The centre of just about every galaxy is thought to host a black hole, some with masses of thousands of millions of Suns and consequently strong gravitational pulls that disrupt material around them. They had been thought to hinder the birth of stars, but now an international team of astronomers studying the nearby galaxy Centaurus A has found quite the opposite: a black hole that seems to be helping stars to form.

An international team of scientists has discovered a potentially habitable super-Earth orbiting a nearby star. The star is a member of a triple star system. The discovery demonstrates that habitable planets could form in a greater variety of environments than previously believed.

The Hubble Space Telescope has taken a picture of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1073 in the constellation of Cetus (The Sea Monster).

This new view shows a stellar nursery called NGC 3324. It was taken using the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2,2m telescope at the La Silla Observatory in Chile. The intense ultraviolet radiation from several of NGC 3324's hot young stars causes the gas cloud to glow with rich colours and has carved out a cavity in the surrounding gas and dust.