Kuiper Belt News

June 26, 2025

Top Headlines

Mojave Lichen Defies Death Rays—could Life Thrive on Distant Exoplanets?

June 24, 2025 — Lichen from the Mojave Desert has stunned scientists by surviving months of lethal UVC radiation, suggesting life could exist on distant planets orbiting volatile stars. The secret? A microscopic “sunscreen” layer that protects their vital ...

Millions of New Solar System Objects to Be Found and 'Filmed in Technicolor' -- Studies Predict

June 3, 2025 — Astronomers have revealed new research showing that millions of new solar system objects are likely to be detected by a brand-new facility, which is expected to come online later this ...

Webb Reveals the Origin of the Ultra-Hot Exoplanet WASP-121b

June 2, 2025 — Tracing the origin of an ultra-hot exoplanet: The chemical composition of WASP-121b suggests that it formed in a cool zone of its natal disc, comparable to the region of gas and ice giants in our Solar System. Methane indicates unexpected ...

Unveiling the Secrets of Planet Formation in Environments of High UV Radiation

May 21, 2025 — The fundamental building blocks for planet formation can exist even in environments with extreme ultraviolet radiation, according to a new ...

Astronomers Take a Second Look at Twin Star Systems

May 14, 2025 — Apples-to-apples comparisons in the distant universe are hard to come by. Whether the subject is dwarf galaxies, supermassive black holes, or 'hot Jupiters,' astronomers can spend months or years searching for comparable objects and formations to ...

New Research Shatters Long-Held Beliefs About Asteroid Vesta

Apr. 29, 2025 — For decades, scientists believed Vesta, one of the largest objects in our solar system's asteroid belt, wasn't just an asteroid and eventually concluded it was more like a planet with a crust, mantle and core. Now, new research flips this notion on ...

Astronomers Discover a Planet That's Rapidly Disintegrating, Producing a Comet-Like Tail

Apr. 22, 2025 — A planet 140 light-years from Earth is rapidly coming apart due to its close proximity to its star. The roasting planet is effectively evaporating away: It sheds an enormous amount of surface ...

Did It Rain or Snow on Ancient Mars? New Study Suggests It Did

Apr. 21, 2025 — Geologists weigh in on a long-running debate about Mars: Billions of years ago, was the Red Planet warm and wet or cold and ...

Ever Wonder Why Some Meteor Showers Are So Unpredictable?

Apr. 16, 2025 — Why do comets and their meteoroid streams weave in and out of Earth's orbit and their orbits disperse over time? Researchers show that this is not due to the random pull of the planets, but rather the kick they receive from a moving ...

'Big Surprise': Astronomers Find Planet in Perpendicular Orbit Around Pair of Stars

Apr. 16, 2025 — Astronomers have found a planet that orbits at an angle of 90 degrees around a rare pair of peculiar stars. This is the first time we have strong evidence for one of these 'polar planets' orbiting a ...

On Jupiter, It's Mushballs All the Way Down

Apr. 15, 2025 — Observations of Jupiter show that ammonia is unevenly distributed in the upper atmosphere, against expectations of uniform mixing. Scientists found evidence for a complicated but apparently real process associated with fierce lightning storms: ...

Mysterious Atmosphere of 'Rosetta Stone' Exoplanet

Apr. 15, 2025 — A new study modeled the chemistry of TOI-270 d, an exoplanet between Earth and Neptune in size, finding evidence that it could be a giant rocky planet shrouded in a thick, hot atmosphere. TOI-270 d is only 73 light years from Earth and could serve ...

Latest Headlines

updated 1:35pm EDT

Why Giant Planets Might Form Faster Than We Thought

June 14, 2025 — Astronomers using ALMA have uncovered how gas and dust in planet-forming disks evolve separately an insight that reshapes our understanding of how different types of planets form. While dust lingers, ...

Astronomers Just Found a Giant Planet That Shouldn’t Exist

June 11, 2025 — Scientists have discovered a giant planet orbiting a tiny red dwarf star, something they believed wasn t even possible. The planet, TOI-6894b, is about the size of Saturn but orbits a star just a ...

Sand Clouds and Moon Nurseries: Webb’s Dazzling Exoplanet Reveal

June 10, 2025 — Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have captured breathtakingly detailed images of two giant exoplanets orbiting a distant sun-like star. These observations revealed sand-like silicate ...

Scientists May Have Spotted a Giant New Planet Forming

June 9, 2025 — A team of international astronomers has uncovered what may be a gas giant planet forming around a distant young star. Using the powerful Very Large Telescope in Chile, they captured dazzling ...

Planets May Start Forming Before Their Stars Are Even Done

June 9, 2025 — Planets may begin forming much earlier than scientists once believed during the final stages of a star s birth, not afterward. This bold new model, backed by simulations from researchers at SwRI, ...

What If We Find Nothing in Our Search for Life Beyond Earth?

Apr. 7, 2025 — What if we spend decades building advanced telescopes to search for life on other planets and come up emptyhanded? A recent study exploring what we can learn about life in the universe -- even if we ...

Astronomers Discover Doomed Pair of Spiralling Stars on Our Cosmic Doorstep

Apr. 4, 2025 — Astronomers have discovered an extremely rare, high mass, compact binary star system only ~150 light years away. These two stars are on a collision course to explode as a type 1a supernova, appearing ...

Meteorites: A Geologic Map of the Asteroid Belt

Mar. 18, 2025 — Where do meteorites of different type come from? In a review paper, astronomers trace the impact orbit of observed meteorite falls to several previously unidentified source regions in the asteroid ...

Webb Telescope Captures Its First Direct Images of Carbon Dioxide Outside Solar System

Mar. 17, 2025 — The James Webb Space Telescope has captured its first direct images of carbon dioxide in a planet outside the solar system in HR 8799, a multiplanet ...

Combination of Cosmic Processes Shapes the Size and Location of Sub-Neptunes

Mar. 17, 2025 — A combination of cosmic processes shapes the formation of one of the most common types of planets outside of our solar system, according to a new ...

TOI-1453: Sub-Neptune in System of Two Exoplanets

Mar. 14, 2025 — Astronomers have discovered two exoplanets around TOI-1453, a star about 250 light years away. These two exoplanets, a super-Earth and a sub-Neptune, are common in the galaxy, yet are absent from our ...

Signs of Alien Life May Be Hiding in These Gases

Mar. 12, 2025 — Scientists identify a new way to detect life in outer space with currently existing telescopes. The method hinges on worlds that look nothing like Earth, and gases rarely considered in the search for ...

Entwined Dwarf Stars Reveal Their Location Thanks to Repeated Radio Bursts

Mar. 12, 2025 — A white dwarf and a red dwarf star have been discovered closely orbiting each other emitting radio pulses every two hours. Their findings means we know it isn't just neutron stars that emit such ...

Four Tiny Planets Found Orbiting One of Our Nearest Stars

Mar. 11, 2025 — Astronomers have revealed new evidence that there are not just one but four tiny planets circling around Barnard's Star, the second-nearest star system to ...

Super-Earths and Mini-Neptunes: More Earth-Like Planets May Exist

Mar. 11, 2025 — A new study presents a compelling new model for the formation of super-Earths and mini-Neptunes -- planets that are 1 to 4 times the size of Earth and among the most common in our galaxy. Using ...

Small and Large Planets Have Significantly Different Upbringings

Mar. 5, 2025 — Studying the orbits of thousands of exoplanets shows that large planets tend to have elliptical orbits, while smaller planets tend to have more circular orbits. This split coincides with several ...

Astronomer Finds Gas Giant Exoplanets Formed Earlier Than Previously Thought

Mar. 5, 2025 — A fresh look at past data reveals that exoplanets with masses similar to Jupiter formed much sooner than previously thought, according to new ...

Ultra-Hot Nova Observed Erupting: Surprising Chemical Signature

Mar. 5, 2025 — Astronomers have for the first time observed a recurring nova outside of the Milky Way in near-infrared light. The data revealed highly unusual chemical emissions as well as one of the hottest ...

Beyond Our Solar System: Scientists Identify a New Exoplanet Candidate

Mar. 4, 2025 — The discovery of new exoplanets can help scientists understand how planets form and ...

NASA's Hubble Finds Kuiper Belt Duo May Be Trio

Mar. 4, 2025 — The puzzle of predicting how three gravitationally bound bodies move in space has challenged mathematicians for centuries, and has most recently been popularized in the novel and television show ...

NASA's Hubble Provides Bird's-Eye View of Andromeda Galaxy's Ecosystem

Feb. 27, 2025 — Located 2.5 million light-years away, the majestic Andromeda galaxy appears to the naked eye as a faint, spindle-shaped object roughly the angular size of the full Moon. What backyard observers ...

Can We Find Floating Vegetation on Ocean Planets?

Feb. 27, 2025 — Recent advances in astronomical observations have found a significant number of extrasolar planets that can sustain surface water, and the search for extraterrestrial life on such planets is gaining ...

Today's Forecast: Partially Cloudy Skies on an 'Ultra-Hot Neptune'

Feb. 25, 2025 — Using the James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers investigate the extreme weather patterns and atmospheric properties of exoplanet LTT 9779 b. New JWST observations with NIRISS reveal a dynamic ...

300 New Intermediate-Mass Black Holes Plus 2500 New Active Black Holes in Dwarf Galaxies Discovered

Feb. 19, 2025 — Within the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument's early data, scientists have uncovered the largest samples ever of intermediate-mass black holes and dwarf galaxies hosting an active black hole, ...

Einstein Probe Catches X-Ray Odd Couple

Feb. 18, 2025 — Lobster-eye satellite Einstein Probe captured the X-ray flash from a very elusive celestial pair. The discovery opens a new way to explore how massive stars interact and evolve, confirming the unique ...

'Out of Science Fiction': First 3D Observations of an Exoplanet's Atmosphere Reveal a Unique Climate

Feb. 18, 2025 — Astronomers have peered through the atmosphere of a planet beyond the Solar System, mapping its 3D structure for the first time. By combining all four telescope units of the European Southern ...

Does Planetary Evolution Favor Human-Like Life? Study Ups Odds We're Not Alone

Feb. 14, 2025 — Humanity may not be extraordinary but rather the natural evolutionary outcome for our planet and likely others, according to a new model for how intelligent life developed on ...

Deposits Found on a Nearby Asteroid Point to Salty Water in the Outer Solar System

Feb. 14, 2025 — Asteroids that orbit close to the Earth inevitably cause us some anxiety due to the even remote possibility of a collision. But their proximity also offers ample opportunities to learn more about the ...

Astronomers Gauge Livability of Exoplanets Orbiting White Dwarf Stars

Feb. 13, 2025 — Astronomers used a 3D global computer model to compare the climates of exoplanets in different stellar and orbital configurations. They found that a planet orbiting a white dwarf star would offer a ...

Temperamental Stars Are Distorting Our View of Distant Planets

Feb. 7, 2025 — 'Temperamental' stars that brighten and dim over a matter of hours or days may be distorting our view of thousands of distant planets, suggests a new ...