discovery

Largest-ever discovery of ‘missing link’ black holes revealed by dark energy camera (video)

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a bright white cloud against a background of stars, beside 18 different images of bright white dots surrounded by fuzzy white disks

Astronomers have uncovered a treasure trove of feeding black holes at the heart of dwarf galaxies — small, faint galaxies containing thousands to several billions of stars but very little gas. The discovery, made with the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI), contains several “missing link” intermediate-mass black holes. This is both the largest sample of … Read more

Accidental discovery reveals ‘millinovas’ a new class of cosmic explosion 100 times brighter than the sun

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Superman isn’t the only one with X-ray vision. Plenty of exploding stars are also adept at blasting outbursts of this high-energy light. Now, thanks to a chance discovery, scientists are aware of an entirely new explosive stellar source of X-ray radiation. These outbursts’ light output didn’t resemble any previous cosmic explosion. Meet the “millinovas,” a … Read more