Boston University

Astronomy

NASA astronaut Bob Hines (ENG’97) demonstrated space acrobatics with the help of fellow astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti during a live downlink from the International Space Station to the George Sherman Union’s Metcalf Ballroom on Wednesday.

Alumni

Live from Space, BU Alum and Astronaut Bob Hines Talks Gravity, Lasagna, NASA Careers

July 20, 2022

Image: Photo of the Carina Nebula. Image looks like craggy mountains on a moonlit evening with an ombre black to blue "sky" filled with stars and a cloud of orange-y red haze/cloud.

Astronomy

“A New Era of Discovery”: We Can Now See the Deepest Infrared View of Space Ever

July 13, 2022

A student peers through a telescope at the Boston University Coit Observatory.

Things-to-do

Spend a Free Night Stargazing at the Coit Observatory

July 4, 2022

An illustration by Sky & Telescope that depicts where certain planets will be in the sky on June 24th

Space

Want to See Five Planets with Your Naked Eye This Week?

June 21, 2022

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

Natural Sciences

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

Listen Now

With Space Tourism a Reality, Will Civilians Travel to Space? And When?

September 16, 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

Space

Janet Petro Is First Woman to Lead NASA’s Kennedy Space Center

July 16, 2021

Supernova Shrapnel

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

July 8, 2021

Black and white image from video provided by the Department of Defense labelled Gimbal, from 2015, an unexplained object is seen at center as it is tracked as it soars high along the clouds, traveling against the wind. Numbers in white are seen around the edge of the image.

unidentified objects

Are UFOs Visitors from Space? Government Report Won’t Rule It Out

June 11, 2021

Gif of the helicopter recently flown on Mars by NASA. The small, drone-like option is surrounded by red dirt and rocks as its propellors spin.

Rhetoric

Manned Missions. Conquering Space. The Problem with Space Lingo

April 26, 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

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

The rocket carrying mini-sensors developed by BU students on the launch pad in New Zealand before liftoff

Space

University’s Student-Built Satellites Blast into Space after Years of Delays

June 17, 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

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