the latest news from the maunakea observatories
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Andrea Ghez Wins Nobel Prize In Physics
Dr. Andrea Ghez, an astrophysicist at UCLA who has been observing the Galactic Center from Maunakea for over two decades, has won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physics. She is honored for her pioneering work using W. M. Keck Observatory to provide conclusive experimental evidence of a supermassive black hole with the mass of four million suns residing at the center of our Milky Way galaxy.
October 20, 2021
Astronomers using the Keck observatory on Maunakea have observed a planetary system located near the center of our Milky Way galaxy and provided a glimpse into the (distant) future of our own Solar System. Read more, in the W M Keck Observatory press release.
July 27, 2021
Astronomers using the Event Horizon Telescope (of which two Maunakea observatories are a part) have zoomed into Astronomers have discovered the shortest-ever gamma-ray burst (GRB) caused by the implosion of a massive star. Using the Gemini North telescope on Maunakea, astronomers identified the cause of this 0.6-second flurry of gamma rays as a supernova explosion in a distant galaxy. GRBs […]
July 21, 2021
Astronomers using the Event Horizon Telescope (of which two Maunakea observatories are a part) have zoomed into the heart of Centaurus A for the first time — at the center of which lies a black hole with the mass of 55 million suns. Read more, in the Submillimeter Array press release.
June 16, 2021
“We are normal!” - After thirty years of observational work, largely from Maunakea, astronomers reveal that the gas giant planets in many other solar systems lie at about the same distance from their stars as Jupiter does in our own solar system.
March 29, 2021
Two Maunakea telescopes, the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT), and the Submillimeter Array (SMA), have once again combined efforts with the global “Event Horizon Telescope” network to produce a view of Pōwehi, the Black Hole at the Center of the galaxy M87. The new results show the black hole in new light – specifically, polarized light. This enables astronomers, for […]