Galaxy meger NGC 520. Credit: NASA, ESA, the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration, and B. Whitmore (STScI The diversity in galaxy mergers is amazing, and entire careers and catalogs have been dedicated to systems. A favorite pastime for many merger modelers has been trying to figure out what our own galaxy and the Andromeda galaxy will look like as they merge, and trying to figure out which of the mergers we see we might look the most like. Except, new research, led by Till Sawala finds that the Milky Way and Andromeda may not be destined to become Milkdromeda after all....

Comparison of Hubble and Webb views of a Cepheid variable star. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, A. Riess (JHU/STScI) Understanding our universe isn’t a straightforward process. For every theory that appears to be beautifully proven out by data, there is another theory...

Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC; Lucy Reading-Ikkanda/Simons Foundation; K. Storey-Fisher et al. 2024 In trying to understand our universe, theorists can build models that describe how the universe formed as a mostly, but not completely, smooth distribution of matter and energy...

Part of the simulated universe. Credit: The AGORA Collaboration In a paper that made me do math, researchers have shared the results of a remarkable new suite of simulations that explore how galaxies are born, live, and evolve. Over 160 researchers from 60...

False-colour JWST image of a small fraction of the GOODS South field, with JADES-GS-z7-01-QU highlighted. Credit: JADES Collaboration In a paper in Nature, with Tobias Looser as the first author, researchers discuss a galaxy cataloged as JADES-GS-z7-01-QU. This...