Northrop Grumman's Cygnus cargo spacecraft blasting off atop an Antares rocket (Image NASA TV)

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A little while ago Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft blasted off atop an Antares rocket from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS), part of NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility (WFF) on Wallops Island. After about nine minutes it successfully separated from the rocket’s last stage went en route to its destination. This is its 12th official mission, called NG-12 or CRS NG-12, to transport supplies to the International Space Station for NASA.

A possible low-mass black hole discovered

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An article published in the journal “Science” reports the discovery of what could be the lowest-mass known black hole, perhaps even the first of a new class of black holes. A team of researchers led by Professor Todd Thompson of Ohio State University used data from APOGEE (Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment) to discover a binary system that includes an invisible object that could be a black hole. If instead it were a neutron star it would be by far the most massive known, far beyond the theoretical highest limit before the collapse of such an object into a black hole.

Artist's concept of exoplanet near its star (Image ESA)

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An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports the study of exoplanets that orbit two red giant stars: HD 212771 and HD 203949. A team of researchers led by Tiago Campante of the Instituto de Astrofísica and Ciências do Espaço (IA) of the University of Lisbon, Portugal, applied the astrosismology technique to observations conducted with NASA’s TESS space telescope. The result was surprising in the case of the HD 203949 system because the planet wasn’t swallowed by the star during its expansion even though it orbited very close to it.

Asteroid Hygiea is spherical and could be reclassified as a dwarf planet

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An article published in the journal “Nature Astronomy” reports a study of asteroid Hygiea that shows its roughly spherical shape, one of the requirements to be cataloged as a dwarf planet. A team of researchers led by Pierre Vernazza of the Laboratoire d’Astrophysique of Marseille, France, used the SPHERE instrument mounted on ESO’s VLT in Chile to obtain detailed images of one of the largest objects in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. If Hygiea were reclassified, it would be the smallest dwarf planet with a diameter that is less than half that of Ceres.

A map of the four galaxy clusters merging in Abell 1758

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An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports a study on Abell 1758, a quadruple galaxy cluster formed by two pairs that are in different merger phases. A team of researchers used NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes to map this gigantic group of galaxies. Each pair is made up of hundreds of galaxies embedded in enormous amounts of hot gas and invisible dark matter. These accurate observations will help to better assess how long it will take for mergers to occur in the two pairs of clusters, which in the future will in turn merge to form a super cluster that will be one of the most massive objects in the universe.