Boston University

Space Sciences

Photograph of the constellation Taurus made by the avid astrophotographer Akira Fujii. In the photo, tiny white dots, stars, fill the image, with a brighter, reddish dot towards the bottom right, which is Taurus.

Space Science

Seeing through the Fog—Pinpointing Young Stars and Their Protoplanetary Disks

May 16, 2022

Image giving the first visual evidence of the presence of Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy, captured by the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) Collaboration. EHT Collaboration. In the image, a bright orange blob is seen, sort of resembling a donut, with three brighter yellow spots. The area around the orb is pitch black.

Black Holes

The First Black Hole Image from the Milky Way Is Here

May 13, 2022

Image of what a heliosphere might look like. Image shows a croissant-shaped light yellow blob, with red lines passing through it, all displayed on a black background

Space Physics

NASA Gives Boost to BU-led Effort to Model Solar System’s Protective Bubble

April 14, 2022

See intricate cloud patterns in the northern hemisphere of Jupiter in this new view taken by NASA's Juno spacecraft. The color-enhanced image was taken on April 1, 2018 at 2:32 a.m. PST (5:32 a.m. EST), as Juno performed its twelfth close flyby of Jupiter. At the time the image was taken, the spacecraft was about 7,659 miles (12,326 kilometers) from the tops of the clouds of the planet at a northern latitude of 50.2 degrees. Citizen scientist Kevin M. Gill processed this image using data from the JunoCam imager. https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA21984 . - Enhanced image by Kevin M. Gill (CC-BY) based on images provided courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS

NASA

Stunning Close-Up Images of Jupiter, Its Storms, and a Dolphin Cloud

January 27, 2022

a model of a heliosphere magnetic field. image shws a rainbow of colors winding and intersecting as if in water.

Astrophysics

Another Breakthrough for Team Studying Our Solar System’s Protective Bubble

December 3, 2021

BU engineers Brian Walsh and Emil Atz work on the Cusp Plasma Imaging Detector (CuPID) satellite which uses a new kind of optical technology to enable wide-field X-ray imaging of magnetic fields from inside a shoebox-size package.

SPACE SCIENCES

CuPID Satellite Will Take Widest Ever Images of Earth and Sun’s Magnetic Fields

September 27, 2021

A theoretical image depicting a young star, the yellow ball in the center, eating up gas and dust particles of a protoplanetary disk, which is represented by green material surrounding the bright star. Colored lines represent the direction of the magnetic field that connects the star to the protoplanetary disk—blue represents the magnetic field moving toward Earth, red is moving away, and other colors represent directions in between.

Astronomy

What Can a Young Star Teach Us about the Birth of Our Planet, Sun, and Solar System?

September 1, 2021

Supernova Shrapnel

Why Is This Weird, Metallic Star Hurtling Out of the Milky Way?

July 8, 2021

A photo of the LEXI telescope in front of a full moon. A video play button is overlayed.

Space Sciences

BU-Made Telescope Going to the Moon in 2023

April 12, 2021

A photo of a donut-shaped ring that serves as a racetrack for particles called muons

Physics

A Physics Breakthrough: More Evidence of New Particles or Forces

April 7, 2021

High-resolution rendered image of the Serpens South star cluster and the molecular cloud surrounding it.

Star Formation

Gazing into Magnetized Interstellar Clouds to Understand How Stars Are Born

September 1, 2020

A photo of a spiral galaxy

Astrophysics

Could the Distribution of Galaxies Reveal the Universe’s Invisible Web of Dark Matter?

June 4, 2020

A photo of an empty lab in BU’s Rajen Kilachand Center for Integrated Life Sciences & Engineering

Return to Campus Labs

BU Unveils First Phase of Campuswide Research Recovery Plan

May 6, 2020

An illustration of the heliosphere

Space Physics

Reimagining Our Solar System’s Protective Bubble, the Heliosphere

March 16, 2020

A portrait photo of Merav Opher, a Boston University College of Arts & Sciences associate professor of astronomy.

Space Sciences

Visualizing the Heliosphere, Our Solar System’s Protective Bubble

February 21, 2020

The first direct visual evidence of the supermassive black hole in the center of Messier 87 (M87) and its shadow. The shadow of the black hole seen here is the closest we can come to an image of the black hole itself, a completely dark object from which light cannot escape

Research that Rocks

12 Breakthroughs That Wowed Us in 2019

December 19, 2019

View from behind the International Space Station with the planet Earth on the horizon.

Chemistry

Out-of-This-World Chemistry

October 23, 2019

Scientific illustration showing Earth's magnetic field deflecting solar winds from the sun.

Accolades

Meet BU’s Six CAREER Award Recipients

October 22, 2019

Brian Walsh of the Boston University Center for Space Physics works on the LEXI x-ray imager in his lab

Space Sciences

A BU X-ray Instrument Is Heading to the Moon

July 2, 2019

satellite image of Boston, MA

Earth & Environment

Orbiting NASA Instrument to Examine Boston’s Carbon Emissions, Plant Life

May 6, 2019

Orbiting NASA Instrument to Examine Boston’s Carbon Emissions, Plant Life