Some exoplanets have characteristics totally alien to our Solar System. Hot Jupiters are one such type. They can have orbital periods of less than 10 days and surface temperatures that can climb to well over 4,000 K (3,730 °C or 6,740 °F). Unlike any planets in our system, they’re usually tidally locked. Astronomers probed the … Read more
Scientists have received an unexpected Christmas gift this year: a potential solution to the mystery of JuMBOs, strange celestial objects that seem not to be planets or stars. Try putting a bow on that! This gift comes courtesy of a team of researchers who believe that mysterious JuMBOs (Jupiter-mass binary objects) are actually stellar cores … Read more
What makes up the matter we perceive in the universe? To start, there are the usual suspects, like electrons, protons, quarks and neutrinos. But if those particles aren’t strange enough for you, I’m here to help. There are other particles that are so rare, we’re not even sure they exist. Here are five of the … Read more