Milky Way

A planet-vaporizing impact is the leading explanation for a distant star’s curiously fluctuating light

Astronomers have found high-altitude clouds formed from quartz crystals on the gas-giant world WASP-17b

The James Webb Space Telescope’s infrared gaze sheds new light on the Orion nebula, an icon of the night sky

Slow-moving stars at the Milky Way’s outskirts suggest our galaxy may be far lighter than previously believed, with profound implications for dark matter

Of the thousands of stars visible to the eye, only a few hundred are known to have planets. But that number may be far higher in reality

Worlds around red giant stars—and others that don’t orbit any star at all—hint at an unexpected diversity of possibilities for planets and life in the universe

From dim red to brilliant blue, stellar colors span the spectrum—and reveal how much any star brings the heat

Marvel for a moment at the Milky Way’s night-sky spectacle—and the scientific revolutions it has sparked

The “magnitude scale” for measuring stellar brightness also reveals the limits of naked-eye stargazing

Earth-based analogs are opening new frontiers in studies of the superdense interiors of neutron stars

Get to know the stellar trio behind one of the most iconic sights in summer’s night sky

Tiny spheres of once-molten metal magnetically dredged from the seafloor could be pieces from IM1, a potential interstellar meteor that struck Earth in 2014