SUNSET: 
Galaxy in a Bucket
A tiny lab experiment could provide additional evidence for how galaxies come by their magnetic fields. The physics isn't new, but that's part of the allure.
Black Hole Breakfast En Route
Astronomers have discovered a dusty, stretched-out cloud heading for the supermassive black hole lurking in the Milky Way's core. The blob could be the meal the beast needs to wake up for a bit from its slumber, if the cloud survives its incoming trip on the dining cart.
Amateur Discovers A Planetary Nebula
Austrian amateur Matthias Kronberger has found a planetary nebula near the northern constellation of Cygnus, the Swan. His discovery might help scientists understand the role of stellar companions in the formation of these glowing gas clouds.
Rethinking Galaxies
Edwin Hubble's tuning-fork diagram has helped astronomers classify galaxies for more than 70 years. But recent research shows that it might be time for a makeover — to a "comb" diagram.
The Earliest Black Holes
Combining data from the deepest images ever taken in visual/infrared wavelengths and X-rays, astronomers have discovered some of the earliest black holes in the universe.
Best-yet Value for Universe's Expansion
A new study with the Hubble Space Telescope pins down the universe's expansion rate with unprecedented accuracy.
A Galaxy when Galaxies Were Young
News media worldwide are reporting today on the new "farthest galaxy ever found," but the discovery is not quite as definite as it’s being made out.
The Most Distant Galaxy Cluster
Many instruments working together have profiled a baby galaxy group, seen not long after the Big Bang, of the kind that probably evolved into our Milky Way.
A Black Hole “Too Big” For Its Galaxy
A lightweight little dwarf galaxy with no central bulge has a supermassive black hole half as heavy as the Milky Way's. How did that happen?
Draw Some Bubbles, Help Astronomy
A fun and colorful new citizen-science effort has been launched to spot and flag star-forming regions throughout our galaxy.
Starry, Starry, Starry Night
Two astronomers report that small, dim red-dwarf stars are far more abundant in elliptical galaxies than thought — so much so that the total number of stars in the universe is likely three times higher than previous estimates.
Why is the Milky Way Blowing Bubbles?
Using gamma-ray eyes on NASA's Fermi spacecraft, astronomers now see that our home galaxy sports a matched pair of enormous and recently formed bubbles. It's a mystery how and why they formed.
Black-Hole Bonanza
Astronomers announce supermassive double holes, an intermediate-mass hole that seems to have pulled apart a star, fast-spinning holes, and a screaming runaway.
A Glowing Vision of the Early Universe
Astronomers shed new light on our picture of the early Universe.
Black-Hole Missing Link Found?
Astronomers are searching galaxies with no central bulges for intermediate-mass black holes — the missing links between the small black holes that result from collapsing stars and the monsters in the cores of bulge galaxies. A team reports that it's found one — or maybe three.
A Now-You-See-It, Now-You-Don’t Quasar?
Poring over sky-survey data, a Dutch schoolteacher noticed a starless blue-green blob near a faint galaxy. Astronomers think "Hanny's Voorwerp" is a cloud of intergalactic gas lit by an active galactic nucleus (AGN) hidden in the galaxy just to its north. But if so, why don't we see the AGN?
Why You Missed the Supernova in M82
Radio astronomers have spotted emission from a supernova that went unnoticed when it exploded more than a year ago in the nearby galaxy M82.
Dark Matter or Pulsars? Fermi is on the Case
Something funny is going on within a few hundred light-years of us, creating high-energy electrons that we don't understand. Recent data from NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope keep the mystery alive.
Black Holes First, Galaxies Second
Back when the universe was young, a new study finds, galaxies grew their central black holes faster than the holes' starry surroundings. But how?
Star-Studded Black Holes
A pair of Scottish astronomers has solved the mystery of how young stars can form improbably close to the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy.