[SwRI] A Southwest Research Institute-led study used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to examine ice grains streaming from interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS, just the third object from beyond our solar system […]
imaging
![Model SED calculations for Ceres (left), Eros (middle), and Hektor (right). For each target, the top panel (a) shows the predicted flux density at each epoch, while the bottom panel (b) shows the corresponding flux ratio between reflected and thermal radiation. The color coding represents heliocentric distance. The vertical dashed lines indicate the wavelength where the reflected and thermal flux contributions are equal. Alt text: Modeled spectral energy distributions of Ceres, Eros, and Hektor showing reflected and thermal emission contributions. -- [astro-ph.EP]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Spectroscopic.png?resize=1200%2C725&ssl=1)
Posted inAriel Mission
Spectroscopic Survey of Small Solar System Bodies with Ariel
[astro-ph.EP]. The small Solar System bodies (SSSBs) preserve records of the formation and evolution of the Solar System. In particular, the near-infrared wavelength region around 3 μm provides crucial insights […]
![Polarization axis scribing station developed for DragonflyPol. The setup enables repeatable transmission axis marking at better than 0.2◦ precision. Components include the QTH10 illumination source, Sloan r′ bandpass filter, pinhole, polarizing beamsplitter cube (reference axis), motorized rotation stage, and Hamamatsu photodiode readout.-- [astro-ph.IM]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/DragonflyPol.png?resize=1200%2C828&ssl=1)
Posted inAstronomy & Telescopes
DragonflyPol: Wide-Field Optical Linear Polarimetry with the Dragonfly Telephoto Array (Instrument Description and Commissioning)
[astro-ph.IM] We present DragonflyPol, a wide-field optical linear polarimetry capability implemented on the Dragonfly Telephoto Array. DragonflyPol leverages Dragonfly’s modular, multi-lens architecture to obtain simultaneous measurements in four linear polarization […]
![Left. Two-dimensional UMAP representation of the TMC-1 inventory using the original ChemBERTa input vectors. Right. Same representation but using the last hidden layer of the neural netwok model. The red rectangle highlights the region of the UMAP representation where highly abundant molecules are located. The different dot sizes represent the observed column density of each molecule. -- [astro-ph.GA]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/A-neural.png?resize=1200%2C725&ssl=1)
Posted inAstrochemistry
A Neural-network Model To Find Correlations In Astrochemical Space
[astro-ph.GA] The detection of new interstellar molecules is central to astrochemistry, and arguably the most transformative development in the field in past decade has been the increase in both number […]
![Schematic diagram of the Fragmented Pupil telescope concept. Left Panel: Bright stars available over ∼degree scale optical fields are condensed into an artificial cluster at sub-arcminute scales (red box). Middle Panel: This is accomplished in a single reflection from a high-stability tessellated optical surface aboard a stable space telescope. Right Panel: Precision astrometric monitoring can then be accomplished by analysis of the resulting well-sampled interferograms in the image plane. Here the central science target is surrounded by a set of 6 reference stars, condensed to lie at arcsecond scales. -- [astro-ph.IM]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Astrometric-detection.png?resize=1200%2C555&ssl=1)
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets
Astrometric Detection Of Rocky Exoplanets From Inexpensive Space Platforms
[astro-ph.IM] The detection of orbiting exoplanets by way of astrometric monitoring of the host star to reveal gravitationally induced reflex motion requires extreme precision and measurement stability when targeting Earth-mass […]
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets
The First Selection Of Optimal Targets For The Lazuli ExtraSolar Coronagraph’s Reflected Starlight Exoplanet Campaign
[astro-ph.EP] Direct detection and characterization of exoplanet atmospheres via reflected starlight enables probes of composition of mature exoplanet systems (since flux is decoupled from age) at closer separations than via […]
Posted inUncategorized
Complex Organic Molecules in Protostars with ALMA Spectral Surveys (COMPASS): I. Overview of the ALMA Large Program
[astro-ph.GA] It remains a fundamental research question in astrochemistry to characterize the inventory of complex organic molecules formed during the early stages of star formation, which may affect the eventual […]
![Illustration of the spatial distribution and proposed origin of the molecular species discussed in this work, including the tentative FeS emission. Left: H2O v2 = 1 and NaCl emission maps toward Orion SrcI reported by A. Ginsburg et al. (2018). Right: schematic view of the proposed distinction between species associated with the outflow and those tracing the disk midplane, based on the results presented here (Table 1) and those of A. Ginsburg et al. (2018, 2019). -- [astro-ph.GA]](https://i0.wp.com/astrobiology.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Tentative-Detection.png?resize=1200%2C719&ssl=1)
Posted inAstrochemistry
Tentative Detection of FeS toward Orion SrcI
[astro-ph.GA] Iron sulfide (FeS) is a key refractory compound in astrophysical environments. It is commonly found in meteorites and evidence of FeS has only been reported in solid form in […]
Posted inIcy Worlds
Isobaric Crystallization of Aqueous Magnesium Chloride Solutions at Icy Moon Conditions
[ACS] Subsurface oceans inside icy moons are expected to contain dissolved salts whose crystallization controls the mineralogy of their hydrospheres and potentially their surfaces.
Posted inExoplanets, -moons, -comets
Systematic Uncertainties in Rocky Exoplanet Reflected Light from Incomplete Laboratory BRDF Measurements
[astro-ph.EP] The first observations of short-period rocky exoplanets have initiated the era of terrestrial exoplanet characterization. The interpretation of these observations relies on forward models used in atmospheric and surface […]