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Cosmochemical measurements reveal the existence of two distinct reservoirs of non-carbonaceous and carbonaceous materials, originating from the inner and outer protoplanetary disk, respectively, which separated after the first million years after the birth of the Solar System, possibly due to the rapid growth of Jupiter’s core.
Thermonuclear supernovae — those involving the explosion of a white dwarf — and particularly type-Ia supernovae, have become indispensable tools for observationally measuring the expansion of the Universe. However, we still do not fully understand these objects, especially the range of progenitor systems that give rise to them. Future observations will enable us to make headway.
The diversity of core-collapse supernovae — the explosions of massive stars — has increased greatly recently, driven by developments in observing facilities and techniques. Here Modjaz, Gutiérrez and Arcavi survey the current observational classifications, question whether the lines are starting to blur and look forward to the large samples of supernovae that are to come.
The latest observational developments in the fast-paced fields of superluminous supernovae and fast blue optical transients, both types of extreme supernovae, are reviewed. The next decade, with the advent of survey facilities such as the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, will deliver many more examples of such objects.
This article reviews radio emission mechanisms in radio-quiet active galactic nuclei (AGNs), from star formation and AGN winds, to free-free emission from photoionized gas and AGN disk coronal activity. These mechanisms can be probed by sensitive radio observatories.
Current black hole spin measurements, in X-rays, radio and gravitational waves, are already constraining models for the growth of black holes, the dynamics of stellar core-collapse and the physics of relativistic jet production.
Supermassive black holes are fed through galaxy interactions and mergers, chaotic cold accretion in galaxy clusters and secular processes that may include stellar bars. Observations constraining these mechanisms at different scales are reviewed.
