If nothing else, the global pandemic of the Coronavirus has slowed the world down and in effect, our minds too. In our socially-distanced states, we are bound to be thinking more about what we are doing in our lives, where we are heading, and what our futures will entail, both collectively as a planet and as individuals.

Astronomers from Nanjing University in China have detected gamma ray emission from two star-forming galaxies designated M33 and Arp 299. The finding, which is detailed in a paper published March 17 on arXiv.org, could be helpful in improving knowledge about the origin of very high-energy emission in galaxies.

A star that pulsates on just one side has been discovered in the Milky Way about 1500 light years from Earth. It is the first of its kind to be found and scientists expect to find many more similar systems as technology to listen inside the beating hearts of stars improves.

Last month, SpaceX became the operator of the world’s largest active satellite constellation. As of the end of January, the company had 242 satellites orbiting the planet with plans to launch 42,000 over the next decade. This is part of its ambitious project to provide internet access across the globe. The race to put satellites in space is on, with Amazon, U.K.-based OneWeb and other companies chomping at the bit to place thousands of satellites in orbit in the coming months.

Project is collaboration between privately-funded firm and New Mexico observatory

Three Leiden astronomers have shown that some asteroids that are considered harmless for now, can collide with Earth in the future. They did their research with the help of an artificial neural network. The results have been accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Earlier this month astronomers found strange repeating signals emanating from deep space. Now a top astronomer has said there’s a possibility they were produced by an alien civilisation. The transmissions are called fast radio bursts and are similar to other signals which have been spotted before. But the recent burst is believed to be the first with a discernible pattern.

Just as astronomers thought they were making sense of fast radio bursts (FRBs) — the mysterious repeating signals originating deep in space — the universe threw us a curveball.

NASA warned that a massive potentially hazardous asteroid bigger than the Empire State Building is currently headed for Earth. If this space rock hits the planet, the blast would be powerful enough to wipe out an entire major city.

ESA’s exoplanet-observer Cheops acquired the first image of its initial target star, following the successful telescope cover opening on 29 January 2020. The intentionally blurry image is a product of the specially designed telescope optics, which are deliberately defocused to maximise the precision of Cheops’ measurements and enable its unprecedented study of exoplanets, or planets in other solar systems.

Scientists have discovered the first fast radio burst that beats at a steady rhythm, and the mysterious repeating signal is coming from the outskirts of another galaxy.

Astronomers want more public funds to help search for intelligent life elsewhere in the universe.

Scientists have created a prototype "lunar oxygen plant" by testing a method for extracting oxygen from imitation Moon rocks that could be invaluable for lunar settlements.

If you stargaze on a clear winter night, it’s hard to miss the constellation Orion the Hunter, with his shield in one arm and the other arm stretched high to the heavens. A bright red dot called Betelgeuse marks Orion’s shoulder, and this star's strange dimming has captivated skygazers for thousands of years. Aboriginal Australians may have even worked it into their oral histories.

A black hole about 390 million light-years away has caused the biggest eruption ever seen in the universe. The supermassive black hole sits at the center of a galaxy located in the Ophiuchus galaxy cluster. Its eruption was about five times greater than the last record-holder. Black holes suck up matter that comes close to them, but they often expel matter as well. When matter falls toward the black hole, it’s sometimes redirected into beams or jets that blast into space and slam into surrounding material.

Researchers using ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT) have observed an extreme planet where they suspect it rains iron. The ultra-hot giant exoplanet has a day side where temperatures climb above 2400 degrees Celsius, high enough to vaporise metals. Strong winds carry iron vapour to the cooler night side where it condenses into iron droplets.

esearchers in Poland have been able to chart our galaxy on a scale bigger than ever before by measuring the distance from our sun to thousands of individual pulsating stars scattered across the Milky Way. A newly created three-dimensional map (see below), which provides a broad view of our location in the cosmos, reveals the S-like structure of the Milky Way’s warped stellar disc. The map was published on Thursday in the journal Science.

A new study provides the most accurate estimate of the frequency that planets that are similar to Earth in size and in distance from their host star occur around stars similar to our Sun. Knowing the rate that these potentially habitable planets occur will be important for designing future astronomical missions to characterize nearby rocky planets around sun-like stars that could support life. A paper describing the model appears August 14, 2019 in The Astronomical Journal.

Canadian astronomers at McGill University, using satellite data collected over the past decade, have come up with a spectral “fingerprint” of Earth that could be compared to atmospheric signatures from exoplanet transits to help determine their ability to support life.

Astronomers say this type of cosmic event happens once every 10,000 to 100,000 years.