astronomy Archives

Modes of interstellar expansion across two dimensions. The horizontal axis (expansion agent) runs from biological (crewed colonization, settlers, generation ships) to machine (autonomous probes, robotic seed systems). The vertical axis (visibility) runs from quiet (low-mass, low duty cycle, weak technosignatures) to loud (high-power, high waste heat, galaxy-scale signatures). The four quadrants summarize alternative expansion modes considered in the literature; the quiet expansion filter proposed in this paper occupies the lower-right quadrant (highlighted). -- astro-ph.IM

AI - Data - Apps - Cybernetics, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Intelligence & Language, Interstellar, SETI & Technosignatures, Status Report

Autonomous AI-Cosmoindustry and the Quiet Expansion Filter: A Threshold-Based Resolution of the Fermi Paradox

by Keith CowingJune 16, 2026June 16, 2026

The Fermi paradox is sharpened, not weakened, by plausible extrapolations of artificial intelligence, autonomous robotics, in-situ resource utilization, orbital manufacturing, space-based computing, and uncrewed interstellar probes.

The distribution of planetary radius and orbital period of TOIs and new false positives and planet candidates. COUNTESS discovered 38 new planetary signals, with 28 of them being FPs through triceratops validation and LEOVetter pixel-vetting. Note that the square symbols indicate TOI FPs that were successfully recovered as FPs through COUNTESS. -- astro-ph.EP

Astronomy & Telescopes, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Status Report, Stellar Cartography

COUNTESS I: A Uniformly Vetted Catalog of Known and New Transiting Exoplanets in the TESS Northern Continuous Viewing Zone

by Keith CowingJune 15, 2026June 15, 2026

The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) has transformed the study of nearby exoplanetary systems; however, its nominal observing strategy limits sensitivity to planets with orbital periods shorter than ∼10 days […]

GLS periodograms of individual wavelength contrast lightcurves. In each of the panels, the light pink, dark pink, and black highlighted lines are the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd 12CO bandheads, respectively. The grey horizontal lines indicate the 1%, 5%, and 10% false alarm probabilities. The black vertical lines indicate the expected rotation period at 8.7 hrs and its first integer harmonic at 4.35 hrs. The top panel shows the uncorrected periodogram, with all wavelengths significantly affected by systematic effects caused by the fibre coupling. The middle panel shows the periodogram after the polynomial correction, while the bottom panel adds Gaussian smoothing to this to highlight strong periodic signals. -- astro-ph.EP

Astrochemistry, Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Beta Pictoris, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Icy Worlds, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Interstellar, Status Report

13CO And Potential Variability In β Pictoris b With GRAVITY+

by Keith CowingJune 14, 2026June 14, 2026

The 12CO/13CO ratio was introduced as an indicator for where in the disk a planet has formed. Previously a lower value compared to the host star’s was suggested to show […]

Carbon isotope ratio as a function of the semi-major axis for young, directly-imaged companions. Measurements in the HR 8799 system for planets e, b, and c (Ruffio et al. 2026) are shown with squares and connected with a dotted line. The other measurements are for HD 984 b (Costes et al. 2024), GQ Lup b (González Picos et al. 2025b), VHS 1256 b (Gandhi et al. 2023), YSES 1 b (Zhang et al. 2024), AB Pic b (Gandhi et al. 2025), and DH Tau b and HIP 79098 b (Xuan et al. 2024a). The present-day local ISM (12C/13C = 68±14; Milam et al. 2005) and solar photospheric value (12C/13C⊙ = 91.4 ± 1.3; Lyons et al. 2018) are overlaid. The horizontal line spans the typical CO snow-line location for a solar-type host star (22–36 au). For stars hotter than the Sun, the CO snow line is expected at distances greater than 30 au, so β Pic b is located interior to the CO snow line. -- astro-ph.EP

Astrochemistry, Astronomy & Telescopes, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Interstellar, Status Report

The Carbon Isotope Ratio Of β Pic b With High-resolution Spectroscopy

by Keith CowingJune 13, 2026June 13, 2026

Isotopic ratios trace the formation and evolution of planets and link their atmospheres to the chemistry of their natal protoplanetary discs.

Overview of the simulation pipeline components used in this work. The modeling begins with hwo pol, a Poke front-end we constructed tailored to modeling the EACs. The ray trace file and coating data are fed to Poke which computes the Jones pupils and saves them as a FITS file. These data are loaded into hwo sim and applied on top of the phase and amplitude errors encountered by propagating through the OTA and tertiary collimator assembly (TCA, mirrors 3-5). The now polarization aberrated field is propagated through a scalar diffraction model, subject to jacobianfree wavefront control with perfect knowledge of the electric field. Using this control simulation, we can save a series of intensity images into a Yield Input Package, which is sent to the FRIDAY AYO calculator to close the loop to exoEarth yields. -- astro-ph.EP

Astronomy & Telescopes, Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Status Report

Connecting Polarization To Exoplanet Yield Calculations For Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO)

by Keith CowingJune 13, 2026June 13, 2026

The Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) aims to enable the detection and characterization of Earth-like planets around Sun-like stars to search for possible signs of life elsewhere in our universe.

Simulated multiband light-curve populations in the Cchroma–Ccross diagnostic plane. Left: noise-dominated, natural, and coherent variability classes (N ≈ 167 each, 500 total); ellipses show population covariance, open circles mark centroid-nearest examples. Right: normalised Rubin/LSST g, r, i light curves for those examples; coherent case shows stable cross-band structure, natural case shows stochastic variability, noise case is dominated by incoherent fluctuations. -- astro-ph.IM

Astrochemistry, Astronomy & Telescopes, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, SETI & Technosignatures, Status Report

Prospects for Astrobiology And Technosignature Searches With The Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey Of Space And Time

by Keith CowingJune 12, 2026June 12, 2026

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) will map sources in multiband colour–variability space.

Example of the optical design for the NIR coronagraph. (Top) Overall layout of the optical system, where the post-coronagraph section shows only the imaging part and omits the spectroscopic part. (Bottom) Enlarged view of the imaging part. -- astro-ph.IM

Astronomy & Telescopes, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Status Report

Japan’s Possible Contributions For Coronagraph Of The Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO)

by Keith CowingJune 12, 2026June 12, 2026

In this paper, we describe Japan’s possible contributions for coronagraph of the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) based on our independent study.

Super-Earths and sub-Neptunes are fairly common across our galaxy, but they don’t appear in our own solar system. Their size ranges fall in between Earth and Neptune. Credit: Keith Miller (Caltech/IPAC/SELab)

Astrochemistry, Astronomy & Telescopes, Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Press Release, Stellar Cartography

Finding Patterns in Planets: Researchers Explore the Demographics of Alien Worlds in K2 Data

by Keith CowingJune 11, 2026June 11, 2026

Our galaxy is jam-packed with planets, with thousands already discovered and millions more expected to eventually come into view. Within this ever-growing bounty, surprises have abounded, revealing that our solar […]

Left: Qϕ image of WRAY 15-1880 obtained from the SPHERE polarimetric data. The red dot at the center of the image marks the position of the star; the dashed white circle is the size of the coronagraph used in this observation. The dotted straight lines mark the major and minor axes, as obtained by Curone et al. (2025). Right: similar image, but projected on the disk plane (i “ 39.22 deg) and rotated to have the major axis vertical and the minor axis horizontal. On this plane, the coronagraphic mask is an ellipse represented by the white dashed line. The yellow circle has a radius of 214.1 mas that is the peak of the disk as determined by the ALMA data (see Section 3.3.2). The center of this circle has been offset by 37 mas along the minor axis, to fit the outer contour of the observed disk East of the star, that is the closest side of the disk. The red solid circle (radius of 110 mas) fits the feature seen north of the star. The position of the planet discussed in Section 3.2 at the epoch of the SPHERE polarimetric observation is marked with a small white circle, and its orbit is shown as magenta circle. -- astro-ph.SR

Astronomy & Telescopes, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Status Report

Analysis Of The Young Disk Around WRAY 15-1880: Does It Contain A Primitive Planetary System?

by Keith CowingJune 11, 2026June 11, 2026

Observations of (giant) planets accreting material within their natal environment are crucial to constrain models for their formation.

Telluric spectrum observed at R = 45,000 with IGRINS (black) and the same spectrum smoothed to R = 2,000 (yellow). The middle panel labels the primary molecular constituents while the upper and lower panels show details of particular bands. -- astro-ph.IM

Astronomy & Telescopes, Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Habitable Zones, Imaging & Spectroscopy, Status Report

The Case for High-Resolution Infrared Spectroscopy with the Habitable Worlds Observatory

by Keith CowingJune 11, 2026June 11, 2026

A high-resolution near-IR spectroscopy capability on the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) could strongly and efficiently advance many of the mission’s goals.

astronomy

Autonomous AI-Cosmoindustry and the Quiet Expansion Filter: A Threshold-Based Resolution of the Fermi Paradox

COUNTESS I: A Uniformly Vetted Catalog of Known and New Transiting Exoplanets in the TESS Northern Continuous Viewing Zone

13CO And Potential Variability In β Pictoris b With GRAVITY+

The Carbon Isotope Ratio Of β Pic b With High-resolution Spectroscopy

Connecting Polarization To Exoplanet Yield Calculations For Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO)

Prospects for Astrobiology And Technosignature Searches With The Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey Of Space And Time

Japan’s Possible Contributions For Coronagraph Of The Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO)

Finding Patterns in Planets: Researchers Explore the Demographics of Alien Worlds in K2 Data

Analysis Of The Young Disk Around WRAY 15-1880: Does It Contain A Primitive Planetary System?

The Case for High-Resolution Infrared Spectroscopy with the Habitable Worlds Observatory

NASA Spaceline Current Awareness List #1,206 2 July 2026 (Space Life Science Research Results)

Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group (MEPAG) Concerns

Bridging Astrobiology Research and Education Through Interactive Learning Frameworks

Viking In The History And Future Of Astrobiology Programs

Collaborating With Artists In The Search For Life