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Astronomy and Cosmology

On this page we collect articles about Astronomy and Cosmology.

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Illustration of a black hole engine emitting focused radiation giving rise to the gamma ray burst
Department of Astronomy

New Study Questions Decades-Long Understanding of Gamma Ray Bursts

On Sunday, Oct. 9, 2022, a pulse of intense gamma-ray radiation swept through our solar system, saturating detectors on numerous spacecraft, and sending astronomers across the world scurrying to train their fastest and most powerful telescopes on it. The new source, dubbed GRB 221009A, turned out to be the brightest gamma-ray burst (GRB) ever observed. In a new study that appeared yesterday in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, multi-wavelength observations of this extraordinary event are questioning our decades-long understanding of how these events explode into their multi-coloured fireworks.

New Study Questions Decades-Long Understanding of Gamma Ray Bursts - Read the full article
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Galaxies at a great distance

Star formation in distant galaxies by the James Webb Space Telescope

Thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope’s first images of galaxy clusters, researchers have, for the very first time, been able to examine very compact structures of star clusters inside galaxies, so-called clumps. In a paper published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, researchers from Stockholm University have studied the first phase of star formation in distant galaxies.

Star formation in distant galaxies by the James Webb Space Telescope - Read the full article
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AlbaNova campus area.

Creative research environment attracts physicists and astronomers to Stockholm

In 2008, the Oskar Klein Centre in Stockholm was founded to tackle the greatest problems in astrophysics and particle physics in an interdisciplinary manner. It is now celebrated as a rich and rewarding research environment that attracts internationally leading researchers, including Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek.

Creative research environment attracts physicists and astronomers to Stockholm - Read the full article
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illustrates how it might look when a star approaches too close to a black hole

Rare sighting of a luminous jet from a star-eating supermassive black hole

Over 8 billion years ago, a star was torn apart as it got too close to a supermassive black hole. Jets of gas directed towards Earth recently made the fate of the star visible to a telescope looking for new sources of light in the night sky. The observation has led to two independent publications including researchers at Stockholm University in Nature and Nature Astronomy.

Rare sighting of a luminous jet from a star-eating supermassive black hole - Read the full article
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IceCube

IceCube neutrinos provide new view of a nearby galaxy

For the first time, an international team of scientists has found evidence of high-energy neutrino emission from a nearby galaxy. The galaxy, NGC 1068 (also known as Messier 77) is an active galaxy in the constellation Cetus and one of the most familiar and well-studied active galaxies. The results are published in Science.

IceCube neutrinos provide new view of a nearby galaxy - Read the full article
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Clas Hättestrand och Jessica Meir

Astronaut Jessica Meir took Stockholm University flag into space

NASA astronaut, marine biologist, and former Stockholm University student Jessica Meir visited Sweden in June for a five-day tour, during which she gave talks and met the general public, researchers, and students. During a seminar, she took the opportunity to return a mini version of the Stockholm University flag, which she had taken with her on the International Space Station ISS.

Astronaut Jessica Meir took Stockholm University flag into space - Read the full article
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James Webb-teleskopet

The James Webb Telescope has reached its orbit

After 25 years of planning, the world's largest space telescope to date, James Webb, is finally out in space. The telescope uses infrared light to measure objects in space. It will examine the atmosphere on planets in other solar systems and look further back into the history of the universe than has previously been possible. The instrument on the telescope designed to capture faint infrared light has been developed by scientists from Stockholm University, together with other Swedish researchers.

The James Webb Telescope has reached its orbit - Read the full article
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Sara Strandberg

Measuring the Higgs Boson

All matter on Earth and in the universe is made up of elementary particles that have existed since just after the Big Bang. Wallenberg Scholar Sara Strandberg is studying how the particles interact with each other. She is using data from the LHC particle collider at CERN to learn more about the Higgs Boson and the part it plays in the Standard Model of particle physics.

Measuring the Higgs Boson - Read the full article
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Research projects

A new epoch for applied stellar spectroscopy

Starlight contains a wealth of information, not only about the stars themselves, but also of the exoplanets that are bound to them. The infinitesimal signal of the planet can reveal many secrets, for example the constituents of its atmosphere.

Analysis of starlight through the atmosphere. Image credit ESO/M. Kornmesser.
Black Holes from Core Collapse Supernovae

Black holes are formed deep within dying massive stars and they signal a special evolution away from the canonical picture where the star explodes and leaves behind a neutron star. To probe these special evolutions and the formation pathways of black holes is a crucial link between our understanding of stellar evolution and gravitational wave astrophysics.

Numerical simulation of a supernova
Dark matter and scientific method

According to our best cosmological model ‘dark matter’ makes up ≈80% of the total mass of the universe. But what is dark matter, and in what sense are we justified in positing its existence?

Discovering Dark Matter: Extending Philosophy of Experiment to Dark Matter

The existence of dark matter is well-supported: there is a wide range of empirical evidence for a novel type of matter that has important gravitational effects on the evolution of our universe. But beyond the fact that it has gravitational effects, all that is known is that dark matter is unlike anything studied by particle physics so far.

Homing in on Earth-like planets

Planets around other stars than the Sun are collectively called “Exoplanets”. The first exoplanets were discovered in the late 1990s, and since then, the field has rapidly developed, with thousands of exoplanets known to date.

The making of the heaviest elements in the Universe

About 14 billion years ago, the Universe began with the Big Bang. A few minutes later, hydrogen, helium, and traces of lithium were formed during the Big Bang Nucleosynthesis. However, the Universe expanded and cooled, leading to the end of this process after 20 minutes. Where, when, and how were the remaining elements of the periodic table produced?

High-resolution spectrum of the highly r-process enhanced star HD 222529
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