I'm super excited to share a HUGE paper out from Young Worlds Lab team member Andy Boyle.
I present for you, ~900,000 rotation periods from TESS!
🤯🔭🧪⭐ #exoplanets #stellarrotation
arxiv.org/abs/2603.05586
SO excited to see the first alerts from @vrubinobs.bsky.social being broadcast to the world last night. A huge congratulations to @ebellm.bsky.social and the Alert Pipeline + Data Management teams here at @dirac-institute.bsky.social for their years of hard work!
www.washington.edu/news/2026/02...
TMT Explores a Promising Path Forward in Spain TMT International Observatory LLC (TIO LLC) announced today that in response to the generous offer from the Spanish Ministry of Science, it is exploring a promising avenue for a new observatory based in Spain. While the Members of TO LLC continue discussions regarding the TMT site, this represents a prospective opportunity to allow TO LLC to proceed with the TMT project. For this reason, TO LLC will jointly develop with the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities a detailed roadmap toward the potential realization of the TMT at the Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos (La Palma, Spain). TMT
This is pretty significant and that it’s been 11 years since they tried to build on Maunakea and Kanaka Maoli protectors have successfully impeded them is a major victory for traditional knowledge keepers and people fighting for Kanaka sovereignty. 🔭🧪
www.tmt.org/news/708
Wow🤩🤩
Congrats Dr.!🥳👏
Petition for Action As provided under the Lloyd-La Follette Act (5 U.S.C. 7211), the signatories respectfully petition the Committee to: 1. Ensure that NSF employees are shielded from politically motivated firings and protected under merit-based personnel systems. 2. End illegal impoundments of monies appropriated to NSF. 3. Defend the agency from further interference in its peer review process. 4. Demand transparency from OMB, DOGE, and NSF leadership regarding internal employment policies and future agency relocations. 5. Reaffirm NSF’s scientific independence and support for world-class research that advances national prosperity and security. NSF employees are committed to serving the American people through research, education, and innovation. But they cannot do so under fear, censorship, and institutional sabotage. Without immediate oversight and corrective action from Congress, one of our nation’s greatest engines for scientific and technological advancement faces irreversible long-term damage. Put simply, America will forfeit its scientific leadership position to China and other rival nations.
NSF staff release their appeal—slightly different format than the declarations of dissent from EPA/NIH/NASA; a more formal petition to Congress to redress attacks on the agency and its employees. 149 signatories (48 named)
democrats-science.house.gov/imo/media/do...
A sprawling, textured field of galaxies scattered across the deep black of space. It is filled with the delicate smudges and glowing cores of galaxies of many shapes, sizes and colors, as well as the bright multi-colored points of stars. The image focuses on a collection of interacting galaxies connected by delicate streams of stars. At top center lies a large elliptical galaxy that is dense and smooth, like a polished stone glowing with golden light. Like delicate spider silk or stretched taffy, these stellar bridges link the large elliptical to the few larger galaxies beneath, evidence of past collisions. All throughout the image, thousands of galaxies gather in clusters or are spread throughout, like glittering gems strewn on a table. Some are sharp-edged and spiral, like coiled ribbons; others round and diffuse, like polished pebbles. Still others are just smudges of various colors against the black of space. The background is peppered with pinpoint stars in reds, yellows, and blues, crisp against the velvet black.
A cosmic tapestry of glowing tan and pink gas clouds with dark dust lanes. In the upper right, the Trifid Nebula resembles a small flower in space. Its soft, pinkish gas petals are surrounded by blue gas, and streaked with dark, finger-like veins of dust that divide it into three parts. It radiates a gentle, misty glow, diffuse and soft like the warmth of breath on a cold hand. To the lower left, the much larger Lagoon Nebula stretches wide like a churning sea of magenta gas, with bright blue, knotted clumps sprinkled throughout where new stars are born. Both nebulae are embedded in a soft tan backdrop of gas that is brighter on the left than on the right, etched with dark tendrils of dust and sprinkled with the pinpricks of millions of stars.
A sprawling, textured field of galaxies scattered across the deep black of space. It is filled with the delicate smudges and glowing cores of galaxies of many shapes, sizes and colors, as well as the bright multi-colored points of stars. To the lower left is a region filled with the hundreds of golden glittering gems of a distant galaxy cluster. In the foreground, below and right of center, two blue spiral galaxies look like eyes beneath the entangled mass of a triple galaxy merger in the upper right. A few bright blue points of foreground stars pierce the glittering tapestry. All throughout the image, thousands of galaxies gather in clusters or are spread throughout, like glittering gems strewn on a table. Some are sharp-edged and spiral, like coiled ribbons; others round and diffuse, like polished pebbles. Still others are just smudges of various colors against the black of space. The background is peppered with pinpoint stars in reds, yellows, and blues, crisp against the velvet black.
Introducing...your sneak peek at the cosmos captured by NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory!
Can you guess these regions of sky?
This is just a small peek...join us at 11am US EDT for your full First Look at how Rubin will #CaptureTheCosmos! 🔭🧪
#RubinFirstLook
ls.st/rubin-first-look-livestream
✉️ It's time to speak up for science! Kick off our Week of Action by writing to your members of Congress. Urge them to robustly fund space science in FY 2026 & beyond. Every letter makes a difference! You can use our prompts for inspiration. #WeekOfAction aas.org/advocacy/get...
#withoutNSF this work would end and so would my career as an astrophysicist. This is not just about science, it’s about the support it provides real life people and communities.
#NSF is now funding my postdoc where I am doing research to disentangle stellar signals from planetary ones to better understand the implications for habitability. It’s also allowing me to provide educational support and mentorship to incarcerated youth.
#NSF funded a critical 3 years of my grad studies (at a time when I was almost forced out of the field). It is the reason I was able to finish my PhD.
I will keep posting about this because I want people to know it continues, and it is a lot more than the individual cases we see in the news. >1000 students at 170+ universities across 43 states now. Thank you @insidehighered.com and @amowreader.com www.insidehighered.com/news/global/...
I will surely come up with something thoughtful to say about the proposal to cut NASA's science budget in half, and especially one that reminds everyone that the cosmos is worth our curiosity and NASA explores it quite cheaply but also, FUCK FUCK FUCK, that's a major cut to climate change science 🧪
First the rumour was a 20% budget cut. Then, 50%. Now the president's NASA budget is out and it's a 68% cut to astrophysics ($1.5B to $487M).
Even if this gets reversed in four years, we will *never* recover the missions, partners, people who will be gone.
www.washingtonpost.com/science/2025...
Huge congratulations!!🥳
Hola new followers 👋
Quick #intro:
I am an NSF postdoc at JHU who uses space based telescopes 🔭🛰️ to study the relationship between stars and exoplanets 🌟
WA born Mexicana 🇲🇽
First generation
Bilingual (ES, EN)
Dog + plant mom🐶🪴
Sports enthusiast 🏀⚽️🏈🥊
Baile 💃🏻
