Ken Croswell

Ken Croswell has a Ph.D. in astronomy from Harvard University and is the author of eight books, including The Alchemy of the Heavens: Searching for Meaning in the Milky Way and The Lives of Stars.

All Stories by Ken Croswell

  1. image of a FU Orionus
    Astronomy

    Two stars’ close encounter may explain a cosmic flare that has barely faded

    A brilliant outburst of light that has lasted nearly a century arose when two young stars skirted past each other, simulations suggest.

  2. image of a supernova remnant in the constellation Cassiopeia
    Astronomy

    How massive stars in binary systems turn into carbon factories

    A massive star with an orbiting partner star ejects on average twice as much carbon, an element crucial for life, into space compared with a solo star.

  3. illustration of debris from a destroyed rocky planet circling a white dwarf star
    Astronomy

    Distant rocky planets may have exotic chemical makeups that don’t resemble Earth’s

    Elements sprinkled on white dwarf stars suggest that the mantles of faraway rocky worlds differ greatly from their counterparts in our solar system.

  4. white dwarf star illustration
    Astronomy

    A Jupiter-like planet orbiting a white dwarf hints at our solar system’s future

    A new planet is the first ever discovered that is orbiting a white dwarf and resembles Jupiter in both its mass and its distance from its star.

  5. illustration of a white dwarf star and a red dwarf star in the binary star system AE Aquarii
    Astronomy

    The fastest-spinning white dwarf ever seen rotates once every 25 seconds

    A white dwarf star that spins every 25 seconds owes its record-breaking rotation rate to a companion star dumping gas onto it.

  6. a black background highlights several galaxies, with a half-circle orange arc
    Astronomy

    A supernova’s delayed reappearance could pin down how fast the universe expands

    “SN Requiem” should reappear in the 2030s and help determine the universe’s expansion rate.

  7. illustration of a brown dwarf
    Astronomy

    Here’s how cool a star can be and still achieve lasting success

    The dividing line between successful stars and failed ones is a surface temperature of about 1,200° to 1,400° Celsius, a new study reports.

  8. the planet Jupiter
    Astronomy

    A shadowy birthplace may explain Jupiter’s strange chemistry

    Dust that blocked sunlight caused the giant planet to form in a deep freeze, a new study suggests.

  9. planet orbiting star WASP-79
    Space

    Most planets on tilted orbits pass over the poles of their suns

    Nearly all of the worlds on misaligned trajectories in other solar systems orbit at nearly 90 degrees to their stars’ equators.

  10. planet Saturn
    Astronomy

    Saturn has a fuzzy core, spread over more than half the planet’s diameter

    Analysis of a wave in one of Saturn’s rings has revealed that the planet’s core is diffuse and bloated with lots of hydrogen and helium.

  11. dwarf galaxy HSC J1631+4426
    Astronomy

    A record-breaking, oxygen-starved galaxy may be full of gigantic stars’ shrapnel

    The newly discovered galaxy may have once been home to stars more than 300 times as massive as the sun — a peek at conditions in the early universe.

  12. Diagram of low-frequency radio waves in galaxy cluster Abell 2877
    Astronomy

    The ‘USS Jellyfish’ emits strange radio waves from a distant galaxy cluster

    The unusual pattern of radio waves dubbed the USS Jellyfish tells a story of intergalactic gas meeting black hole by-products.