New observations are challenging a hypothesis about what produces these energetic bursts of radio waves. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it ...

Astronomers have discovered a new kind of star, and with it, a new clue to an old mystery: how magnetars form. The discovery is related to a peculiar star in a binary system some 3,000 light-years ...

Magnetars are surrounded by the most powerful magnetic fields in the known universe, but these dead stars are also surrounded by plenty of mystery. And now, thanks to the Hubble Space Telescope and ...

Gamma rays are a broad category of high-energy photons, including everything with more energy than an X-ray. While they are often created by processes like radioactive decay, few astronomical events ...

Astronomers have discovered a new type of star, and it appears to be a major clue in solving a long-standing cosmic mystery. This massive helium star has an ultra-strong magnetic field, meaning it ...

HD 45166 is believed to have the strongest magnetic field ever found in a massive star. Credit: ESO / L. Calçada illustration Astronomers have been studying a weird old star in deep space that is ...

Strange radio signals coming from a magnetar that "woke up" after more than a decade of radio silence cannot be explained by our current understanding of the universe's strongest magnets, hinting at a ...

"Magnetars are very young, because they cannot continue giving off energy at this rate for very long." When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it ...

After a decade of silence, one of the most powerful magnets in the universe suddenly burst back to life in late 2018. The reawakening of this “magnetar”, a city-sized star named XTE J1810-197 born ...

Stars are big hot balls of plasma, but astronomers have now spotted a super strange one that seems to have a solid surface. Its intense magnetic field is strong enough to overcome its blistering ...

Gregory Desvignes received funding from European Research Council (ERC) Synergy Grant “BlackHoleCam” Grant Agreement Number 610058. Patrick Weltevrede receives funding from Science and Technology ...

On the outskirts of the Milky Way, one of the rarest kinds of stars in the galaxy has just become even more mysterious than it was before. Astronomers have used the Hubble and Gaia telescopes to study ...