took of a famous galaxy that is 400 million light years away.
Marks on Martian Dunes May Reveal Tracks of Dry-Ice Sleds
Chunks of frozen carbon dioxide most likely carved linear gullies into sand dunes on Mars, according to a new study combining images from the UA-operated HiRISE camera and experiments conducted on dunes here on Earth. The results add to a series of discoveries reminding us that Mars is less Earth-like than it may seem.
Cougars Expand Their Range
Mountain lion, puma, cougar - no matter what you call it, the big cat is making a comeback. Melanie Culver, a wildlife geneticist at the UA, says the cougar appears to have evolved about 300,000 years ago from a cheetah-like cat that now is extinct. When Europeans arrived in the Americas, cougars were everywhere, but human predation and the loss of habitat to agriculture took a heavy toll.
Stars Don’t Obliterate Their Planets - Very Often
A new UA co-authored study using data from NASA's Kepler space telescope shows that hot Jupiters, despite their close-in orbits, are not regularly consumed by their stars. Instead, the planets remain in fairly stable orbits for billions of years until the day comes when they may ultimately get eaten.
