Perseid meteor shower to be visible from August 11

The majority of known asteroids orbit inside the main asteroid belt, which is positioned between Mars and Jupiter at an average distance of around 250 million km from Earth. Since the discovery of the first asteroid in 1801, about 750.000 asteroids have been identified, primarily in the last decade thanks to several optical surveys that examine the sky on clear nights.

The sky is no longer the limit - but flying is risky. We lose many of the clues we need to orient ourselves when we leave the Earth's surface, and this spatial disorientation can be fatal. Astronauts typically require extensive training to protect themselves against it. However, scientists have discovered that wearable devices that vibrate to provide orientation cues may considerably improve the efficacy of this training, making spaceflight slightly safer.

Astronomers got a special treat on August 30 when a rare celestial event known as a Super Blue Moon became visible in the sky across the nation. A blue moon has nothing to do with the colour of the Moon. NASA defines it as the second full moon in a single month. "Once in a blue moon" occurs every two and a half years on average.

The best proof to date that Saturn's rings are astonishingly young has been provided by recent research headed by physicist Sascha Kempf at the University of Colorado Boulder. This finding may provide an answer to a subject that has baffled scientists for well over a century.

Published in Astronomy & Astrophysics, a study carried out by the Stellar Standard Candles and Distances research group, led by Richard Anderson at EPFL's Institute of Physics, achieved the most accurate calibration of Cepheid stars -- a type of variable star whose luminosity fluctuates over a defined period -- for distance measurements to date based on data collected by the European Space Agency's (ESA's) Gaia mission.

What scientists previously believed about the genesis of galaxies in the cosmos is being challenged by the discovery of six huge galaxies in the early universe.

All kinds of exoplanets orbit very close to their star. Some look like the Earth, others like Jupiter. Very few, however, are similar to Neptune. Why this anomaly in the distribution of exoplanets? Researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS have observed a sample of planets located at the edge of this Hot Neptune Desert to understand its creation. Using a technique combining the two main methods of studying exoplanets (radial velocities and transits), they were able to establish that a part of these exoplanets has migrated in a turbulent way near their star, which pushed them out of the orbital plane where they were formed. These results are published in the specialized journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Astronomers have found a way to peer into the physics of some of the brightest stars in the sky. Using data from NASA's Kepler space telescope, an international team of researchers has found new evidence that red giants, dying stars that have exhausted their supply of hydrogen and are in the final stages of stellar evolution, often experience large-scale structural variations, or what is known as "glitches" deep inside their inner core.

Washington [US], December 17 (ANI): Scientists analyzed new measurements showing that the light emitted by stars outside our galaxy is two to three times brighter than the light from known populations of galaxies, challenging assumptions about the number and environment of stars in the universe. Results of the study led by researchers at Rochester Institute of Technology have been posted to ArXiv and accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal.

Studying an atomic clock on-board a spacecraft inside the orbit of Mercury and very near to the Sun might be the trick to uncovering the nature of dark matter, suggests a new study published in Nature Astronomy.