Astronomers exposed acetylene ice -- a chemical that is used on Earth in welding torches and exists at Titan's equatorial regions -- at low temperatures to proxies of high-energy galactic cosmic rays.

A new technique for analysing satellite images may help scientists detect and count stranded whales from space. Researchers tested a new detection method using Very High Resolution (VHR) satellite images of the biggest mass stranding of baleen whales yet recorded. It is hoped that in the future the technique will lead to real-time information as stranding events happen.

Earth-like planets may be common in the universe, a new study implies. The team of astrophysicists and geochemists presents new evidence that the Earth is not unique.

'Weather' in clusters of galaxies may explain a longstanding puzzle. Scientists have now used sophisticated simulations to show how powerful jets from supermassive black holes are disrupted by the motion of hot gas and galaxies, preventing gas from cooling, which could otherwise form stars.

Hubble has given astronomers their best look yet at an interstellar visitor -- comet 2I/Borisov -- whose speed and trajectory indicate it has come from beyond our solar system. Comet 2I/Borisov is only the second such interstellar object known to have passed through the solar system.

For the first time, astronomers have witnessed 3D motions of gas in a planet-forming disk. At three locations in the disk around a young star called HD 163296, gas is flowing like a waterfall into gaps that are most likely caused by planets in formation. These gas flows have long been predicted and would directly influence the chemical composition of planet atmospheres.

Researcher finds evidence of ancient solar magnetic storms based on cuneiform astrological records and carbon-14 dating. This work may help with our understanding of intense solar activity that can threaten modern electronics.

Electromagnetism was discovered 200 years ago, but the origin of the very large electromagnetic fields in the universe is still a mystery.

At the center of a galaxy called NGC 1068, a supermassive black hole hides within a thick doughnut-shaped cloud of dust and gas. When astronomers used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to study this cloud in more detail, they made an unexpected discovery that could explain why supermassive black holes grew so rapidly in the early Universe.

Astronomers have completed the largest survey to date of the faint outskirts of nearby galaxies, successfully testing a low-cost system for exploring these local stellar systems. The team find that the diameters of the galactic outskirts -- the haloes -- appear to correlate with the brightness and type of galaxy.

Researchers have produced crops in Mars and moon soil simulant developed by NASA. The research supports the idea that it would not only be possible to grow food on Mars and the moon to feed future settlers, but also to obtain viable seed from crops grown there.

The entry probe of the Galileo mission to Jupiter entered the planet's atmosphere in 1995 in fiery fashion, generating enough heat to cause plasma reactions on its surface. The data relayed about the burning of its heat shield differed from the effects predicted in fluid dynamics models, and new work examines what might have caused such a discrepancy. Researchers now report their findings from new fluid radiative dynamics models.

Astronomers have used a massive cluster of galaxies as an X-ray magnifying glass to peer back in time, to nearly 9.4 billion years ago. In the process, they spotted a tiny dwarf galaxy in its very first, high-energy stages of star formation.

Astronomers have discovered that powerful winds driven by supermassive black holes in the centers of dwarf galaxies have a significant impact on the evolution of these galaxies by suppressing star formation.

New research sheds light on the ages of ice deposits reported in the area of the Moon's south pole -- information that could help identify the sources of the deposits and help in planning future human exploration.

Although the mapping of aboveground biomass is now possible with satellite remote sensing, these maps still have to be calibrated and validated using on-site data gathered by researchers across the world.

Gas blown out of the Milky Way disk from exploding stars falls back onto the galaxy to form new generations of stars. In an effort to account for this recycling process, astronomers were surprised to find a surplus of incoming gas.

A team of astronomers has discovered that several of the small -- or 'dwarf' -- galaxies orbiting the Milky Way were likely stolen from the Large Magellanic Cloud, including several ultrafaint dwarfs, but also relatively bright and well-known satellite galaxies, such as Carina and Fornax.

Researchers have constructed a framework for starting and raising a fusion plasma to temperatures rivaling the sun in hundreds of milliseconds.

How do some neutron stars become the strongest magnets in the Universe? Astrophysicists have found a possible answer to the question of how these so-called magnetars form. Researchers have used large computer simulations to demonstrate how the merger of two stars creates strong magnetic fields. If such stars explode in supernovae, magnetars could result.

A hot, molten Earth would be around 5% larger than its solid counterpart. The difference between molten and solid rocky planets is important for the search of Earth-like worlds beyond our Solar System and the understanding of Earth itself.

Physicists at Stockholm University and the Max Planck Institute for Physics have turned to plasmas in a proposal that could revolutionise the search for the elusive dark matter.

Out at the boundary of our solar system, pressure runs high. This pressure, the force plasma, magnetic fields and particles like ions, cosmic rays and electrons exert on one another when they flow and collide, was recently measured by scientists in totality for the first time -- and it was found to be greater than expected.

This year's Nobel Prize in Physics is being awarded 'for contributions to our understanding of the evolution of the universe and Earth's place in the cosmos,' with one half to James Peebles 'for theoretical discoveries in physical cosmology' and the other half jointly to Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz 'for the discovery of an exoplanet orbiting a solar-type star.'

A team of scientists have discovered that the fading of infrared light following Type Ia supernovae explosions can be interrupted, with brightness staying the same for up to a year.