Despite the name, black holes often shine very bright in the sky, due to their hot glowing corona. Now, astronomers have been puzzled to watch a black hole’s corona suddenly vanish – and if that wasn’t weird enough, it reappeared a few months later.

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Astronomers are celebrating the 4th of July weekend by releasing a new image of some cosmic fireworks. The spectacular shot is made up of a mosaic of radio and infrared images, showing a cluster of young stars exploding into life.

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Julien's Auctions is offering a trio of historic Apollo 11 artifacts as part of its Legends & Explorers auction. Three of the hand controllers used to steer the Columbia spacecraft are expected to fetch between US$80,000 and $200,000 each.

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The Hubble Space Telescope has captured a striking sight in the Serpens Nebula – a huge shadow in the shape of a bat. Now, follow-up observations have shown that it appears to be flapping its wings, which may be the influence of a nearby planet.

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Given how big the universe is, chances are tiny that Earth is the only planet with life. But how would we find others? A new NASA grant has been awarded to try and do so by hunting for signs of advanced alien civilizations, or "technosignatures."

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ESA has awarded a contract to Airbus Defence and Space to go ahead on the next phase to develop the Sample Fetch Rover. The contract will allow Airbus to continue work on the rover that will collect Martian rock and soil samples for return to Earth.

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Northrop Grumman has been awarded a US$187 million contract to design the Habitation And Logistics Outpost (HALO) crew module for NASA's Gateway deep space outpost. The HALO will provide pressurized living quarters for visiting astronauts.

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Constructed using 3D printing technology, the Prometheus is a liquid-fueled rocket engine demonstrator that is intended as the model for the next generation of potentially reusable propulsion systems suitable for a wide variety of launch vehicles.

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The exact nature of the bizarre interstellar object ‘Oumuamua remains a mystery. There’s been no shortage of ideas, but now astronomers at Yale and the University of Chicago have proposed that it’s a brand new type of object: a hydrogen iceberg.

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The launch of the SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the ISS marks two historic events. It is the first manned launch from American soil since the retirement of the Space Shuttle fleet in 2011, and the first ever manned commercial mission to go into orbit.

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