Gemini News Archive
Exploring a Frozen Extrasolar World
Press Release | 2016 July 6
As the Juno mission begins exploring Jupiter in our Solar System, scientists explore a solo world that researchers say looks more similar to Jupiter than any exoplanet yet discovered.
Innovative Gemini/CFHT Partnership Explores a Hot Jupiter
Web Feature | 2016 June 19
The novel collaboration between the Gemini Observatory and Canada-France-Hawai‘i Telescope (CFHT) called GRACES (Gemini Remote Access to CFHT ESPaDOnS Spectrograph), helped to characterize a “hot Jupiter” around the T-Tauri star V830 Tau.
Ultra-sharp Image Uncovers the Shocking Lives of Young Stars
Press Release | 2016 June 17
The world’s most advanced adaptive optics system reveals “shocking” details on star formation in a new image released by the Gemini Observatory probing a swarm of young and forming stars that appear to have been shocked into existence.
Resolving an Exoplanet’s Motion to Constrain a Young Planetary System
Web Feature | 2016 May 24
Using the Gemini Planet Imager astronomers have successfully monitored the motion of a planet around the forming exoplanet system orbiting the star HD 95086 and suggest that more unseen planets are present.
Helium’s Role in the Pulsation of Early White Dwarfs
Web Feature | 2016 May 11
Before low-medium mass stars become white dwarfs they pulsate wildly and eventually spew their outer layers into space – often forming beautiful planetary nebulae. The same stars are predicted to continue pulsating during their transformation to a white dwarf, if they have helium in their atmospheres.
Gemini Identifies Free-floating Jupiter Analogue
Web Feature | 2016 April 5
Using the FLAMINGOS-2 spectrometer/imager at Gemini South, astronomers have characterized an especially young, free-floating analogue to Jupiter in our neighborhood (92 light years away).
Lonely Black Hole Relic Shines Light on Young Universe
Press Release | 2016 April 5
Astronomers using the 8-meter Gemini North telescope on Hawaii’s Maunakea have probed an enigmatic, and unexpected, supermassive black hole dominating the core of a large galaxy in the cosmic backwaters.
Celebrating 12 Years of Journey Through the Universe (and Counting!)
Web Feature | 2016 March 22
During the week of March 7-11, 83 observatory professionals consisting of astronomers, engineers, astronomy educators, and other observatory staff brought their passion for science into hundreds of local Hawai'i Island classrooms as a part of Gemini Observatoryʻs flagship annual outreach program, Journey Through the Universe.
The Fastest Quasar Ultraviolet Wind
Web Feature | 2016 March 21
Observations using the Gemini Multi-Object Spectrographs (GMOS) on both Gemini North and South telescopes have revealed the fastest ultraviolet wind ever measured in a quasar.
Supermassive Black Hole - That Wasn't
Web Feature | 2016 February 29
Research shows that supermassive black holes like to be the only residents on the block, as stars too close to them end up being thrown vast distances from the galaxy's center.
Are the Coolest Brown Dwarfs Loners?
Web Feature | 2016 February 18
Astronomers use Gemini’s high-resolution multi-conjugate adaptive optics system to look for elusive companions to the lowest mass brown dwarfs.
Gemini Confirms a Free-Floating Planet
Web Feature | 2016 February 10
An extremely red planetary-mass object is confirmed, based on Gemini observations, to be a free-floating member of the Beta Pictoris moving group. This is one of only a handful of directly imaged planets available for spectroscopy – allowing scientists to probe the world’s physical characteristics.
NSF Selects AURA to Continue Managing Gemini
Press Release | 2016 February 5
The National Science Board (NSB) and the international Gemini Board have authorized the NSF to award a new 6-year, $208 million cooperative agreement to the AURA for the management and operation of the Gemini Observatory.
Nightly Base Facility Operations at Gemini North!
Web Feature | 2016 January 21
Base Facility Operations (BFO) are now fully implemented for the Gemini North telescope. All operations are now routinely conducted each night from the Hilo Base Facility.
Gemini Helps Confirm Dark “Noodles” in Milky Way
Press Release | 2016 January 21
Clumps of gas shaped like noodles could be floating around in our Galaxy, radically challenging our understanding of gas conditions in the Milky Way.
Gap in Dusty Disk is Likely Embryonic Sub-Jupiter Mass Planet
Web Feature | 2015 December 22
At just 180 light years from Earth and a ripe young age of roughly 8 million years, this nearly solar-mass star and its orbiting, circumstellar disk of dust and gas are prime targets to better understand the processes involved in star and planet formation
Gemini and Keck Put New Spin on Galaxy Formation
Web Feature | 2015 December 14
A team of Australian researchers used two Maunakea-based observatories – Gemini North and W. M. Keck Observatory – to discover why some galaxies are clumpy rather than spiral in shape and it appears that low spin is to blame.
Gemini Featured at Extreme Solar Systems III Conference
Web Feature | 2015 November 30
Observations using the Gemini Planet Imager are featured prominently at the Extreme Solar Systems III meeting which occurred Nov. 29 - December 4 2015 in Waikoloa Hawai‘i. Below are two results from a press conference on December 1, 2015.
Gemini Characterizes Cheshire Cat
Web Feature | 2015 November 23
Gemini observations provide a key scientific context for a striking new image of the gravitationally lensed galaxy group popularly known as the Cheshire Cat. Gemini played a critical role in the image’s scientific story by taking the spectral fingerprints of many of the galaxies that make up the foreground cluster which bends the distant galactic light
Illumination of the Early Universe by Quasars: Korea's 1st Result as Limited Gemini Partner
Web Feature | 2015 November 10
A team of Korean astronomers discovered a faint quasar in the early Universe which sheds light on the main sources of illumination about 1 billion years after the Big Bang.
