This Week in Astronomy: SPHEREx, Dark Dwarfs and an Interestellar Object

maps the entire sky in infrared. NASA recently launched a new space telescope called SPHEREx, which started its mission in March. This telescope is now orbiting the Earth and has begun scanning the entire sky to create a massive, detailed map of the universe. What makes this mission special is that Spherrex sends the data it collects to a public archive every week. That means anyone, scientists, students, or curious people can use this information to explore space and study how

the universe works. SPHEREx stands for Spectrophotometer for the History of the Universe, Epic of Reonization, and ICE's Explorer. It looks at the sky using infrared light, a type of light that's invisible to our eyes but very useful in space science. Unlike some past missions, like NASA's earlier Wise telescope, which used four infrared wavelengths, SPHEREx observes the sky in one hundred and two different infrared wavelengths. This gives scientists

a much more detailed view. By using all of these wavelengths together, researchers can detect the presence of specific molecules in space through a technique called spectroscopy. This allows them to study where frozen water and organic molecules, ingredients important for life, are located in the Milky Way Galaxy, the key pieces of the puzzle for understanding how stars, planets, and possibly life itself begin to form. But that's not

all SPHEREx can do. Scientists will also use the data to investigate what caused the universe to expand after the Big Bang and how much light all the galaxies have emitted over time. Because the data has made public, scientists around the world can study many different things that go beyond what the original SPHEREx team could cover by themselves.

NASA is committed to open science, which means they want everyone to have access to the data, so SPHEREx sends its data to a public archive within sixty days of collecting it. In that short time, the SPHEREx team processes the data. They clean it up, correct technical issues from the detectors, and make sure everything is properly aligned with the stars and galaxies in the sky. Over its two year main mission, SPHEREx will skin the entire sky twice

a year, making four full sky maps in total. After one year, they plan to release a full map showing the sky in all one hundred and two infrared wavelengths. The data from SPHEREx is especially useful when combined with other space missions. For example, it can help NASA's James

Webb Space Telescope choose better targets to study. It can also improve the accuracy of planet data from the Test mission and support research into dark matter and dark energy when used with the European Space Agency's EUCLID mission or NASA's future Roman Space Telescope. All this data is stored in NASA's IRSA Archive Infrared Science Archive, which already holds information from past space missions. Together, this creates a rich collection of space data that researchers can use to explore

all kinds of cosmic mysteries. SPHEREx is now part of NASA's long tradition of space surveys. As one scientist said, people are going to find all sorts of creative and surprising ways to use the data, many of which we can't even imagine yet. Dark dwarfs may reveal the true nature of dark matter. Some scientists think there might be a new kind of object hidden in the center of our galaxy. These mysterious things are called dark dwarfs, and they could help explain one of the biggest mysteries in

the universe, what dark matter really is. A group of researchers from the UK and Hawaii wrote a paper about these dark dwarfs. They believe we could find them using powerful telescopes we already have, like the James Webb Space Telescope. They gave them the name dark dwarfs because of their strong connection with dark matter, not because they are actually dark in appearance. Dark matter is a strange kind of matter that makes up about twenty five percent of the universe.

We can't see it because it doesn't give off flight, but we know it's there because of the way it affects gravity. Even those scientists have studied it for decades, nobody knows exactly what it is. That's why research like this is exciting. It might give us clues. There's a popular idea that dark matter is made of very heavy particles that don't interact with normal matter. These particles are called whimps, weakly interacting massive particles. They're invisible and silent,

but they do have gravity. If dark matter is made of whimps, then it might be possible for some stars to catch and hold them. If enough of this dark matter builds up inside a star, the particles might destroy each other annihilate, which releases energy and makes the star shine. Regular stars like our sun shine because of nuclear fusion in their course, but that only happens when a star is big enough. If a star is too small, like only eight percent the size of our sun, it can't

start fusion. These small stars are called brown dwarfs, and they're usually very dim. But if a brown dwarf is in a place with lots of dark matter, like the center of the galaxy, it could collect enough of it to start glowing, not because of fusion, but because of the energy from the dark matter inside it. When that happens, it's no longer just a brown dwarf. It becomes a dark dwarf. This only works if dark matter is made

of the heavy self interacting kind like whimps. Other ideas for dark matter, like axioms or ultra light particles wouldn't work because they're too light and can't create the same energy inside stars. The scientists also thought of a way to tell if something is a dark dwarf and not just a normal brown dwarf. They say to look for lithium seven, a special version of lithium. Regular stars burn through lithium seven quickly, so if we find a glowing object with lithium seven still in it, it could be

a sign that it's a dark dwarf. Telescopes like James Webb might already be able to spot these dark dwarfs, especially if we look at groups of faint stars and study their patterns. If we find one or more dark dwarfs, that would be a strong clue that dark matter is made of whimps or something very similar. We still wouldn't be one hundred percent sure what dark matter is, but

it would narrow it down a lot. Finding a dark dwarf wouldn't solve the whole mystery, but it would be a big step forward in understanding this invisible part of the universe. Late on July first, twenty twenty five, astronomers watching the skies with an asteroid warning system spotted something unusual. A big, bright object was moving quickly through the Solar System. It immediately caught the attention of scientists around the world because it looked like it might have come from outside

our Solar system. The next day, the European Space Agency confirmed that this object, first called a eleven PL three and later renamed three ice slash Atlas, really did come from beyond the Solar System. It's only the third object ever found that isn't originally from our solar neighborhood. Three ice slash Atlas is very large, about twenty kilometers wide, and although it won't come close to Earth, it's still

very interesting. Scientists believe it could help explain how planets form in other Solar systems and give more insight into the other two interstellar objects that were found before, Umyuamua and two ice slash Borisov. Each of those had very different features. Umyuamua didn't have a tail and moved in strange ways that weren't fully explained by gravity. Borisov looked more like a regular comet, but still had unusual parts

in its makeup. Everyone expected the next object to look like one of those, but three ice slash atlasts doesn't look like either. That surprised and excited scientists. Object is much brighter than the others and is also much farther away, yet telescopes can still see it clearly. That's because it's so big. Since it's visible from far away, astronomers will have more time to study it than they did with Umuamua or boris Off. It's also moving very fast, which

makes it even more unusual. At first, scientists weren't sure if it was really from outside the Solar System. Sometimes things seem interesting at first, but as more information comes in they turn out to be less exciting. But in this case, as more data was gathered, experts became more convinced that it really is interstellar. They could tell by looking at how the object moves. One of the main things that tells astronomers if something came from another star

system is its orbit. Most objects in the Solar System travel in circles or stretched out circles called ellipsies. But if an object travels in a way that never loops back and instead shoots off into space, that's called a hyperbolic orbit. It means the object is not tied to the Sun's gravity and didn't come from this solar system. Scientists can figure this out by watching how fast the object is moving and comparing its position to the stars in the background. As they get more data, they update

their understanding of its path through space. Interstellar objects like three ice slash Atlas are special because they are leftovers from how other solar systems formed. In our own solar system, small objects like asteroids and comets have taught us a lot about how planets were created. If we study an object from another system, we can learn how that system was different or similar to ours. Scientists are still trying to figure out what kind of object three ice slash

Atlas is. It might be a comet like Borisov, or it might behaved strangely like Umuamua. If it turns out to be a comet, they will want to know if it contains ice. Ice tells scientists a lot about where the object came from. If the object still has ice it probably didn't spend much time near a star because the heat would have melted it. That would mean the object formed far from its star and was possibly pushed

out by a giant planet like Jupiter or Neptune. In the end, this object might help scientists understand more about other parts of the galaxy. It's still early, but many telescopes are already focusing on it. In the coming days and weeks, scientists hope to gather much more information and possibly unlock new secrets about how planets form in distant solar systems. To do, as the name m