Black Holes Hide in Our Cosmic Backyard
January 7th, 2017
Monster black holes sometimes lurk behind gas and dust, hiding from the gaze of most telescopes. But they give themselves away when material they feed on emits high-energy X-rays that NASA's NuSTAR mission can detect. That's how NuSTAR recently identified two gas-enshrouded supermassive black holes, located at the centers of nearby galaxies.
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Young Magnetar Likely the Slowest Pulsar Ever Detected
September 8th, 2016
Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other X-ray observatories, astronomers have found evidence for what is likely one of the most extreme pulsars, or rotating neutron stars, ever detected. The source exhibits properties of a highly magnetized neutron star, or magnetar, yet its deduced spin period is thousands of times longer than any pulsar ever observed.
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NuSTAR Principal Investigator Honored for Research
August 8th, 2016
Fiona Harrison, principal investigator of NASA's NuSTAR mission, has been selected to receive the 2016 Massey Award, given by the Committee on Space Research. The Massey Award honors "outstanding contributions to the development of space research in which a leadership role is of particular importance" and honors the memory of Sir Harrie Massey.
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Chorus of Black Holes Sings in X-Rays
July 28th, 2016
Supermassive black holes in the universe are like a raucous choir singing in the language of X-rays. When black holes pull in surrounding matter, they let out powerful X-ray bursts. This song of X-rays, coming from a chorus of millions of black holes, fills the entire sky -- a phenomenon astronomers call the cosmic X-ray background.
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Black Hole Makes Material Wobble Around It
July 12th, 2016
The European Space Agency's orbiting X-ray observatory, XMM-Newton, has proved the existence of a "gravitational vortex" around a black hole. The discovery, aided by NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) mission, solves a mystery that has eluded astronomers for more than 30 years, and will allow them to map the behavior of matter very close to black holes. It could also open the door to future investigations of Albert Einstein's general relativity.
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Where a Neutron Star’s Accretion Disk Ends
March 16th, 2016
Using observations made by X-ray space observatories NuSTAR and Swift/XRT, a team of scientists led by Ashley King (Einstein Fellow at Stanford University) has managed to measure the location of the inner edge of the disk in Aquila X-1, a neutron-star X-ray binary located 17,000 light-years away.
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2016 Outstanding Faculty Award Recipient
January 22nd, 2016
Dr. Lynn R. Cominsky, Professor and Chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, joined the faculty at Sonoma State University in 1986 and became chair of the Physics and Astronomy Department in 2004. She also founded Sonoma State’s Education and Public Outreach group in 1999. Previously, she worked with the University of California, Berkeley Space Sciences Laboratory and NASA’s Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer Satellite Project. Dr. Cominsky earned her PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and her BA from Brandeis University.
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Fiona Harrison Awarded High-Energy Astrophysics Prize
January 16th, 2016
The 2015 Rossi Prize has been awarded to Fiona Harrison, the Benjamin M. Rosen Professor of Physics at Caltech, for her "groundbreaking work on supernova remnants, neutron stars, and black holes enabled by NuSTAR." The award is the top prize in high-energy astrophysics.
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Andromeda Galaxy Scanned with High-Energy X-ray Vision
January 5th, 2016
NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, has captured the best high-energy X-ray view yet of a portion of our nearest large, neighboring galaxy, Andromeda. The space mission has observed 40 "X-ray binaries" -- intense sources of X-rays comprised of a black hole or neutron star that feeds off a stellar companion.
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NuSTAR Finds Cosmic Clumpy Doughnut Around Black Hole
December 17th, 2015
The most massive black holes in the universe are often encircled by thick, doughnut-shaped disks of gas and dust. This deep-space doughnut material ultimately feeds and nourishes the growing black holes tucked inside.
News Release
October 26th, 2015
The baffling and strange behaviors of black holes have become somewhat less mysterious recently, with new observations from NASA's Explorer missions Swift and the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR. The two space telescopes caught a supermassive black hole in the midst of a giant eruption of X-ray light, helping astronomers address an ongoing puzzle: How do supermassive black holes flare?
News Release
August 3rd, 2015
When I stop and think about it, it never ceases to amaze me that radio waves, infrared light, which we experience as heat, x-rays and gamma-rays are all the same fundamental physical phenomenon – light, or electromagnetic radiation. The thing that distinguishes these different kinds of light is the wavelength.
News Release
July 8th, 2015
X-rays light up the surface of our sun in a bouquet of colors in this new image containing data from NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR.
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NuSTAR Stares Deep into Hidden Lairs of Black Holes
July 6th, 2015
Some of the "biggest and baddest" black holes around are buried under thick blankets of gas and dust. These monsters in the middle of galaxies are actively devouring material, but their hidden nature makes observing them a challenge. NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) recently caught a glimpse of five of these secluded beasts.
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Star Explosion is Lopsided, Finds NASA's NuSTAR
May 7th, 2015
NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, has found evidence that a massive star exploded in a lopsided fashion, sending ejected material flying in one direction and the core of the star in the other.
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Strong Evidence For Coronal Heating Theory Presented at 2015 TESS Meeting
April 30th, 2015
The sun's surface is blisteringly hot at 10,340 degrees Fahrenheit -- but its atmosphere is another 300 times hotter. This has led to an enduring mystery for those who study the sun: What heats the atmosphere to such extreme temperatures? Normally when you move away from a hot source the environment gets cooler, but some mechanism is clearly at work in the solar atmosphere, the corona, to bring the temperatures up so high.
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NASA's NuSTAR Captures Possible 'Screams' from Zombie Stars
April 29th, 2015
Peering into the heart of the Milky Way galaxy, NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array has spotted a mysterious glow of high-energy X-rays that, according to scientists, could be the "howls" of dead stars as they feed on stellar companions.
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NASA, ESA Telescopes Give Shape to Furious Black Hole Winds
February 19th, 2015
NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array and ESA’s XMM-Newton telescope are showing that fierce winds from a supermassive black hole blow outward in all directions -- a phenomenon that had been suspected, but difficult to prove until now.
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NuSTAR Principal Investigator Receives High-Energy Astrophysics Prize
January 16th, 2015
The 2015 Rossi Prize has been awarded to Fiona Harrison, a professor at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California, for her "groundbreaking work on supernova remnants, neutron stars and black holes enabled by NuSTAR".
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Will the Real Monster Black Hole Please Stand Up?
January 8th, 2015
A new high-energy X-ray image from NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, has pinpointed the true monster of a galactic mashup. The image shows two colliding galaxies, collectively called Arp 299, located 134 million light-years away. Each of the galaxies has a supermassive black hole at its heart.
News Release
Sun Sizzles in High-Energy X-Rays
December 22nd, 2014
For the first time, a mission designed to set its eyes on black holes and other objects far from our solar system has turned its gaze back closer to home, capturing images of our sun. NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array has taken its first picture of the sun, producing the most sensitive solar portrait ever taken in high-energy X-rays.
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NASA X-ray Telescopes Find Black Hole May Be a Neutrino Factory
November 13th, 2014
The giant black hole at the center of the Milky Way may be producing mysterious particles called neutrinos. If confirmed, this would be the first time that scientists have traced neutrinos back to a black hole. The evidence for this came from three NASA satellites that observe in X-ray light: the Chandra X-ray Observatory, the Swift gamma-ray mission, and the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array.
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NuSTAR Featured in a Documentary on the Science of Interstellar
October 30th, 2014
NuSTAR featured in Discovery Channel documentary called 'The Science of Interstellar'. Matthew McConaughey narrates this behind-the-scenes look at the epic voyage to deep space depicted in the movie Interstellar. Director Christopher Nolan worked with top physicists to create a realistic trip to distant solar systems.
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NASA's NuSTAR Telescope Discovers Shockingly Bright Dead Star
October 8th, 2014
Astronomers have found a pulsating, dead star beaming with the energy of about 10 million suns. This is the brightest pulsar - a dense stellar remnant left over from a supernova explosion - ever recorded. The discovery was made with NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR.
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NASA Holds Teleconference on NuSTAR Discovery
October 6th, 2014
NASA will host a news teleconference at 10 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. EDT) Wednesday, Oct. 8, to announce new findings from its Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) mission. The results describe an unusual source of X-rays that will leave theorists scratching their heads, but also will help astronomers learn more about how black holes and galaxies are formed.
News Release
Pulse of a Dead Star Powers Intense Gamma Rays
September 16th, 2014
When the most massive stars explode as supernovas, they don't fade into the night, but sometimes glow ferociously with high-energy gamma rays. What powers these energetic stellar remains?
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Science Friday Podcast | Unraveling the Mysteries of Black Holes
August 29th, 2014
Peering into supermassive black holes and picking through the remains of exploded stars is among the detective work the NuSTAR telescope performs. Launched in June 2012, the comparatively small telescope uses high energy x-rays to penetrate dust and gas to get a clear look at some of the densest, hottest regions of the universe, says Fiona Harrison.
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NuSTAR Guest Observer Program announced
August 26th, 2014
Announcement of opportunity to propose for NuSTAR observations - cycle 1.
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NASA's NuSTAR Sees Rare Blurring of Black Hole Light
August 12th, 2014
NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) has captured an extreme and rare event in the regions immediately surrounding a supermassive black hole. A compact source of X-rays that sits near the black hole, called the corona, has moved closer to the black hole over a period of just days.
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NuSTAR team members attended the COSPAR conference in Moscow
August 7th, 2014
Special sessions on NuSTAR highlighted the results from the baseline mission.
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