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Killing Star Formation in Satellite Galaxies
When a dwarf galaxy falls into the halo of a large galaxy like the Milky Way, how is star formation in the dwarf affected? A collaboration led by Andrew Wetzel (California Institute of Technology and...
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Discovery in the Galactic Bulge
In our efforts to map our galaxy’s structure, one region has remained very difficult to probe: the galactic center. A new survey, however, uses infrared light to peer through the gas and dust in the...
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How to Spot a Disrupted Galactic Satellite
Many satellites — dwarf galaxies and globular clusters — are thought to be orbiting our galaxy, but detecting them can be a tricky business. In particular, satellites can be disrupted by the galactic...
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Imaging the Heart of Our Galaxy
New radio images of the center of the Milky Way are providing an unprecedented view of the structure and processes occurring in the Galactic center. JVLA images of Sgr A at 5.5 GHz. The large-scale,...
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Satellite Galaxies of the Milky Way
This beautiful 13’ x 13’ image (click for the full view!) holds more than meets the eye. Look closely at the small concentration of blue stars just to the left of center. This is Eridanus II, one of...
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A High-Velocity Collision With Our Galaxy’s Disk
What caused the newly discovered “supershell” in the outskirts of our galaxy? A new study finds evidence that a high-velocity cloud may have smashed into the Milky Way’s disk millions of years ago....
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Featured Image: The Milky Way’s X
The X-shaped bulge is even more evident in this image, wherein a simple exponential disk model has been subtracted off. [Adapted from Ness & Lang 2016]This contrast-enhanced image of the Milky Way,...
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Building Up the Milky Way’s Skeleton
A team of scientists has now uncovered half of the entire “skeleton” of the Milky Way, using an automated method to identify large filaments of gas and dust hiding between stars in the galactic plane....
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Selections from 2016: An Intermediate-Mass Black Hole in the Milky Way?
Editor’s note: In these last two weeks of 2016, we’ll be looking at a few selections that we haven’t yet discussed on AAS Nova from among the most-downloaded papers published in AAS journals this year....
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Selections from 2016: Hidden Galaxies Found Behind the Milky Way
Editor’s note: In these last two weeks of 2016, we’ll be looking at a few selections that we haven’t yet discussed on AAS Nova from among the most-downloaded papers published in AAS journals this year....
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Featured Image: Structures in the Interstellar Medium
This beautiful false-color image (which covers ~57 degrees2; click for the full view!) reveals structures in the hydrogen gas that makes up the diffuse atomic interstellar medium at intermediate...
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Can You Tell a Sibling from a Doppelganger?
Editor’s note: Astrobites is a graduate-student-run organization that digests astrophysical literature for undergraduate students. As part of the partnership between the AAS and astrobites, we repost...
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Challenging the Model for Galactic Bulges
Galaxies of similar stellar mass to our own don’t all have the same bulge and black hole masses. So what determines how much mass will end up in the bulge and the black hole at the center of a...
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Featured Image: Globular Cluster Orbits
This figure (click for the full view) shows the meridional galactic orbits of 12 globular clusters that orbit the Milky Way. The recent release of stellar parallax data from Gaia allowed a team of...
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Exploring the Minispiral at the Milky Way’s Center
An image of the continuum emission from the galactic center minispiral, previously taken by ALMA at 100 GHz. This image labels the structures of the minispiral: a bar and multiple arcing arms, and the...
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The Story of a Boring Encounter with a Black Hole
Remember the excitement three years ago before the gas cloud G2’s encounter with the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy, Sgr A*? Did you notice that not much was said about it after...
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Where Are the IceCube Neutrinos Coming From?
Editor’s note: Astrobites is a graduate-student-run organization that digests astrophysical literature for undergraduate students. As part of the partnership between the AAS and astrobites, we repost...
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Discovery of Two More Runaway Stars
Speeding stars running away from our galaxy pose an intriguing puzzle: where did these stars come from, and how were they accelerated to their great speeds? The recent discovery of two new runaway...
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Making and Breaking Clouds
Molecular clouds — which you’re likely familiar with from stunning popular astronomy imagery — lead complicated, tumultuous lives. A recent study has now found that these features must be rapidly built...
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Is S0-2 a Binary Star?
Editor’s note: Astrobites is a graduate-student-run organization that digests astrophysical literature for undergraduate students. As part of the partnership between the AAS and astrobites, we repost...
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A Look at the Milky Way’s Outskirts
Studying the large-scale structure of the Milky Way is difficult given that we’re stuck in its interior — which means we can’t step back for a broad overview of our home. Instead, a recent study uses...
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Exploring Our Galaxy’s Thick Disk
What is the structure of the Milky Way’s disk, and how did it form? A new study uses giant stars to explore these questions. A View from the Inside Schematic showing an edge-on, not-to-scale view of...
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Selections from 2017: Computers Help Us Map Our Home
Editor’s note: In these last two weeks of 2017, we’ll be looking at a few selections that we haven’t yet discussed on AAS Nova from among the most-downloaded papers published in AAS journals this year....
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Using Satellite Galaxies to Weigh the Milky Way
Weighing galaxies is a tricky business — especially when that galaxy is our own! In a recent study, scientists have tackled this problem by harnessing incredibly precise measurements of the motions of...
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Featured Image: An Active Past for a Milky-Way Twin?
What would the Milky Way look like if the supermassive black hole at its center was a little more active? This stunning HST/WFC3 image of NGC 6744, spanning 160” x 160” (click for the whole view), may...
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New Detections of the Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole
A supermassive black hole lurks at the center of our galaxy — and we’re still trying to understand its structure and behavior. Now scientists have made new detections of Sgr A* in far infrared, helping...
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Selections from 2018: Looking for the Shadow of Our Galaxy’s Black Hole
Editor’s note: In these last two weeks of 2018, we’ll be looking at a few selections that we haven’t yet discussed on AAS Nova from among the most-downloaded papers published in AAS journals this year....
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Dwarf Galaxy or Giant Globular Cluster?
You might think that we’d already discovered all the large clusters of stars orbiting our galaxy. Surprisingly, there are still detections to be made — such as the recently discovered cluster FSR 1758....
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Holding Together a Speeding Cloud
High-velocity clouds observed in our galaxy’s halo pose a conundrum: given their tenuous nature and large speeds, why haven’t they been ripped apart? New observations of one such cloud now provide a...
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Giant Stars in Our Black Hole’s Neighborhood
How does a supermassive black hole affect its stellar neighbors? One way to explore this question is by searching for old, giant stars in the extreme environs of the galactic center. Crowded Quarters...
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Will Radio Bursts Reveal Hidden Baryons?
The Earth, your body, and the electronic device you’re reading this on are all made up of ordinary, baryonic matter. A new study has now used bursts of radio emission to probe whether the outskirts of...
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Different Views of a Fast Radio Burst
Fast radio bursts are perplexing astrophysical phenomena. As their name suggests, they’re essentially short radio signals, but they pack a surprising amount of energy. More unusual is that some fast...
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The Eyes of GAIA: Peering Into Our Galaxy’s Variable Nature
Editor’s note: Astrobites is a graduate-student-run organization that digests astrophysical literature for undergraduate students. As part of the partnership between the AAS and astrobites, we...
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Finding Fire-Breathing Dragons in the Milky Way
Editor’s note: Astrobites is a graduate-student-run organization that digests astrophysical literature for undergraduate students. As part of the partnership between the AAS and astrobites, we...
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What Fast Radio Bursts Tell Us About Galaxy Halos
In recent years, we’ve recorded hundreds of brief, powerful flashes of radio light originating from outside of our galaxy. In new work, scientists are now leveraging these enigmatic fast radio bursts...
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A Magnetar Bursting with Mysteries
We’re used to watching magnetars throw temper tantrums which involve large outbursts of energy in the form of X-rays. One magnetar, however, recently exhibited some unusual behavior during such an...
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