astronomy

The Green Bank Telescope recently captured a groundbreaking image of NASA's Artemis 2 spacecraft orbiting the Moon, marking a significant advancement in deep-space human exploration. This achievement demonstrates the power of radio astronomy to precisely track spacecraft, providing crucial situational awareness for future lunar missions and highlighting a new era of cosmic transparency.

An engineer's quest to fix radio interference in 1933 unexpectedly led to a monumental discovery. Karl Jansky's rotating antenna detected a mysterious, periodic hiss, not from Earth or the Sun, but from the Milky Way's center. This groundbreaking finding, revealing the galaxy emits radio waves, birthed radio astronomy and revolutionized our understanding of the cosmos.

In a spirited appeal, JD(U) representative Sanjay Kumar Jha called on Union Minister G S Shekhawat to integrate the Mithila Research Institute into the Gyan Bharatam Mission, aimed at safeguarding and digitizing invaluable manuscripts. Furthermore, he championed extensive archaeological efforts at Balirajgarh for the next ten years, underlining the significance of Mithila's vast historical and cultural tapestry.

A young scientist discovered a strange signal in 1967. This signal came from a rapidly rotating stellar corpse, a pulsar. Pulsars are collapsed stars that emit powerful energy rays. Their discovery confirmed theories about neutron stars. These cosmic clocks help scientists test physics and study space-time. The discovery changed our understanding of the universe.

A team of scientists has made an astounding discovery in the icy depths of Antarctica, uncovering a significant drop in iron-60 stardust that occurred 40,000 to 80,000 years ago. This intriguing shift correlates with the Solar System's traversal of the Local Interstellar Cloud, signalling a change in the accumulation of celestial materials.

A colossal cosmic ray, dubbed Amaterasu, struck Earth in 2021, baffling scientists with its immense power and unknown origin. Detected by Utah's Telescope Array, this particle's journey through space was obscured by magnetic fields. While a blazar is now a potential source, the mystery highlights the ongoing quest to understand these powerful cosmic visitors.

A rare long-period comet, C/2025 R3 (PanSTARRS), is currently visible in southern skies for a limited time. Originating from the Oort Cloud, this ancient remnant is now moving away from the Sun, causing its brightness to decline. Observers in New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa have a brief window to view its blue-green glow with binoculars or telescopes.

Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing exoplanet discovery, with a new AI system validating over 100 planets and flagging thousands more potential worlds. This automated approach, processing data from the TESS telescope, significantly speeds up the identification of planets using the transit method, allowing astronomers to focus on deeper analysis and confirmation.