Search Publications
Dynamics and clouds in planetary atmospheres from telescopic observations
Sánchez-Lavega, Agustín; Irwin, Patrick; García Muñoz, Antonio
This review presents an insight into our current knowledge of the atmospheres of the planets Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, the satellite Titan, and those of exoplanets. It deals with the thermal structure, aerosol properties (hazes and clouds, dust in the case of Mars), chemical composition, global winds, and selected dynamical…
The first X-ray look at SMSS J114447.77-430859.3: the most luminous quasar in the last 9 Gyr
Salvato, M.; Buchner, J.; Nandra, K. +18 more
SMSS J114447.77-430859.3 (z = 0.83) has been identified in the SkyMapper Southern Survey as the most luminous quasar in the last $\sim 9\, \rm Gyr$ . In this paper, we report on the eROSITA/Spectrum-Roentgen-Gamma (SRG) observations of the source from the eROSITA All Sky Survey, along with presenting results from recent monitoring performed using …
HH 80/81: Structure and Kinematics of the Fastest Protostellar Outflow
Bally, John; Reipurth, Bo
Hubble Space Telescope (HST) images obtained in 2018 are combined with archival HST data taken in 1995 to detect changes and measure proper motions in the HH 80/81 shock complex, which is powered by the fastest known jet driven by a forming star, the massive object IRAS 18162-2048. Some persistent features close to the radio jet axis have proper m…
Multi-wavelength observations and modeling of a microflare: constraining non-thermal particle acceleration
Reeves, Katharine K.; Polito, Vanessa; Yu, Sijie +5 more
In this work we analyze a small B-class flare that occurred on 29 April 2021 and was observed simultaneously by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) and the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) X-ray instrument. The IRIS observations of the ribbon of the flare show peculiar spectral characteristics that are typical signatures…
The collisional and photoionized plasma in the polarized NLS1 galaxy Mrk 1239
Komossa, S.; Grupe, D.; Gallo, Luigi C. +4 more
Mrk 1239 is a highly polarized NLS1 in the optical band, whose 0.3-3 keV spectrum has remained remarkably consistent over more than two decades of observation. Previous analysis of this object suggested that the soft X-ray band was dominated by emission lines (collisionally and/or photoionized) from the distant host galaxy as the X-ray emission fr…
Plasma heating and particle acceleration in collisionless shocks through astrophysical observations
Miceli, M.
Supernova remnants (SNRs), the products of stellar explosions, are powerful astrophysical laboratories, which allow us to study the physics of collisionless shocks, thanks to their bright electromagnetic emission. Blast wave shocks generated by supernovae (SNe) provide us with an observational window to study extreme conditions, characterized by h…
Variability of Magnetic Hot Stars from the TESS Observations
Li, Gang; Zhang, Yu; Fu, Jian-Ning +7 more
Magnetic hot stars refer to stars that have effective temperatures approximately in the range from 7000-50,000 K, and with large-scale globally organized magnetic fields. These magnetic fields exhibit strengths ranging from tens of Gauss to tens of kilo-Gauss. They are key in understanding the effects caused by magnetic fields in the stellar evolu…
Caught in the Act: A Metal-rich High-velocity Cloud in the Inner Galaxy
Jenkins, Edward B.; Fox, Andrew J.; Wakker, Bart P. +7 more
We characterize the chemical and physical conditions in an outflowing high-velocity cloud (HVC) in the inner Galaxy. We report a supersolar metallicity of [O/H] = +0.36 ± 0.12 for the HVC at v LSR = 125.6 km s-1 toward the star HD 156359 (l = 328.°7, b = -14.°5, d = 9 kpc, z = -2.3 kpc). Using archival observations from the F…
Development of a new Phobos spectral simulant: spectral properties from visible to the mid-infrared range
Barucci, M. A.; Fornasier, S.; Doressoundiram, A. +6 more
Phobos is the target of the Martian Moons eXploration (MMX), the next sample return mission of the Japanese space agency (JAXA). The mission will investigate the origin of Phobos and Deimos - the two martian moons, using a suite of dedicated instruments. Infrared analysis of the surface composition will be performed by the MIRS spectrometer onboar…
The Mass of the Black Hole in NGC 5273 from Stellar Dynamical Modeling
Vasiliev, Eugene; Onken, Christopher A.; Bentz, Misty C. +2 more
We present a new constraint on the mass of the black hole in the active S0 galaxy NGC 5273. Due to the proximity of the galaxy at 16.6 ± 2.1 Mpc, we were able to resolve and extract the bulk motions of stars near the central black hole using adaptive-optics-assisted observations with the Gemini Near-infrared Integral Field Spectrograph, as well as…