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Astronomers present an explanation for the mesmerising shapes of planetary nebulae. The discovery is based on an extraordinary set of observations of stellar winds around ageing stars. Contrary to common consensus, the team found that stellar winds are not spherical but have a shape similar to that of planetary nebulae.

Plasma astrophysicists at KU Leuven have created the first self-consistent simulation of the physical processes that occur during a solar flare. The researchers used Flemish supercomputers and a new combination of physical models. Solar flares are explosions on the surface of the Sun that release an enormous amount of energy, equivalent to a trillion 'Little Boy' atomic bombs exploding at the same time.

Objective: increase COVID-19 screening capacity throughout Europe via a mobile, fast and flexible method First phase: Piedmont, Italy , to screen front-line teams (medical, volunteer, police, civil protection) The University of Louvain (UCLouvain ) and the European Space Agency (ESA ) are joining forces to deploy a mobile laboratory capable of testing front-line screening teams : doctors, nurses, volunteers, police, civil protection actors.

An international team of astronomers has captured fifteen images of the inner rims of planet-forming disks located hundreds of light years away. These disks of dust and gas, similar in shape to a music record, form around young stars. The images shed new light on how planetary systems are formed. They were published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics .

Let's first state the obvious: the universe is endlessly fascinating. When the first ever picture of a black hole was released this spring, it easily made front pages.

On behalf of the ESA, UCLouvain has developed antennas for the LaRa instrument that will go to Mars in 2020 to study the red planet's habitability.

Exploring the heart (core) of Mars will elucidate the red planet's evolution and thus determine whether life would be possible in the future In 2020 the ExoMars mission will send a platform with the LaRa, a 100% Belgian-made instrument , supervised by UCLouvain researcher Véronique Dehant LaRa's objective  is to observe Mars's rotation in order to understand its core Info: https://lara.oma.be and https://exploration.esa&peri

Bioscience engineers at KU Leuven have developed a method to measure the snow depth in all mountain ranges in the Northern Hemisphere using satellites. This technique makes it possible to study areas that cannot be accessed for local measurements, such as the Himalayas. The findings were published .

Blue supergiants are rock 'n' roll: they live fast and die young. This makes them rare and difficult to study. Before space telescopes were invented, few blue supergiants had been observed, so our knowledge of these stars was limited. Using recent NASA space telescope data, an international team led by KU Leuven studied the sounds originating inside these stars and discovered that almost all blue supergiants shimmer in brightness because of waves on their surface.

Red giants are old stars that eject gaseous material and solid particles through a stellar wind. Some red giants appeared to lose an exceptionally large amount of mass this way. However, new observations reveal that this is not quite the case. The stellar wind is not more intense than normal, but is affected by a partner that was overlooked until now: a second star that circles the red giant.

Ghost particle originates from supermassive black hole An international team of scientists has found the first evidence of a source of high-energy cosmic neutrinos. The measured neutrino originates from a supermassive black hole. Researchers from VUB are among those behind the sensational finding.

Stephen Hawking's last paper, co-authored by Thomas Hertog, does away with the infinite multiverse and predicts a simpler and finite universe. Find out more in this ERC interview with Thomas Hertog. You put forward a new theory of the origin of the universe. What's wrong with the current one? "The prevailing theory of the Big Bang is called eternal inflation.

Just a year ago, on the 22 February 2017, at a press conference at NASA headquarters, an international team of researchers revealed the existence of a unique exoplanetary system, made up of seven planets orbiting a small nearby star. Known as TRAPPIST-1, this system created a hug buzz on the Web, in the media, and within the scientific community.

A stellar core that challenges predictions: here is the result of the first cartography of the interior of a white-dwarf star performed by an international team that includes  Valérie Van Grootel and Marc-Antoine Dupret , two researchers belonging to the STAR Institute at Université de Liège. This discovery will provide insights on the different physical mechanisms involved in the evolution of stars and our Sun.