Milky Way

The iconic star Polaris appears to be much younger than its true age. The secret: it’s eating another star

A supernova showering Earth with radioactive debris is a surprisingly common cosmic occurrence

For the first time, scientists observed matter’s free fall into a black hole’s “plunging region”

How do astronomers find the darkest objects in the universe?

An exploding star is a catastrophe on a cosmic scale, but here on Earth we’re safe from such astral disasters—for now

Every now and then, tiny particles of antimatter strike Earth from cosmic parts unknown. A new balloon-borne experiment launching this spring may at last find their source

As the Event Horizon Telescope pursues ambitious upgrades, the project’s latest results reveal the magnetic fields around our galaxy’s supermassive black hole

Giant bubbles erupting across this red supergiant star’s surface could solve a lingering astrophysical mystery

Figuring out whether there are more stars in the universe than sand grains on Earth’s seashores requires math—and imagination

Polarized light from Sagittarius A*, our galaxy’s supermassive black hole, shows swirling magnetic fields that may hint at the presence of an unseen jet

A nova called T Coronae Borealis spectacularly erupts every 80 years. Your only chance to see it will come any day now

At least one in a dozen binary stars shows signs of eating their planets