New observations suggest that the dwarf planet Makemake is surrounded by faintly glowing methane gas. Scientists are unsure if the gas is contained within a wispy atmosphere or being ejected into ...

The methane gas may constitute a rarefied atmosphere, or it may come from erupting plumes on Makemake’s surface.

The solar system is composed of the sun, eight major planets, five dwarf planets, over a hundred moons, and countless comets ...

In approximately 5 billion years, the sun will deplete its hydrogen fuel and collapse under its own gravity, becoming a white ...

Siraj’s Planet Y search started about a year ago when he was trying to find out whether the shape of the Kuiper Belt is flat. “The planets of the solar system have slight tilts up and down, but ...

In an ancient star system expected to be stable and dormant, scientists found a 3 billion-year-old white dwarf star still ...

Pluto is a bit of a loner. The dwarf planet is no longer considered a regular planet; it does not orbit on the same plane as the solar system's eight planets; and its orbit is both highly elliptical ...

Astronomers recently peered deep into space and found that an old, faint white dwarf named LSPM J0207+3331, located about 145 ...

Red dwarfs are the most common stars in our galaxy, and understanding how planets form around them is therefore essential. Yet, until now, we had never observed this arrangement around this type of ...

Material around Chiron, a small icy world in the far reaches of the solar system, may be taking shape into a ring system of ...