After three years of searching, scientists have caught the elusive phenomenon. — -- The "brilliant flash" that occurs when a star dies and explodes has been captured for the first time in visible ...

The brilliant flash of an exploding star’s shockwave—what astronomers call the “shock breakout” -- is illustrated in this cartoon animation. The animation begins with a view of a red supergiant star ...

When the Kepler space telescope malfunctioned last spring, it looked as though its incredibly successful planet-hunting mission might be over—and NASA made that sad fact official a few months later.