Giving Stars a Brake
Stars of various temperatures and sizes slow down at different rates– and to different extents. The authors of this paper address this distinction in a regime never before addressed observationally.
GW190412: The first gravitational waves from a lopsided black hole merger
The latest pair of merging black holes announced by LIGO-Virgo, the first made public from their latest observing run, is unlike any seen before.
(s)Pinning down the origins of black hole mergers
All of the black hole mergers we’ve seen so far with LIGO/Virgo have surprised us with their mass-spin relationship. Are we misunderstanding stellar collapse? Or is there something even more exotic going on?
All spun up
A variety of mechanisms cause stars to experience spin evolution. Can we learn about planet formation by pushing spin measurements down to substellar masses?
An Exoplanet’s Fast Spin
Planets in the Solar System with a higher mass spin faster than lower-mass planets. But what about planets in other systems? The authors of this paper make the first measurement of an exoplanet’s spin to compare its spin and mass to Solar System planets.
Evidence for Two Kinds of Pulsars
This paper presents the first evidence of two distinct populations of pulsars, which the authors speculate stem from a difference in how they are formed.