Astronomy and Astrophysics

black and white image, close-up of crystalline dust fragment

UChicago, Field Museum scientists discover oldest material on Earth: 7-billion-year-old stardust

Visualization of a blue planet half in shadow, with mass of clouds gathered over the bright side

NASA’s TESS spacecraft discovers its first habitable planet, first world with two stars

View of a star partially obscured by a large rocky planet with magma ocean

Why some planets eat their own skies

Parker Solar Probe illustration

Parker Solar Probe’s first discoveries: Odd phenomena in space weather, solar wind

Phoenix galaxy cluster

Astronomers use giant galaxy cluster as X-ray magnifying lens

Gemini Observatory

Nearly a decade in the making, exoplanet-hunting instrument installed in Hawaii

South Pole Telescope

Ambitious project to map the Big Bang’s afterglow earns NSF funding

Merging black holes

Lecture series to examine growing research on gravitational waves

Kepler mission rendering

New exoplanet is smallest to be precisely measured

Red giants

New measure of Hubble constant adds to mystery about universe’s expansion rate