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Astronomers have succeeded in observing the magnetic field around a young star where planets are thought to be forming. The team was able to use dust to measure the three-dimensional structure 'fingerprint' of the magnetic field. This will help improve our understanding of planet formation.

Using a pioneering artificial intelligence platform, researchers have assessed whether a cardiac AI tool recently trialed in South Australian hospitals actually has the potential to assist doctors and nurses to rapidly diagnose heart issues in emergency departments.

A group of male koalas were filmed grooming and playing together, in contrast to their solitary reputation, probably as a result of an unusually dense population in southern Victoria

Set to enter hospice care, a patient with idiopathic multicentric Castleman's disease is now in remission after treatment with a medication identified by an AI-guided analysis.

The current exoplanet census contains 5,832 confirmed candidates, with more than 7,500 still awaiting confirmation. Of those that have been confirmed, most have been gas giants ranging from Neptune-like bodies (1992) to those similar to or many times the size and mass of Jupiter and Saturn (1883). Like the gas giants of the Solar System, astronomers generally theorized that these types of planets form in the outer reaches of their star system, where conditions are cold enough for gases like hydrogen and helium and volatile compounds (water, ammonia, methane, etc.) will condense or freeze solid.

However, astronomers have noted that many of the gas giants they’ve observed orbited close to their stars, known as “Hot Jupiters.” This has raised questions about whether or not gas giants and other planets migrate after formation until they find their long-term, stable orbits. In a new study, a team from Arizona State University’s School Of Earth and Space Exploration (ASU-SESE) examined the atmospheric chemistry of several Hot and Ultra-Hot Jupiters. After examining WASP-121b, the team came to the unexpected conclusion that it likely formed close to its star.

The research was conducted by Graduate Associate Peter C. B. Smith and other members of the ASU-SESE. They were joined by exoplanet researchers from the Steward Observatory, the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF), the Trottier Institute for Research on Exoplanets (iREX), the Centre for Exoplanets and Habitability (CEH), and multiple universities. Collectively, they are part of the Roasting Marshmallows Program, and their latest research was presented in a paper appearing in The Astronomical Journal.

Members of this program are dedicated to studying the atmospheres of hot and ultra-hot Jupiters using the Immersion GRating INfrared Spectrograph (IGRINS), built by the University of Texas and the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI). The instrument is part of the Gemini South telescope in Chile, one of two telescopes that make up the International Gemini Observatory, funded in part by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and operated by the National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory (NOIRLab).

This program aims to learn more about the protoplanetary disks from which hot gas giants formed. In the past, scientists assumed that these disks – leftover rocky and icy material from the nebulae that give birth to stars – settle into gradients around their suns that allow certain types of planets to form around them. According to this theory, material closer to the star would consist largely of rocky material since volatiles would turn to vapor, while material farther from the star would consist of icy material since temperatures would be low enough for it to solidify.

Since the material in these disks varies based on the distance from their parent stars, astronomers can measure the abundance of these materials in planetary atmospheres based on their spectral signatures. As a result, they can determine how far from a parent star its planets may have formed. Ordinarily, measuring this ratio requires multiple observations in both visible and infrared light (for rocky and gaseous elements, respectively). However, the team obtained measurements WASP-121b to determine the radio of rocky and gaseous elements thanks to it being an ultra-hot Jupiter.

As a result, the planet’s atmosphere contains vaporized rock and gaseous materials that were detectable using the IGRINS instrument alone and with a single observation! This instrument allowed the team to obtain high-resolution spectral data from WASP-121b as it made a transit in front of its star. Said Smith:

“Ground-based data from Gemini South using IGRINS actually made more precise measurements of the individual chemical abundances than even space-based telescopes could have achieved. Our measurement means that perhaps this typical view needs to be reconsidered and our planet formation models revisited. The planet’s dayside is so hot that elements typically thought of as ‘metal’ are vaporized into the atmosphere, making them detectable via spectroscopy.”

This artist’s impression shows an ultra-hot exoplanet as it is about to transit in front of its host star.
Credit: ESO

The spectra showed that WASP-121b has a high rock-to-ice ratio, indicating that it accreted an excess of rocky material while forming. This suggests the planet formed closer to its star, which was quite a surprise since traditional models suggest that gas giants need much colder temperatures to form. The reason for this became obvious once Smith and his team learned several things about WASP-121b’s atmosphere. On the dayside, temperatures are so hot that rocky material and metals are vaporized into the atmosphere, while powerful winds blow these to the night side, where they condense.

This leads to WASP-121b experiencing many types of “metal rain” on its night side, a phenomenon that astronomers had previously observed. “The climate of this planet is extreme and nothing like that of Earth,” said Smith, adding that IGRINS was a major factor in his team’s detailed measurements. “Our instrument sensitivity is advancing to the point where we can use these elements to probe different regions, altitudes, and longitudes to see subtleties like wind speeds, revealing just how dynamic this planet is.”

These results may resolve the mystery of Hot Jupiters by demonstrating that gas giants need not be composed predominantly of gaseous volatile elements, but heavier elements that are heated to the point that they become vapor. These findings support previous observations of gas giants that experience metal precipitation, such as WASP-76, Kepler-7b, KELT-9b. The team hopes that future surveys using IGRINS successor instrument – IGRINS-2 – which was commissioned for the Gemini North telescope in Hawai‘i and is currently being calibrated for science operations.

Further Reading: NOIRLab, The Astronomical Journal

The post This Hot Jupiter Probably Formed Close to Its Star appeared first on Universe Today.

A temporary loss of access to key datasets on levels of CO2 in the atmosphere added to concern about the potential fallout of the Trump administration’s attacks on climate science

Is it possible to understand the Universe without understanding the largest structures that reside in it? In principle, not likely. In practical terms? Definitely not. Extremely large objects can distort our understanding of the cosmos.

Astronomers have found the largest structure in the Universe so far, named Quipu after an Incan measuring system. It contains a shocking 200 quadrillion solar masses.

Astronomy is an endeavour where extremely large numbers are a part of daily discourse. But even in astronomy, 200 quadrillion is a number so large it’s rarely encountered. And if Quipu’s extremely large mass doesn’t garner attention, its size surely does. The object, called a superstructure, is more than 400 megaparsecs long. That’s more than 1.3 billion light-years.

A structure that large simply has to affect its surroundings, and understanding those effects is critical to understanding the cosmos. According to new research, studying Quipu and its brethren can help us understand how galaxies evolve, help us improve our cosmological models, and improve the accuracy of our cosmological measurements.

The research, titled “Unveiling the largest structures in the nearby Universe: Discovery of the Quipu superstructure,” has been accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics. Hans Bohringer from the Max Planck Institute is the lead author.

“For a precise determination of cosmological parameters, we need to understand the effects of the local large-scale structure of the Universe on the measurements,” the authors write. “They include modifications of the cosmic microwave background, distortions of sky images by large-scale gravitational lensing, and the influence of large-scale streaming motions on measurements of the Hubble constant.”

Superstructures are extremely large structures that contain groups of galaxy clusters and superclusters. They’re so massive they challenge our understanding of how our Universe evolved. Some of them are so massive they break our models of cosmological evolution.

Quipu is the largest structure we’ve ever found in the Universe. It and the other four superstructures the researchers found contain 45% of the galaxy clusters, 30% of the galaxies, 25% of the matter, and
occupy a volume fraction of 13%.

The image below helps explain why they named it Quipu. Quipu are recording devices made of knotted cords, where the knots contain information based on colour, order, and number. “This view gives the best impression of the superstructure as a long filament with small side filaments, which initiated the naming of Quipu,” the authors explain in their paper.

This figure from the new research is a wedge diagram in declination and distance of the Quipu superstructure. The distance is in units of Megaparsecs. The red dots show the superstructure members and the black lines show the friends-to-friends linking. The grey dots show the non-member clusters. The two dashed lines give the distances for redshifts of 0.03 and 0.06.

In their work, Bohringer and his co-researchers found Quipu and four other superstructures within a distance range of 130 to 250 Mpc. They used X-ray galaxy clusters to identify and analyze the superstructures in their Cosmic Large-Scale Structure in X-rays (CLASSIX) Cluster Survey. X-ray galaxy clusters can contain thousands of galaxies and lots of very hot intracluster gas that emits X-rays. These emissions are the key to mapping the mass of the superstructures. X-rays trace the densest regions of matter concentration and the underlying cosmic web. The emissions are like signposts for identifying superstructures.

This figure from the research shows galaxy distribution in density gradients. The density ratio to the average density is shown by six contour levels: 0 – 0.23 (black), 0.23 – 0.62 (dark blue), 0.62 – 1.13 (light blue), 1.13 – 1.9 (grey), 1.9 – 3.7 (olive), and > 3.7 (white). The clusters of the five superstructures are overplotted with filled black circles. Image Credit: Bohringer et al. 2025.

The authors point out that “the difference in the galaxy density around field clusters and members of superstructures is remarkable.” This could be because field clusters are populated with less massive clusters than those in the superstructure rather than because the field clusters have lower galaxy density.

Regardless of the reasons, the mass of these superstructures wields enormous influence on our attempt to observe, measure, and understand the cosmos. “These large structures leave their imprint on cosmological observations,” the authors write.

The superstructures leave an imprint on the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), which is relic radiation from the Big Bang and key evidence supporting it. The CMB’s properties match our theoretical predictions with near-surgical precision. The superstructures’ gravity alters the CMB as it passes through them according to the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe (ISW) effect, producing fluctuations in the CMB. These fluctuations are foreground artifacts that are difficult to filter out, introducing interference into our understanding of the CMB and, hence, the Big Bang.

The full-sky image of the temperature fluctuations (shown as colour differences) in the cosmic microwave background is made from nine years of WMAP observations. These are the seeds of galaxies from a time when the universe was under 400,000 years old. Credit: NASA/WMAP

The superstructures can also impact measurements of the Hubble constant, a fundamental value in cosmology that describes how fast the Universe is expanding. While galaxies are moving further apart due to expansion, they also have local velocities, called peculiar velocities or streaming motions. These need to be separated from expansion to understand expansion clearly. The great mass of these superstructures influences these streaming motions and distorts our measurements of the Hubble constant.

The research also notes that these massive structures can alter and distort our sky images through large-scale gravitational lensing. This can introduce errors in our measurements.

On the other hand, simulations of the Lambda CDM produce superstructures like Quipu and the four others. Lambda CDM is our standard model of Big Bang cosmology and accounts for much of what we see in the Universe, like its large-scale structure. “We find superstructures with similar properties in simulations based on Lambda-CDM cosmology models,” the authors write.

It’s clear that these superstructures are critical to understanding the Universe. They hold a significant portion of its matter and affect their surroundings in fundamental ways. More research is needed to understand them and their influence.

“Interesting follow-up research on our findings includes, for example, studies of the influence of these environments on the galaxy population and evolution,” the authors write in their conclusion.

According to the study, these superstructures won’t persist forever. “In the future cosmic evolution, these superstructures are bound to break up into several collapsing units. They are thus transient configurations,” Bohringer and his co-researchers explain.

“But at present, they are special physical entities with characteristic properties and special cosmic environments deserving special attention.”

The post Astronomers Find the Largest Structure in the Universe and Name it “Quipu” appeared first on Universe Today.

Earliest inner solar system planetesimals shaped the inventory of moderately volatile elements in terrestrial planets.

A new climate modeling study presents a new scenario of how climate and life on our planet would change in response to a potential future strike of a medium-sized (~500 m) asteroid.

There's a 26 per cent annual chance that space rocket junk will re-enter the atmosphere and pass through a busy flight area, according to a recent study. While the chance of debris hitting an aircraft is very low, the research highlights that the potential for uncontrolled space rocket junk to disrupt flights and create additional costs for airlines and passengers is not.

There's a 26 per cent annual chance that space rocket junk will re-enter the atmosphere and pass through a busy flight area, according to a recent study. While the chance of debris hitting an aircraft is very low, the research highlights that the potential for uncontrolled space rocket junk to disrupt flights and create additional costs for airlines and passengers is not.

Researchers have developed advanced terahertz photodetectors containing 'living' microelectrodes. A vanadium dioxide (VO2) layer was precisely deposited on a silicon substrate. Temperature regulation modulated the size of conductive metallic areas in VO2, forming a dynamic microelectrode network that selectively enhanced the response of the silicon substrate to terahertz light. These advanced photodetectors reveal the potential of modifiable metamaterials such as VO2 to overcome the performance limitations of traditional materials.

Researchers have developed advanced terahertz photodetectors containing 'living' microelectrodes. A vanadium dioxide (VO2) layer was precisely deposited on a silicon substrate. Temperature regulation modulated the size of conductive metallic areas in VO2, forming a dynamic microelectrode network that selectively enhanced the response of the silicon substrate to terahertz light. These advanced photodetectors reveal the potential of modifiable metamaterials such as VO2 to overcome the performance limitations of traditional materials.

A research team has developed a biodegradable polymer-based delivery system that efficiently transports mRNA.

Students attending schools that ban the use of phones throughout the school day aren't necessarily experiencing better mental health and wellbeing, as the first worldwide study of its kind has found that just banning smartphones is not enough to tackle their negative impacts.

The study of 'starquakes' (like earthquakes, but in stars) promises to give us important new insights into the properties of neutron stars, improving our understanding of the universe and advancing the way we live.

Scientists have developed a versatile platform with an electrically controlled nano-gate that can be used for applications in sensing, chemical synthesis, memristors, and neuromorphic computing. The nano-gate, which consists of a pore in a membrane, is closed by the formation of a precipitate and opened by the dissolution of the precipitate, which are regulated by the applied voltage.

Quantum spin liquids are fascinating states of matter where magnetic spins stay disordered, defying the usual rules of magnetism. Scientists have made an exciting discovery about one such material. Instead of acting like a 2D system as expected, it behaves like a 1D system. This breakthrough changes how we understand these mysterious materials, offering new insights into magnetism and opening doors to advances in quantum materials and technology.

Quantum spin liquids are fascinating states of matter where magnetic spins stay disordered, defying the usual rules of magnetism. Scientists have made an exciting discovery about one such material. Instead of acting like a 2D system as expected, it behaves like a 1D system. This breakthrough changes how we understand these mysterious materials, offering new insights into magnetism and opening doors to advances in quantum materials and technology.

Sour beers have become a fixture on microbrewery menus and store shelves. They're enjoyed for their tart, complex flavors, but some can require long and complicated brewing processes. Researchers have now brewed new sours in less time using a seemingly strange ingredient: field peas. The experimental beers had fruity -- not 'beany' -- flavors and other attributes comparable to a commercial Belgian-style sour, but with shorter, simpler brewing steps.