Extrasolar Planets

(PhysOrg.com) -- The CoRoT satellite has discovered a planet-sized object so exotic that astronomers are unsure whether to call it a planet. The object, named CoRoT-Exo-3b, is approximately the same size as Jupiter, but more than 20 times its mass. It orbits a star slightly larger than the Sun...  

Astronomers using the Subaru Telescope at the summit of Mauna Kea have discovered truly enormous blobs of superheated gas that they describe as "fireballs." The blobs are 3,000 to 6,000 light-years across.  

[caption id="attachment_19239" align="alignnone" width="580" caption="Fireball Galaxy. Credit: Subaru Telescope, National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ)"][/caption] During routine observations of the Coma Cluster of galaxies using the Subaru Telescope in Hawaii, astronomers discovered a...  

These images taken with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope are close-up views of four galaxies from a large survey of nearby galaxies.  

As well, said the Mt. A. professor, they will get to see "deep sky objects," such as other galaxies and rich clusters of stars outside the Milky Way ...  

NGC 253 Close-Up Credit: NASA, ESA, J. Dalcanton, B. Williams (Univ. Washington) Ground-based data: T. Rector (Univ. Alaska, Anchorage), T. Abbott, NOAO/AURA/NSF Explanation: This dusty island universe is one of the brightest spiral galaxies in the sky. Seen nearly edge-on, NGC 253 lies a mere 13...  

A North Carolina astronomy buff uses his Crestron home automation interface to quickly find celestial bodies.  

The Nebraskan-born Australian National University astronomer is a respected world expert on Earth-like planets and dark matter in galaxies. ...  

A group of galaxies in our cosmic backyard has given astronomers clues about how stars form. A thorough survey using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has observed around 14 million stars in 69 galaxies.  

A collision between two spiral galaxies in the constellation of Hercules, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. NASA has delayed the final service mission of ...  

STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Two Japanese scientists and a Tokyo-born American shared the 2008 Nobel Prize for physics for their work in sub-atomic physics, the prize committee said on Tuesday.  

The year 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy (IYA), a celebration of Galileo Galilei's world-changing discoveries since he first looked up into the ...  

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has captured a rare alignment between two spiral galaxies. The outer rim of a small, foreground galaxy is silhouetted in front of a larger background galaxy. Skeletal tentacles of dust can be seen extending beyond the small galaxy's disk of starlight.  

However, projects currently in the pipeline to observe extrasolar planets, such as NASA’s Terrestrial Planet Finder’s coronagraph, due for launch in 2014, ...  

Hoth. Coruscant. Endor. These names will ring familiar to fans of that galaxy far, far away--the setting for the Star Wars movies, including the new animated feature Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Now what about V391 Peg b? GJ 3021 b? WASP-15 b? If you guessed Star Wars droids, you're wrong. They're...