Astronomers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have discovered water molecules inside the enormous envelope of gas and dust surrounding IRS 3, an aging star located remarkably close to the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way. The finding challenges the long-held assumption that the intense radiation and gravitational turbulence around Sagittarius A, commonly known as Sgr A, would prevent molecules from surviving in such a hostile environment.

IRS 3 lies about 0.6 light-years from Sgr A*, a distance equivalent to roughly 42,000 times the separation between Earth and the Sun. In everyday terms, that is an immense distance. On the scale of the Galactic Centre, however, it places the star in the immediate neighbourhood of a black hole containing approximately four million times the mass of the Sun. The region is crowded with stars, powerful magnetic fields, energetic particles and rapidly changing radiation, making IRS 3 an exceptional natural laboratory for studying how stars evolve under extreme conditions.

The observations were conducted with the Mid-Infrared Instrument, or MIRI, aboard the James Webb Space Telescope. Mid-infrared light is particularly useful for investigating cool dust and molecules that absorb and re-emit radiation at characteristic wavelengths. By analysing the infrared spectrum of IRS 3, researchers led by PD Dr Florian Peißker of the University of Cologne identified the chemical and physical properties of the material surrounding the star with far greater detail than previous observations allowed.

What makes IRS 3 especially striking is the scale of its circumstellar envelope. The structure extends to a radius of approximately 10,000 astronomical units, where one astronomical unit is the average distance between Earth and the Sun. Such envelopes are common around mature, evolved stars, but IRS 3 appears to be unusually isolated in the immediate vicinity of Sgr A*. Its enormous shell of material therefore stands out against a dense background containing millions of other stars.

The new observations indicate that IRS 3 is undergoing a phase known as a superwind. This is a brief but dramatic stage in the late evolution of certain stars, particularly asymptotic giant branch stars. During this phase, powerful stellar winds carry gas and newly formed dust away from the star at extremely high rates. Over periods of only a few centuries, the star can lose a substantial fraction of its outer layers, transforming its surroundings into a thick, expanding envelope that will eventually disperse into interstellar space.

According to the research team, IRS 3 is losing material at a rate equivalent to the mass of Earth every 18 days. Although the comparison makes the scale easier to imagine, the total outflow is far more significant when considered over astronomical timescales. The steady loss of gas and dust explains why the envelope is both unusually large and dense. It also provides the raw material in which molecules can form, shielded within cooler regions of the expanding stellar outflow.

The detection of water is the most surprising aspect of the study. Near Sgr A*, ultraviolet radiation, X-rays and high-energy particles are expected to break apart fragile molecules. Water molecules can be destroyed when energetic photons dissociate them into their constituent atoms, particularly in exposed regions close to powerful sources of radiation. Yet the MIRI observations show that water exists within the envelope of IRS 3, suggesting that the dense outflow from the star creates protected pockets where molecular chemistry can proceed.

This discovery does not mean that the Galactic Centre is a calm or hospitable environment. Instead, it demonstrates that stellar mass loss can temporarily create its own chemical refuge. The material expelled by IRS 3 increases the density of gas and dust around the star, allowing some regions of the envelope to absorb damaging radiation. Within these shielded zones, atoms can combine on dust grains or in the gas phase, producing molecules that would otherwise be rapidly destroyed. The finding offers a new view of how evolved stars may enrich even the most violent regions of a galaxy.

The researchers say that IRS 3 may be actively supplying the area around Sgr A* with elements and molecules that later become part of the broader interstellar medium. Water itself is not evidence of life, but it is a crucial ingredient in planetary formation and a central component of the chemistry that precedes biology. As the envelope expands, some of its contents will eventually mix with surrounding gas, potentially influencing the composition of future stars, planets and smaller bodies formed in the Galactic Centre.

The study, published in Astronomy & Astrophysics, also highlights the scientific value of observing the Milky Way’s centre at infrared wavelengths. Visible light is heavily obscured by dust along the line of sight, while infrared radiation can pass through much of that material and reveal otherwise hidden structures. Future observations with METIS, a next-generation mid-infrared instrument being developed for the Extremely Large Telescope in Chile, could provide sharper views of IRS 3’s envelope, measure its winds in greater detail and determine how its molecular content changes over time. For now, the star’s unexpected water-rich cocoon is offering astronomers a rare glimpse of stellar chemistry unfolding beside one of the most extreme objects in the universe.

Subject of Research: Not applicable

Article Title: Dust production in the harsh environment of Sgr A* – MIRI/JWST observation of the O-rich asymptotic giant branch star IRS 3

News Publication Date: 11-Aug-2026

Web References: https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202660243

References: Astronomy & Astrophysics

Image Credits: ESO/F. Peissker

Keywords

James Webb Space Telescope, JWST, MIRI, IRS 3, Sagittarius A, Sgr A, Milky Way, Galactic Centre, water molecules, superwind, asymptotic giant branch star, stellar evolution, circumstellar envelope, dust production, black hole, infrared astronomy, Extremely Large Telescope

SpaceX has formally asked US regulators for permission to operate as many as one million AI data-center satellites. That number is real. It is also an upper limit in an application, not an approved fleet, a launch schedule or evidence that one million spacecraft will actually be built.

If the full Starmind system ever existed, its direct waste heat would be too small to become a major global climate driver. The harder environmental question lies in the industrial cycle required to create and replace it: manufacturing enormous amounts of hardware, launching it through the atmosphere and eventually vaporizing much of it during re-entry.

Climate models have only begun to study satellite constellations measured in tens of thousands. A million large computing satellites would sit far beyond the scale directly tested in that literature.

The FCC has accepted an application, not approved a million launches

SpaceX filed its application on January 30, 2026. The Federal Communications Commission accepted it for public comment on February 4.

The filing seeks authority for a non-geostationary system of up to one million satellites between 500 and 2,000 kilometers altitude. The spacecraft would exchange data through optical links and connect with SpaceX’s Starlink network.

Accepting an application for filing is an administrative step. It does not mean the FCC has determined that the architecture is safe, environmentally acceptable or technically achievable. The public notice also says SpaceX plans different hardware versions across multiple orbital shells, so “one million satellites” does not describe one fixed design.

SpaceX has since presented its first AI1 design for the Starmind system. The company’s published specifications give it a 120-kilowatt average compute load, a 150-kilowatt peak and a deployed wingspan of 70 meters.

The computers’ direct heat is not the main climate problem

Computers turn almost all the electricity they use into heat. In orbit, that heat cannot leave through air or cooling water because neither is available. Large radiator surfaces must emit it as infrared radiation.

One million AI1 satellites operating at the advertised average would use about 120 gigawatts for computing. To put a strict upper bound on the direct climate effect, imagine that every watt of that heat somehow reached and was absorbed by Earth. Spread over the planet’s surface, it would average roughly 0.00024 watts per square meter.

That artificial scenario overstates the real effect because radiators can direct most thermal radiation toward deep space. Even so, its value is more than 10,000 times smaller than the IPCC’s estimate of 2.72 watts per square meter for total human-caused effective radiative forcing between 1750 and 2019.

The fleet would therefore not warm Earth simply by running hot computers overhead. Reflected sunlight, radiator orientation and the design of vast solar arrays would still need assessment, but direct compute heat is not the dominant global term.

Space solar power could avoid some terrestrial emissions

SpaceX argues that sun-synchronous satellites could collect solar energy without clouds or night-time interruptions and reject heat without chillers, cooling towers or fans. If orbital computing genuinely replaced electricity from fossil-fueled grids, it could avoid some power-sector carbon emissions and water consumption.

That benefit cannot be calculated from the one-million figure. A fair comparison would need the energy and materials used to manufacture satellites and rockets, propellant production, launch emissions, ground stations, replacement rates, failed spacecraft and the carbon intensity of the terrestrial data centers displaced.

No published life-cycle assessment yet covers SpaceX’s proposed full system. “Powered by solar energy” describes operation in orbit, not the environmental balance of building and continually replenishing the fleet.

Rocket exhaust is unusually effective high in the atmosphere

Rocket emissions are small beside global aviation, shipping or power generation by mass. Their location makes them different. Rockets inject black carbon, water vapor, nitrogen compounds, alumina and other products directly into atmospheric layers that surface pollution rarely reaches.

Black carbon absorbs sunlight and warms the surrounding stratosphere, changing atmospheric circulation and ozone chemistry. A NOAA modeling study found that a tenfold increase in hydrocarbon-rocket soot could warm parts of the stratosphere by 0.5 to 2 degrees Celsius and alter circulation. The authors stressed that soot emissions from different engines remain poorly measured.

A newer 2026 study in Earth’s Future modeled launch and re-entry emissions from the recent megaconstellation era through 2029. It found a global stratospherically adjusted forcing of about -0.0064 watts per square meter from all space missions in its scenario, with megaconstellations contributing 42 percent.

That modeled forcing is small compared with the present greenhouse-gas-driven climate imbalance, and its negative sign represents a slight cooling influence after the stratosphere adjusts. It is not necessarily good news. The same soot warms the stratosphere, changes circulation and can affect ozone. It is better understood as an uncontrolled atmospheric perturbation than as useful climate cooling.

The result also cannot be multiplied mechanically from thousands of satellites to one million. Starmind would use different spacecraft, potentially different launch vehicles and an unknown deployment cadence.

Re-entry would turn satellite material into atmospheric aerosol

Low-Earth-orbit constellations require replacement. Hardware fails, components age and atmospheric drag eventually brings spacecraft down. A million-satellite fleet with a five-year average life would imply 200,000 replacements and re-entries every year. SpaceX has not established that lifetime for the full system, but the example shows why lifespan matters as much as fleet size.

Re-entering spacecraft do not simply disappear. Heating vaporizes metals and creates particles and gases in the upper atmosphere. A 2024 global emissions inventory identified aluminum oxide as the dominant modeled metal oxide from satellites that ablate, alongside nitrogen oxides produced by high-temperature re-entry.

A 2025 atmospheric modeling study tested a scenario with 10,000 metric tons of re-entry alumina per year, a level associated with forecasts of roughly 60,000 satellites. Depending on particle size and re-entry latitude, the model produced regional temperature anomalies reaching about 1.5 degrees in the middle atmosphere and changes to polar-vortex winds.

That is not a prediction of 1.5 degrees of global surface warming. It is a modeled regional response high in the atmosphere, with large uncertainty about particle size, composition and transport. Scaling to Starmind requires basic information that is not public, especially spacecraft mass, material composition, operational life and disposal pattern.

A million is a different environmental regime

Space Daily has already examined how large Starmind spacecraft could affect ground-based astronomy. Climate and atmospheric chemistry pose a separate problem: pollution can accumulate even when each individual launch or re-entry looks small.

The most honest answer is therefore split. Direct waste heat from the orbital computers would be negligible at the global climate scale. Moving computing away from terrestrial grids might avoid emissions, but that benefit has not been demonstrated through a full life-cycle study.

The serious unknown is the launch-and-replacement machine surrounding the constellation. Existing research already finds measurable, though currently small, radiative and ozone effects from today’s much smaller space industry. A fleet approaching one million satellites would turn an emerging source of upper-atmosphere pollution into a planetary experiment without a validated model of the outcome.

The post SpaceX has asked to operate up to one million AI satellites, but their direct waste heat would barely affect global temperature; the larger climate question is what launches and mass re-entry would put into the upper atmosphere appeared first on Space Daily.

Looks like an entire orbital launchpad could be hitched to a semi-truck and driven anywhere on Earth, thanks to space launch provider Rocket Lab. 

The company has unveiled GHOST, which is short for Global Hypersonic and Orbital Spaceport Technology. GHOST is a deployable, containerized launch infrastructure designed to fire rockets into orbit or suborbital trajectories from nearly anywhere on Earth. 

It is like a spaceflight in a box. GHOST houses everything required to execute a flight campaign: the rockets themselves, ground support equipment, launch pads, and complete range control systems. 

With this technology, Rocket Lab aims to make launch operations fully portable, especially for national security and international space defense.

Furthermore, GHOST’s primary advantage is its ability to support both Electron orbital rockets and HASTE hypersonic test vehicles using a single shared ground infrastructure. 

“We’ve been leading the field in small launch for missile defense and national security for years. Our reliability, repeatability, and affordability sets us apart from everybody else, and creating GHOST is about packaging that up into a deployable system that can serve the world’s most important programs from wherever those missions need,” said Sir Peter Beck, founder and CEO of Rocket Lab. 

Dual mission profiles

Rocket Lab depends on two primary vehicles: Electron, its 59-foot workhorse launcher with 83 missions under its belt since debuting in 2017. It is the second most frequently launched US rocket annually after SpaceX’s Falcon 9.

And HASTE (Hypersonic Accelerator Suborbital Test Electron) is a suborbital derivative designed for testing hypersonic flight technologies. First launched in June 2023, HASTE has flown nine times to date, offering customers dedicated testing environments alongside Electron’s small-satellite orbital rides.

This new containerized setup supports dual-vehicle launches out of a single system. As a result, defense partners and international allies can rapidly establish independent launch points while completely overcoming the high costs of fixed concrete infrastructure.

“Whether it’s for missile defense and deterrence, or opening up more trajectories, orbital missions, and sovereign launch capabilities in allied nations, GHOST is the answer to launching anywhere, anytime, and without compromise,” Beck added. 

GHOST: Launch-anywhere capability

Rocket Lab will debut its containerized GHOST system in 2027 with a suborbital launch from its newly established Launch Complex 4 at Alaska’s Pacific Spaceport Complex. 

Featuring two pads built for high-frequency flight campaigns, this addition brings Rocket Lab’s global network to six operational pads across two hemispheres, expanding beyond its active sites in New Zealand (LC-1) and Virginia (LC-2 and LC-3).

Rocket Lab has expanded its Virginia facility with a second launch pad to support Neutron, its upcoming medium-lift rocket designed to be larger, more powerful, and partially reusable — similar to SpaceX’s Falcon 9.

Although Neutron‘s maiden flight slipped past its original 2024 target, developmental delays are typical for new launch vehicles, and the company continues to make steady progress toward its operational debut.

Earlier this year, Rocket Lab secured its largest launch agreement to date through a $190 million Department of Defense contract for 20 flights of its suborbital HASTE rocket.

Serving as the core testbed for the DOD and Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division, HASTE allows defense agencies to evaluate payloads and maneuverable hardware at Mach 5+ speeds. This high-cadence testing pipeline directly supports the U.S. military’s drive to accelerate its capabilities in hypersonic technology and defense systems against fast, low-altitude aerial threats.

National security space strategy is shifting fast. Fixed launch pads are stationary targets. Through compact, modular launch systems, GHOST could bring mobility-driven deterrence to space defense, allowing swift, on-demand launches directly from allied lands.

💾

The price of saving a newborn’s life can extend far beyond the hospital walls. A new analysis published in the Journal of Perinatology is drawing attention to a largely invisible consequence of neonatal intensive care: the direct medical out-of-pocket costs paid by families. The study, led by researchers Gorka, Profit and Phibbs, examines who carries the greatest financial burden during a neonatal intensive care unit admission and investigates how structural conditions may shape those costs.

Neonatal intensive care is among the most technologically advanced forms of medicine. Infants in NICUs may require mechanical ventilation, incubators that regulate temperature and humidity, continuous heart and oxygen monitoring, intravenous nutrition, specialized medications and repeated laboratory testing. These interventions can be lifesaving, particularly for babies born extremely prematurely or with serious medical complications. Yet the financial consequences of receiving this care are not experienced equally by every household, even when families receive treatment in the same health-care system.

The researchers’ focus is direct medical out-of-pocket spending: the money families must pay themselves for medical services connected to a NICU admission. This can include deductibles, copayments, coinsurance and other forms of cost sharing that remain after insurance has paid its portion. Unlike the total hospital charge or the amount reimbursed by an insurer, out-of-pocket cost reflects the portion that reaches a family’s own budget. For households already coping with an unexpected high-risk birth, even relatively small individual charges can accumulate rapidly.

The study is designed not only to document these expenses, but also to explore the structural forces behind differences in cost burden. In health economics, structural contributions refer to the way institutions and systems distribute risk and resources. Insurance design, employment-linked coverage, household income, geographic location, hospital characteristics and access to public assistance can all affect how much a family ultimately pays. Two infants with similar clinical needs may therefore generate very different financial experiences for their parents, depending on the architecture of coverage surrounding them.

That distinction matters because the effects of a NICU admission are not limited to the newborn’s medical condition. Parents may need to travel long distances to reach a specialized hospital, arrange accommodation near the facility, pay for transportation or meals, and take unpaid leave from work. These expenses may not always appear in estimates of direct medical out-of-pocket costs, but they can intensify the economic shock associated with a prolonged admission. The medical bill is only one component of the broader financial strain that can accompany neonatal illness.

A central question raised by the analysis is whether the families with the fewest financial resources are also the ones most exposed to high cost sharing. A payment that is manageable for a high-income household may consume a substantial share of a lower-income family’s monthly budget. Economists often describe this pattern as a disproportionate cost burden: the absolute amount paid may not be the highest, yet the payment represents a greater fraction of household resources. This distinction can reveal inequities that remain hidden when researchers look only at average dollar amounts.

The findings are expected to be relevant to health-policy debates about medical debt, insurance protection and the financial consequences of premature birth. If structural factors account for meaningful differences in family payments, reducing inequality may require more than improving clinical care. Potential responses could include limits on neonatal cost sharing, stronger protections against unexpected bills, expanded eligibility for public coverage and assistance with transportation or family support services. The analysis may also help hospitals and policymakers identify families at risk of financial hardship while an infant is still receiving care.

The issue has significance beyond individual hospitalizations because NICU care can influence a family’s financial stability long after discharge. Parents may face follow-up appointments, medications, developmental assessments and specialist care for children who experienced complications of prematurity or serious illness. Medical expenses can overlap with reduced work hours, job loss or the need for one parent to become a full-time caregiver. A short period of intensive treatment can therefore produce a long economic aftershock, particularly when families lack savings or paid leave.

By placing family payments at the center of neonatal research, Gorka, Profit and Phibbs emphasize a dimension of NICU care that is often absent from clinical success measures. Survival, complications and length of stay remain essential indicators, but they do not fully describe the experience of families navigating intensive care. Understanding who pays the most, why they pay it and how those payments relate to broader social structures could help redefine quality in neonatal medicine. The study’s message is potentially viral because it connects cutting-edge life-saving technology with a simple but consequential question: when medicine saves a baby, how much of the cost is left for the family to survive?

Subject of Research: Direct medical out-of-pocket costs of neonatal intensive care admissions and structural factors contributing to differences in financial burden among NICU families.

Article Title: Who pays the most for neonatal intensive care? An analysis of the out-of-pocket cost burden borne by NICU families

Article References: Gorka, N., Profit, J. & Phibbs, C.S. “Who pays the most for neonatal intensive care? An analysis of the out-of-pocket cost burden borne by NICU families.” Journal of Perinatology (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41372-026-02869-6

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1038/s41372-026-02869-6

Keywords: neonatal intensive care, NICU, out-of-pocket costs, medical expenses, health-care inequality, premature birth, financial burden, insurance, neonatal health, health policy

Astronomers have released the largest-ever 2D color map of the universe. The 5.6-trillion-pixel image contains nearly 4 billion celestial objects, assembled from more than 263,000 telescope exposures taken over 2,285 nights. The release comes from the DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys, led by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The data is publicly available through the Legacy Survey Sky Viewer, where anyone can explore the full map.

The map is not a single photograph. It is a composite of images from multiple telescopes, including the 570-megapixel Dark Energy Camera at Cerro Tololo in Chile and the Mayall 4-meter Telescope at Kitt Peak in Arizona. Each image was taken under different atmospheric and telescope conditions. Merging those images required about a year of software development. The actual processing took eight weeks on the Perlmutter supercomputer at the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center in Berkeley.

A deep photo, not a distance map

A 2D sky map and a 3D map of the universe serve fundamentally different purposes. The 2D map is essentially a deep photograph. It records where galaxies and stars appear on the sky and how bright they are, across visible and near-infrared wavelengths. The 3D survey is DESI’s primary scientific mission. It adds the third dimension by measuring spectra from individual objects to determine their redshifts and therefore their distances from Earth. Before DESI can measure a galaxy’s distance, it must know the galaxy exists, and the 2D Legacy Surveys map is how it finds them.

The new map has been guiding DESI’s target selection since June 2026. Its release follows DESI completing its original five-year 3D survey in April, ahead of schedule. The instrument captured 47 million galaxies and quasars when the original target was 34 million, plus more than 20 million nearby stars.

DESI outran its own target list

The expansion of the 2D map was driven by a practical problem of success. DESI performed so efficiently that astronomers working on the project became concerned they would exhaust their pool of available targets. “It became clear we might run out of galaxies to look at and run out of sky, and we better start doing something about that,” said David Schlegel of Berkeley Lab, who works on both DESI and the Legacy Surveys.

Expanding the target catalog required expanding the 2D imaging survey it is built on, which produced the record-setting 5.6-trillion-pixel map now publicly available. With DESI continuing observations through 2028, the new catalog will support the instrument’s extended mission.

What the 3D survey has already found

The larger purpose of both the 2D and 3D maps is the study of dark energy, the unknown force that makes up roughly 70 percent of the universe and drives its accelerating expansion. DESI’s early results have produced one of the most consequential hints in modern cosmology: that dark energy may not be constant but weakening over time. If confirmed, that finding would require a fundamental revision of cosmology’s standard model.

The Legacy Surveys map is also being made available as a foundational reference for the next generation of astronomical instruments. This extends its scientific life well beyond DESI’s own mission. Astronomers and citizen scientists can access the Sky Viewer and search for rare phenomena across the nearly four billion objects now catalogued in visible form.

The world’s largest solar telescope and advanced computer simulations revealed vortices that are reshaping our understanding of the Sun. Across the Sun’s visible surface, hot plasma is constantly rising, cooling, and sinking. At the edges of these churning regions, researchers have now resolved tiny swirling structures that may help explain how the Sun twists, stores, [...]

Researchers used New Horizons images to identify evidence that liquid nitrogen may have flowed from beneath Pluto’s famous heart-shaped glacier. Dark markings across part of Pluto’s enormous heart-shaped glacier may record something unexpected beneath its frozen surface: liquid nitrogen moving upward and briefly flowing across the ice. Using observations from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, researchers [...]

A rare total solar eclipse will sweep across parts of Europe on August 12, 2026, briefly turning daylight into darkness as the Moon completely covers the Sun. Europe is about to experience a total solar eclipse, and people around the world will be able to watch it live. The European Space Agency (ESA) will begin [...]

LOS ANGELES, August 11th, 2026. Proteus Space, an AI-native aerospace company delivering rapid, end-to-end access to space, today announced that retired U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Kimberly “Kim” Crider has […]

The post Proteus Space Names Maj. Gen. Kim Crider (USAF, Ret.) to Board of Directors appeared first on SpaceNews.

Last month, the Federal Communications Commission approved an experimental and controversial new satellite being developed by venture Reflect Orbital to reflect sunlight down onto the Earth to illuminate patches of it at night for paying customers.

The purported goal is to allow solar farms to continue generating electricity even after nightfall and provide illumination during emergencies. Those may sound like noble ideas on the surface, but the concept comes with major downsides as well.

One is that such bright satellites could easily wreck deep space observations. Astronomers were appalled at the news, with the FCC receiving nearly nearly 2,000 public comments criticizing the proposal, as Wired reported at the time.

And it’s not just professional astronomers that could be affected, as experts told The Verge. Amateur astronomers gazing up at the prototype mirror satellite, dubbed Eärendil-1 — continuing Silicon Valley’s obsession with borrowing names from JRR Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” — could easily be blinded. Even looking through a 12-inch telescope, a common type used by enthusiasts, could result in permanent eye damage.

It’s a considerable risk to human health that makes the FCC’s approval “extraordinary,” as Royal Astronomical Society deputy executive director Robert Massey told The Verge.

It’s a risk experts have known for decades now. Case in point, observing a similar proposed Russian prototype, dubbed Znamya, could cause damage equivalent to staring at the Sun around a total eclipse, according to a 2000 research article by the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. (Russia launched two experimental Znamya space mirror satellites in the 1990s, but later abandoned the program.)

Critics of the FCC’s approval of Reflect Orbital’s plans pointed out the risk of eye damage to the regulator, which wound up being deemed irrelevant and too “small” of a factor compared to the “benefits of permitting American companies to test innovative technology in space.”

As The Verge points out, astronomers won’t even be warned of when and where the mirror satellite will be in the night sky, which could result in them gazing at it inadvertently.

Reflect Orbital spokesperson Christopher Buscombe told the publication that the company is in active talks with “scientists, astronomers, environmental researchers and other stakeholders” and that it will use its initial demonstration satellite to test out built-in safeguards.

The Air Line Pilots Association has also raised concerns over Reflect Orbital’s inadequate approach to air safety. The satellites could also disrupt sleep and the circadian rhythms migratory species.

“The proposed scale of orbital deployment would represent a significant alteration of the natural night-time light environment at a planetary scale,” the presidents of several international chronobiology assocaitions said in a joint statement quoted by The Guardian.

Buscombe told The Verge that the company would limit the amount of light being reflected and calibrate brightness to “levels humans and animals already tolerate.” But experts warn there are far too many variables that the company won’t be able to control for, from light scattering in the atmosphere to interactions with clouds.

Satellites in general are an increasingly controversial topic. The number of spacecraft in low Earth has exploded over the past decade, and many are being delivered at lower altitudes that make them appear even brighter.

“The stars above us are a valued part of human heritage – deploying more than one million exceptionally bright satellites would utterly destroy this and permanently scar the natural landscape,” Massey told The Verge.

More on the satellites: Astronomers Horrified by Enormous Mirror Satellite That Reflects Sunlight Back Down to Earth at Night

The post Scientists Warn That New Satellites Could Cause Eye Damage for People on the Ground appeared first on Futurism.

European scientists are taking advantage of this week’s solar eclipse to test a potentially groundbreaking instrument that could transform the way astronomers study the Sun.

For weeks, a team from the Astrophysical Observatory of Turin has been stationed at Spain’s Javalambre Astrophysical Observatory, preparing to deploy a novel spectrometer ahead of the August 12 eclipse.

On that date, researchers will activate the Circular Slit Spectrometer (CISS), which the Turin-based team says will provide a unique new view of our life-giving star. Specifically, the device will focus on the corona, the outermost portions of the Solar atmosphere, and the hottest part of the Sun.

The 2026 Solar Eclipse: A Trio of Occurrences

This month, skywatchers will be treated to a trio of celestial events: a solar eclipse and the peak of the Perseids meteor shower on August 12, followed by a lunar eclipse between August 27 and 28. The total solar eclipse will be best viewed from parts of Spain, Portugal, Russia, Iceland, and Greenland, while observers across much of Europe, Africa, and North America will experience only a partial eclipse.

To take advantage of the event, the research team traveled from its home base in Padua, northern Italy, to Spain, where years of development work will culminate in the first field test of CISS. The scientists believe the new instrument could significantly improve observations of the Sun’s corona.

Opportunities Arise During the European Eclipse

Spectrometers are among astronomers’ most valuable tools, allowing researchers to analyze the composition of stars and even detect the atmospheres of distant exoplanets by examining subtle changes in starlight.

Closer to home, the Italian team believes CISS can separate the wavelengths of sunlight far more rapidly than existing instruments. That capability could prove especially valuable because the corona drives powerful space weather events capable of disrupting communications, power grids, and GPS systems on Earth and in orbit.

The researchers see the eclipse as the ideal opportunity to test their instrument, since the Moon’s passage in front of the Sun dramatically increases the contrast of the corona against the sky. For the team, the observation marks the culmination of more than two and a half years spent rethinking some of the fundamental design principles behind conventional spectrometers.

CISS: A Spectrometer Unlike Any Other

Unlike traditional spectrometers, which typically rely on a narrow rectangular slit, CISS uses a circular slit. This allows it to “capture the spectrum of the entire corona at a certain distance from the centre of the Sun in a single photograph,” according to principal investigator Federico Landini of the Astrophysical Observatory of Turin.

By redesigning the instrument’s aperture, the researchers say they have reduced the time needed to scan the corona from hours to just minutes. If successful, the eclipse demonstration could pave the way for incorporating the technology into future space missions designed to observe the Sun from closer vantage points.

For now, the team is focused on ensuring the best possible observing conditions. Researchers continue to monitor the weather, with current forecasts appearing favorable for eclipse viewing. To minimize the risk of equipment problems, the team transported CISS from Italy to Spain by van rather than by air, avoiding the need to disassemble the instrument and reducing the possibility of flight delays or cancellations.

Later this week, they will learn whether years of work have produced a breakthrough in solar observation—or simply the next step in refining a promising new technology.

Ryan Whalen covers science and technology for The Debrief. He holds an MA in History and a Master of Library and Information Science with a certificate in Data Science. He can be contacted at ryan@thedebrief.org.

Stunning new imagery of the distant celestial object NGC 2392, better known as the “Lion Nebula,” has been obtained by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope.

The cosmic vista captured by Webb reveals a colorful view of the ancient nebula, whose characteristic appearance resembles one of nature’s most respected apex predators, complete with a bushy-looking “mane” composed of hazy stellar gases and objects similar to comets.

The new high-resolution imagery offers one of the clearest and most detailed views of the Lion Nebula ever seen. Previous images captured by Webb’s predecessor, the Hubble Space Telescope, were obtained in 2000, featuring the same celestial feature in visible light.

With the added spectral ranges Webb’s Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam) and Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) can capture, the Lion Nebula now appears in colorful pinks and indigo hues, surrounded by distant galaxies blazing in brilliant orange from across vast cosmic distances, whose light has traveled billions of years to reach our Solar System.

A Lion Roars Across the Cosmos

A particularly striking feature about the new imagery is the way cosmic dust and regions of ionized gas are showcased in the new Webb imagery.

“It’s taken several thousand years for this collection of gas and dust to reach its current shape, and the nebula’s components continue to be altered,” read a portion of a statement released by the European Space Agency (ESA) that accompanied the new images.

One reason that helps account for the changing appearance of the Lion Nebula over time can be found at its center, where the remnants of a slowly dying white dwarf star (which effectively forms the nose in the lion’s face after which the nebula is named) continues to supercharge the surrounding cosmic structures made visible in the new Webb imagery.

The rest of the lion’s face is composed of an expanding bubble of ionized gas, the nature of which remains somewhat mysterious. Presently, astronomers are uncertain about what exact mechanisms give rise to the complex appearance of this gassy bubble and its internal structures, which are a recurring element in ancient nebulae such as this.

NGC 2392 isn’t the only celestial feature known as the “Lion Nebula.” An entirely separate diffuse nebula located in the Cepheus constellation, known as Sharpless 2-132, also shares this nickname due to its shape, which resembles a lion’s body seen from the side.

A Cosmic Visage Frozen in Time  

For now, the Lion Nebula is captured in the Webb imagery, which, despite its almost serene beauty, represents a highly active area of the cosmos, undergoing constant change as material is continually ripped away from the stellar central core.

Sometime in the next 10,000 years or so, this striking celestial feature will eventually be destroyed, once the white dwarf powering the nebula completely dies and the remnants of stellar material are completely dispersed into the surrounding space.

Until then, this remarkable cosmic feature will remain a target of study by astronomers, whose inquiries are helped significantly by the unprecedented clarity offered in the latest Webb images.

Additional information about the Lion Nebula (NGC 2392) can be found on NASA’s official page documenting the Webb MIRI imagery.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

One of China's most used rockets, the Long March 7A, exploded a little more than a minute after lifting off on Monday evening, local time.

The medium-lift rocket's payload was classified, but it was believed to be a military communications satellite. The rocket's liftoff from Wenchang Space Launch Site appeared to be nominal, but publicly captured videos (such as this one) showed that the rocket's first stage exploded about 1 minute and 20 seconds into flight.

The Long March 7A rocket was developed by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation and is operated by the state's space agency. As of Monday night in China, state officials have not commented on the explosion.

Read full article

Comments

© Li Zhenzhou/VCG via Getty Images

One of China's most used rockets, the Long March 7A, exploded a little more than a minute after lifting off on Monday evening, local time.

The medium-lift rocket's payload was classified, but it was believed to be a military communications satellite. The rocket's liftoff from Wenchang Space Launch Site appeared to be nominal, but publicly captured videos (such as this one) showed that the rocket's first stage exploded about 1 minute and 20 seconds into flight.

The Long March 7A rocket was developed by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation and is operated by the state's space agency. As of Monday night in China, state officials have not commented on the explosion.

Read full article

Comments

© Li Zhenzhou/VCG via Getty Images

An unusual dead star displaying one of the strongest magnetic fields astronomers have ever seen may offer the clearest evidence yet that regions of space appearing to be void of matter are anything but empty.

An international team of astronomers has revealed that the magnetar 1E 1547-5408 displays behavior consistent with vacuum birefringence, a phenomenon first predicted almost a century ago, but never directly observed—until now.

The findings, detailed in a new study published in the journal Nature, were the product of more than 140 hours of observations in 2025 using NASA’s Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE), the Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER), and Australia’s Murriyang radio telescope.

Spying on the Universe’s Most Extreme Objects

Ranking among the most extreme objects known to astronomers, magnetars are a variety of neutron stars that display unusually strong magnetic fields.

These extreme celestial objects pack more mass than our Sun into a region of space spanning only a few miles; yet they also manage to generate magnetic fields that are sometimes as much as trillions of times that of our planet.

For the recent study, scientists focused on 1E 1547-5408, a magnetar that spins once every two seconds. This magnetar is atypical since it also emits both intense X-rays and bright radio waves. Measuring the polarization of light it produces, researchers were able to discern that X-ray polarization was almost three times stronger than expected, based on current models that characterize the star’s surface, as well as the geometry of its magnetic field.

An Unusual Signal Emerges

The observed characteristics were unexpected, and to explain this, the researchers looked to the concept of vacuum birefringence, a phenomenon originally predicted in 1936. This predicts that magnetic fields possessing enough power could potentially alter the vacuum of space.

According to quantum theory, the vacuum of space isn’t truly empty—it is filled with fleeting “virtual” particles, and when subjected to the influence of such a strong magnetic field, the quantum vacuum is predicted to behave like an extremely large optical filter, whereby light that passes through it is subtly changed, with its polarization increasing.

Based on computer simulations, the researchers found that the proposed vacuum birefringence phenomenon produced results that appeared to be consistent with both the X-ray and radio observations.

Hoa Dinh Thi, a researcher at Rice University and the recent study’s co-lead author, said the team’s model “suggests that reproducing the observed X-ray polarization signatures, while also satisfying the constraints set by radio observations, requires the presence of vacuum birefringence in the neutron star’s environment.”

“This finding exemplifies how neutron stars enable us to test fundamental physics in environments not replicable in labs on Earth,” Thi added.

Although the team says further observations will be required to confirm their findings, their current results offer the strongest evidence to date for one of the longest-standing predictions in quantum physics.

If confirmed through future observations of magnetars, such findings could reveal the presence of other exotic phenomena that may provide astronomers with a unique opportunity to explore the fundamental nature of space itself—and potentially even more surprises in regions of the cosmos that were long assumed to be “empty.”

The recent study, “Vacuum birefringence and the polarized X-ray emission from a radio magnetar,” appeared in the journal Nature. 

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

More than 140 million miles away from Earth, a rare event recently occurred in the twilight skies above Mars, and it was all captured on camera by NASA’s Perseverance rover.

Imagery of a celestial alignment, featuring Earth as it briefly vanished behind the Martian moon Phobos, was revealed in composite photos captured by Perseverance’s Mastcam-Z instrument in early July as the intrepid rover embarked on its 1,907th Martian day, or sol, on the Red Planet.

The rover’s Mastcam-Z camera system, developed by Arizona State University in collaboration with Malin Space Science Systems, was built for capturing high-resolution panoramic zoom imagery of the Martian landscape. Although its main objectives involve its investigations of Jezero Crater and ancient geological features preserved there for eons, which may even include evidence of past microbial life, cases like the recent celestial alignment showcase how the rover’s cameras can also provide unique insights into astronomical events.

A Robot on Mars Captures an Occultation

Captured against fading twilight, our Earthly home appears as little more than a tiny, bright speck of light as it slowly passes behind the irregularly shaped Martian moon, in what astronomers refer to as an occultation.

NASA applied processing to the rare images, which helped to filter out some of the background light, revealing the brief celestial pairing in greater detail. The resulting imagery offers a glimpse of a dark backdrop that now better highlights the motion of Earth and Phobos in their treks through the Martian sky.

A Sunset Unlike Any Other

The image was obtained roughly 40 minutes after the Martian sunset, as the natural orbital path Phobos follows causes it to appear to drift upward in the new sequence of images, while Earth moves diagonally downward, then slips out of view behind the oddly shaped Martian companion.

In an annotated version released by NASA, timestamps spanning just 40 seconds illustrate the progression of the event in single frames, offering a look at a sunset unlike any ever seen on Earth.

That isn’t to say that the same effect can’t be seen from our planet, but in reverse: a lunar occultation where Mars passes behind the Moon can also be observed here, under the right conditions.

Occultations are frequently used by astronomers to help study the positions and motions of various celestial bodies in this way. However, seeing one from the surface of another planet is a rare treat, offering a view of Earth as a distant point of light.

In the past, Perseverance has also captured images of a lunar eclipse from its position on the Martian surface, as Phobos was seen passing in front of the Sun. Past imagery collected by NASA’s robotic explorer has also documented appearances of the Martian moon Deimos in the Red Planet’s early morning skies.

Colors of Change on a Red Planet

Although Mars’ characteristic rusty hues are ever-present, the recent imagery also offers a glimpse of other subtle colors seen in the Martian environment, particularly at twilight. With subtle bluish grays that gradually transition to redder tones, the new images offer a more nuanced and colorful look at the Red Planet.

Perseverance has now spent more than five years exploring Mars, and its ongoing discoveries have added a wealth of new information to the growing body of knowledge scientists have collected about our nearby planetary neighbor.

As for the recent imagery the rover captured, such a unique view requires careful timing, along with a bit of good fortune, according to Mark Lemmon, a Mastcam-Z co-investigator at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado.

“Phobos crosses the Martian sky three times a day, and Earth is visible for months at a stretch,” Lemmon said in a statement, adding that “catching one directly behind the other takes planning and a little luck.”

Additional details provided by NASA about the new imagery can be found here and here.

Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. A longtime reporter on science, defense, and technology with a focus on space and astronomy, he can be reached at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow him on X @MicahHanks, and at micahhanks.com.

The economist John Maynard Keynes once remarked, “In the long run we are all dead.” From an astronomical standpoint, this is true for the Earth itself. In roughly 5 billion years, the Sun will exhaust the hydrogen at its core and enter the next phase of its life as a Red Giant, where it will swell up large enough to engulf and destroy the Earth.

Currently, the Sun is still in its main-sequence phase, where it fuses hydrogen into helium in its core. Although it remains relatively stable during this phase, it will gradually grow brighter with time. As the Sun shines brighter, the increased heat and radiation will raise Earth’s surface temperature, potentially pushing it past the threshold for life to survive. 

One of Earth’s geological processes that helps regulate its surface temperature is the carbon cycle. Over millions of years, carbon moves from the Earth’s interior into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide or CO₂, where it functions as a greenhouse gas that traps heat. Plants take in this CO₂ through photosynthesis and move carbon through the biosphere. 

Meanwhile, rain and rock weathering draw carbon into the oceans and rocks. By pulling CO₂ out of the atmosphere, the carbon cycle could mitigate Earth’s warming as the Sun brightens over time. Today, human activities are increasing atmospheric CO₂ and warming the planet. However, over billions of years, the carbon cycle could gradually remove enough CO₂ from the atmosphere that eventually too little would remain to support photosynthesis. 

With these challenges to life on Earth in mind, the researchers Jacob Haqq‐Misra and Eric Wolf investigated how long Earth’s biosphere could last in the distant future. The team used computer models to calculate the balance of energy that Earth would receive and emit over time, accounting for the effects of increasing sunlight and changing atmospheric CO₂ concentrations. They followed this up with calculations using the ExoCAM model to determine the temperature and atmospheric conditions of future Earth across different latitudes. They related these conditions to a habitability metric to determine their impact on the biosphere.

To estimate the biosphere’s maximum possible lifespan, the team conducted 29 simulations representing the planet’s conditions over the next 2 billion years. In one set of simulations, the Earth’s carbon cycle contributed little to regulating surface temperature, with the atmosphere’s CO₂ concentration fixed at approximately modern levels of 400 parts per million (ppm) and surface temperatures continuing to increase. In another, the carbon cycle worked to keep Earth’s average surface temperature fixed at the modern average of approximately 59℉ (15℃), no matter how much it had to reduce CO₂ in the atmosphere. 

In the scenario with a fixed CO₂ concentration, the team found that in 1.7 billion years, Earth’s surface reached an average of 122°F (50°C), which is too hot for most land plants. After 1.9 billion years, it reached 149°F (65°), becoming too hot for all land plants to survive as temperatures continued to rise. 

They also found that in the fixed average surface temperature scenario, atmospheric CO₂ dropped below the 150 ppm level that most plants require for photosynthesis within 500 million years. After 1.4 billion years, CO₂ levels fell below 10 ppm, leaving only a few land photosynthesizers and aquatic plants alive. After about 1.8 billion years, atmospheric CO₂ dropped to 1 ppm, leaving only microbes capable of photosynthesis.

The researchers’ findings generally extend the estimated lifetime of Earth’s future biosphere compared with earlier, simpler models that suggested maximum lifespans of 100 million to 1.5 billion years. However, they clarified that other scientists should verify their results by running tests with other models, especially under extreme conditions of high incoming solar radiation and low atmospheric CO₂. 

Lastly, Haqq‐Misra and Wolf noted that their model did not account for major evolutionary changes that could help life adapt to future conditions. Over time, plants could evolve to tolerate higher temperatures or lower atmospheric CO₂ levels. Future humans or another intelligent species might also engage in large-scale geoengineering projects to prevent the end of life on Earth. If life on Earth proves adaptable enough, the biosphere may endure until a Red Giant fills the daytime sky.

The post The long-term fate of Earth’s biosphere appeared first on Sciworthy.

A pair of newly found planets are the puffiest worlds ever seen. They’re both about the size of Jupiter but with less than 6 percent of its mass.

In terms of density, these planets are “like candy floss or shaving foam,” says George Dransfield. She’s an astrophysicist at the University of Oxford in England. “They’re the lightest planets that are Jupiter-sized.”

Both orbit TOI 791. That’s a sunlike star about 1,113 light-years from Earth. The TESS space telescope spotted them as they passed — or transited — in front of their star and blocked some of its light. Comparing the star when it was blocked and unblocked let Dransfield and others measure the planets’ width.

One world is about 0.993 times as wide as Jupiter. The other has about 1.155 times Jupiter’s width.

For the team to find their density, it needed to know both the planets’ size and mass. Transits only give their size. That’s where their orbits come in. The two planets periodically pass by one another as they circle their star. As they do, the planets give each other a little gravitational tug.

“They’re in this fun little dance,” Dransfield says. “We were able to measure the masses of the planets by how much they kick each other’s orbits.”

Dransfield and her teammates tracked the planetary dance over several years. They used the Antarctic Search for Transiting ExoPlanets telescope, or ASTEP. It was the only telescope on Earth that could observe the planets’ entire transits. Why? Because it takes about 12 hours for each planet to pass in front of its star. It’s hard to find a place on Earth that gets 12 straight hours of darkness at a time during which to view that. But Antarctica gets three straight months of darkness each year.

“Without this telescope, this discovery would not have happened,” Dransfield says.

Those measurements let her team deduce the planets’ masses. One was 9.5 times the mass of Earth. The other had the heft of 18.6 Earths. (Jupiter has 317 times Earth’s mass.) That means their densities are 0.038 and 0.047 grams per cubic centimeter. For comparison, cotton candy’s density is typically about 0.05 grams per cubic centimeter.

The researchers shared these findings in the July Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Sizing up superpuffs

The new planets join the small group of large but lightweight worlds known as superpuffs. Astronomers aren’t sure how they form. One theory is that they’re born far from their star and move inward. Their atmospheres would heat and puff up as they neared their stars.

Some superpuffs might have giant ring systems, which could make them look bigger than they really are. Astrophysicists Anthony Piro and Shreyas Vissapragada proposed this idea in 2020. But that’s probably not the case for the two newfound planets, says Piro.

Having two ringed planets mistaken for superpuffs around the same star would be too much of a coincidence, he says. Piro works at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, Calif. He did not take part in the new study.

The host star is spinning quickly, which could be a sign that it’s fairly young, Piro notes. If so, these superpuffs might still be cooling off. They might shrink as they age. “We might be catching these planets at an intermediate stage,” Piro says.

The next step is to use the James Webb Space Telescope to probe the planets’ chemical makeup. That could reveal more about their origins, Dransfield says.

“Finding things like superpuffs, which are incredibly rare, means we can learn more about how planets form,” Dransfield says. They also offer clues about how planets evolve and what they can end up looking like. “That also helps us [understand] Earth in the wider context of the cosmos.”