space telescope

Alpha Centauri, the closest stellar system to Earth at 4.37 light-years away, is drawing attention as a target in the hunt for habitable worlds. Proxima Centauri hosts Proxima b, an Earth-mass planet in the habitable zone, and the James Webb Space Telescope may have detected a giant planet orbiting Alpha Centauri A. Rocky planets around its Sun-like stars remain a possibility.

NASA has published an artist's concept of its proposed PRIMA spacecraft through its photojournal. PRIMA, the Probe far-Infrared Mission for Astrophysics, is a planned infrared space telescope designed to study the formation of stars, planets and galaxies in wavelengths that are difficult to observe from Earth. The illustration offers an early visual sense of the observatory's design as the mission seeks support.

The Hubble Space Telescope is currently observing NGC 1068, a nearby galaxy with an active supermassive black hole at its centre. The observations are part of a research programme using an ultraviolet integral field unit to study how energy from the black hole, known as AGN feedback, affects star formation in the galaxy. Calibration targets such as BD-00-413 are also in the observation schedule.

The 2025 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded for work detecting 'ghost particles' — neutrinos — using a space telescope, according to BBC News reporting. The particles, which pass through matter almost undetectably, offer a new way of observing the universe. The announcement is drawing wide attention across science and news circles, with discussion of the researchers honoured and what the discovery means for physics and astronomy.

The 2026 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded for work detecting 'ghost particles' from a space telescope. The particles, so named because they pass through matter almost unnoticed, have become a key tool for studying cosmic phenomena. The award has drawn broad international attention across science and news coverage.

Kepler-202 c is an exoplanet discovered in 2014 by NASA's Kepler telescope, located about 930 light-years from Earth. It is classified as a potentially rocky world, larger than Earth, with a radius roughly 1.85 times that of our planet. It orbits its star every 16.28 days. NASA's Exoplanet Travel Bureau features the planet in its online visualization tool.

An amateur astronomer pointed a large telescope at NGC 456, a faint nebula in the Small Magellanic Cloud, during last weekend's full Moon. He called the attempt ill-advised, because even narrowband filters struggle when the Moon brightens the sky background. The resulting images are being shared with other space enthusiasts, who appreciate the difficulty of deep-sky imaging in poor lunar conditions.

NASA is developing plans for another billion-dollar space telescope even as its existing flagship observatories remain incomplete or constrained. The James Webb Space Telescope and the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope represent billions in investment, and the report argues both are still falling short of full potential. Critics are questioning whether the agency should fund a new large mission before current ones deliver.

A newly released Hubble Space Telescope image shows Arp 4, a larger irregular galaxy, alongside the small spiral galaxy PGC 6629. The image, credited to NASA, ESA and STScI, highlights the contrast between the two galactic structures. Space enthusiasts are sharing the picture as part of ongoing interest in Hubble's deep-sky observations.

The Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded for work that opened the field of neutrino astronomy, the study of ghostly subatomic particles that travel across the universe and can pass through planets unaffected. The honor recognizes researchers whose detectors caught neutrinos from space, giving scientists a new way to observe cosmic events such as exploding stars that traditional telescopes cannot see.

New composite observations of the Crab Nebula are being highlighted, combining X-ray data from NASA's Chandra observatory, optical images from Hubble, and infrared readings from Spitzer. By layering these views across the electromagnetic spectrum, researchers can map how the pulsar wind nebula interacts with its surrounding supernova remnant. The images showcase how multi-wavelength astronomy reveals structures invisible to any single telescope.

NASA's proposed Prima space telescope is being presented as a mission designed to observe phenomena beyond the reach of the James Webb Space Telescope. The concept highlights gaps in current observatories' capabilities and suggests Prima would complement Webb rather than replace it, aiming at wavelengths or targets Webb cannot study.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has found evidence suggesting Mars-sized worlds are smashing together in a distant star system, according to a report carried by ScienceDaily. The observations point to violent collisions between planetary bodies, offering astronomers a rare glimpse of the kind of impacts thought to have shaped young solar systems. Details of the findings and their implications are still being examined.

NASA has announced a second proposal opportunity under ROSES-25 D.3, the Astrophysics General Investigator program for Guest Observations with the NuSTAR X-ray telescope. Researchers can submit new observing proposals in the Astrophysics Research program. This gives scientists who missed the first cycle a further window to request time on the space-based hard X-ray observatory for their astronomy research.

Professional astronomers do not simply buy observing sessions on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope or Hubble Space Telescope. Instead, they compete through open, peer-reviewed proposal calls, submitting scientific cases that anonymous committees rank, with approved time granted in hours. The process is explained in detail in a new piece, shedding light on how scarce time on the world's most in-demand space telescopes is allocated.

The Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded for work detecting 'ghost particles' — neutrinos — using a space telescope, according to BBC News. Neutrinos are near-massless particles that pass through matter almost unnoticed, making them extremely hard to detect and a long-standing challenge in physics. The award is drawing attention to how telescope-based observations have opened a new window on the universe's most elusive particles.

NASA has released new images from the James Webb Space Telescope showing violent stellar jets erupting within a nebula. The observations capture fast-moving streams of gas launched by young stars as they form, revealing in sharp detail the turbulence and energy at work in stellar nurseries. The release has drawn attention from space enthusiasts and science media following the space agency's announcement.

NASA says its SunRISE mission — an array of small satellites that will work together to create a giant radio telescope in space — is now scheduled to launch no earlier than mid-2027. The project aims to study solar radio bursts and improve understanding of how space weather affects Earth.

The exoplanet HATS-6b is being discussed alongside the James Webb Space Telescope and ammonia, suggesting new findings about the distant world's atmosphere. HATS-6b is a gas giant orbiting a faint red dwarf star, and observations of molecules like ammonia in exoplanet atmospheres are a key goal of the telescope's science programme. Details beyond the hashtags and a link to a French tech news site are limited.

Kepler-1314 b is a Neptune-like giant exoplanet located 463 light-years from Earth. Discovered in 2016 by NASA's Kepler telescope, it has a radius about 5.11 times that of Earth and completes an orbit in just 5.42 days. Astronomy communicators are sharing the planet's profile alongside NASA's Eyes on Exoplanets visualisation, drawing renewed attention to the Kepler mission's catalog of worlds beyond the solar system.