Highlights from AAS Nova: 8-21 November 2015
Susanna Kohler American Astronomical Society (AAS)
AAS Nova is a new website that provides brief highlights of recently published articles from the AAS journals. Its intent is to gain broader exposure for AAS authors and to provide astronomy researchers and enthusiasts with summaries of recent, interesting research across a wide range of astronomical fields.
The following are the AAS Nova highlights from the past two weeks; follow the links to read more, or visit the AAS Nova webpage for more posts.
20 November 2015
Grumblings from an Awakening Black Hole
In June of this year, the black hole V404 Cygni woke up after nearly three decades of sleep. Now we’re getting the first descriptions of what we’ve learned from its awakening!
18 November 2015
Eruptions from the Sun
Recent analysis of a powerful solar outburst — captured on video by several Sun-monitoring spacecraft — may help us to understand how it was launched.
16 November 2015
Comet 67P’s Pitted Surface
The surface of comet 67P Churyumov–Gerasimenko is covered in active pits — some measuring hundreds of meters both wide and deep! But what processes caused these pits to form?
13 November 2015
Orbit of a Giant and a Dwarf
The subgiant and white dwarf of the Procyon binary system orbit each other with a tiny angular separation, creating a distinct challenge for astronomers to observe. Two decades of Hubble observations have now finally revealed some of its secrets.
11 November 2015
Measuring a Black Hole’s Mass with Robotic Telescopes
Who needs humans? Robotic observations have been used to measure the mass of a supermassive black hole at the center of an active galaxy.
9 November 2015
Discovery in the Galactic Bulge
A new study has discovered a population of very young stars in a thin disk through the galactic center, providing clues to the star-formation history of the Milky Way over the last 100 million years.