magnetic fields
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Active Galaxies Demystified
Active galaxies are, without a doubt, absolutely spectacular. Though rare, they tell a critical part of the story of galaxies — and of the universe as a whole. And we’ve spent the last few posts exploring them in depth. But…
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How Supermassive Black Holes Work
We first took a peek at supermassive black holes back in our discussion of galaxies. But now that we’ve covered a few types of active galaxies, it’s time to take a deeper dive. Okay, I guess we won’t really be…
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Binary Neutron Stars
Way back when we spent a number of posts surveying the stars, we covered binary systems. These are star systems that contain multiple stars. Imagine if our sun had a companion, and two stars rose and set in our sky…
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How are Stars Born?
Astronomers have discovered that the clouds of gas and dust — the interstellar medium (ISM) — found between the stars are made of the same materials as the stars themselves. In fact, hydrogen is the most common element in both…
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The Secrets of Magnets
Welcome to my first “Science Answers” post! About a month ago, I sent out a post requesting science questions from all of you; you can find it here. This post addresses the first of the questions I was asked. If you…
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Solar Weather
When you hear the word “weather,” you probably think of clouds and lightning bolts and rainstorms. Maybe, if you live in particularly high elevation or latitude, you think snowstorms or even blizzards. We humans are used to these weather patterns.…
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The Sun’s Magnetic Show
Do you recognize the name Galileo Galilei? Galileo was the classical astronomer who made the drawing above. I have little idea what his writing actually says — it’s in Latin — but it’s clear enough what this early diagram is…
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Spots on the Sun
Have you ever looked at the sun, and seen something like this? Now, before you decide to look at it right now and see what you see, it’s my responsibility as an amateur astronomer to remind you of the safety…
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Our Sun: The Corona
When we observe our sun’s corona, we discover something odd. It’s really, really hot. But…wait a second. How is that odd? Shouldn’t the sun be hot? Well…yes. It should, and it is. Its surface temperature is almost ten thousand degrees…
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Cosmic Rays
Cosmic rays remain, for the most part, a cosmic mystery. But then, what about the universe doesn’t still remain partially shrouded in mystery? Cosmic rays are radiation, but they’re not electromagnetic. That is, they’re not on the electromagnetic spectrum. So,…
