Happy Solstice!  As good a day as any to talk about ” . . . Celestial transients, which are astronomical objects that appear suddenly from nowhere and usually disappear soon after, that contradict the standard truth that the universe changes predictably and slowly over billions of years. They include what the typically staid National Academy of Sciences called “the most catastrophic events in spacetime.”  [Quote from a Scientific American newsletter article titled, Mysterious Bright Flashes in the Night Sky, December 16, 2025, by Ann Finkbeiner and Clara Moskowitz.   [Click on image to enlarge].

This is a relatively long read, but well worth the time it takes if you are feeling self-important at the moment.  Prepare to be humbled by the immensity and the mysteries of the cosmos.  Astrophysics is experiencing a golden age, thanks to the tools . . . orbiting telescopes, ground based radio telescopes, stellar and interstellar probes, etc., and the ever greater computing power available to process data.  Of still greater importance is the international cooperation of scientists  made possible by the World Wide Web.

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