Showing 1 – 12 of 2864
THE large-scale optical view and 36.2 GHz methanol maser distribution in NGC 1365. From Chen et al. 2026.

Shocks in NGC 1365 Revealed by 36 GHz Methanol Masers

March 10, 2026

The barred spiral galaxy NGC 1365, at a distance of ~20 mega-parsecs, is a premier local-Universe laboratory for dissecting the extreme physical conditions and interplay of processes within a galactic […]

X-ray, radio and optical light-curves of the low-mass X-ray binary GX 339–4 over a five year monitoring campaign. The bottom panel shows optical magnitudes, the second panel shows X-ray data and the radio flux densities measured by MeerKAT (red:upper limits and blue:detections) and ATCA (pink and orange data points) are shown in the third panel. The top panel shows in purple the Swift/XRT 3-9 keV X-ray fluxes that were obtained quasi-simultaneously with the radio observations.

Five years of multi-wavelength monitoring of GX 339–4

March 9, 2026

Low mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs) are interacting binary stars that contain a low mass star (less that three times the mass of the Sun; the companion or donor star), which […]

A comparison of RACS-mid1 and RACS-mid2 sensitivities across the sky.

Second RACS-mid epoch released

March 6, 2026

by Emil Lenc and the RACS team A second epoch of RACS (Rapid ASKAP Continuum Survey) in the mid-frequency band has been completed and made available to the astronomical community […]

Group photo from the Asian-Pacific SKA meeting held in Chiang Mai, Thailand, in February 2026.

Asian-Pacific SKA meeting

March 5, 2026

by Ivy Wong The picture above is the conference photo for the inaugural Asian Pacific SKA Science meeting held in Chiang Mai, Thailand that was kindly hosted by the National […]

A plot of searches for total eclipses on google trends and associated interest in the Bonnie Tyler song Total Eclipse of the Heart. Image credit: Rami Mandow

Total eclipse sing-along?

March 4, 2026

There was a lunar eclipse last night (which was completely clouded out in Sydney). ATNF co-supervised PhD student Rami Mandow was posting some news about the lunar eclipse on Instagram […]

Screenshot from an animation showing the shifts of background astronomical objects seen in ASKAP data following a powerful solar flare. Red and blue show shifts in opposite directions, the length of the arrow is the magnitude of the shift, and the grey lines are the direction of the Earth's magnetic field lines. Credit: Emil Lenc

A Cosmic “Mexican Wave”

March 3, 2026

By Emil Lenc In early April 2025, I investigated a sustained degradation in the quality of ASKAP images collected over several consecutive days to determine whether the issue arose from […]

The Period-Acceleration diagram for the pulsar 47 Tuc ai. The data points are the barycentric spin periods and line-of-sight accelerations as measured on seven different epochs where the pulsar was blindly detected. The best-fit parametric curve (solid black line), implying a mild orbital eccentricity (e ≈ 0.18). From Risbud et al. 2026.

A massive, eccentric binary system in the 47 Tuc

March 2, 2026

Risbud et al. present describe the discovery of PSR J0024−7204ai, a 13.026 millisecond binary pulsar in the globular cluster 47 Tucanae. 47 Tuc ai was first detected in a MeerKAT […]

Murriyang cryoPAF neutral hydrogen RGB images of the LMC from 165.9 to 318.2 km/s (barycentric) in chunks of width 38 km/s. Each colour channel has a width of 12.7 km/s, with the blue channel starting at the lowest velocity in each image. From Staveley-Smith et al. 2026

Murriyang cryoPAF: spectral line results

February 27, 2026

Staveley-Smith et al. present spectral-line results from the new cryogenic phased array feed (cryoPAF) on Murriyang, the Parkes radiotelescope. The cryoPAF offers a significant improvement in field of view, aperture […]

A comparison of HI spectra at a similar position within the LMC. The red spectrum is a 5 second archival multibeam spectrum from 1998. The blue spectrum is 10 s of data from a cryoPAF beam from 2024 November, smoothed to a similar resolution as the multibeam data (3.9 kHz). No bandpass calibration or baseline fitting has been applied to either spectrum -- illustrating the intrinsic flatness of the cryoPAF spectrum. From Staveley-Smith et al. 2026

Murriyang cryoPAF: spectral-line results

February 26, 2026

Staveley-Smith et al. present spectral-line results from the new cryogenic phased array feed (cryoPAF) on Murriyang, the Parkes radiotelescope. The cryoPAF offers a significant improvement in field of view, aperture […]

Image for Joe Grundy's colloquium, 25 Feb 2026

ATNF Colloquium — Joe Grundy (Curtin University)

February 25, 2026

Investigating the Complex Radio Spectra and Infrared-Radio Correlation in Nearby Starforming Galaxies Abstract: In my recently accepted thesis, I examined the radio continuum emission of galaxies to determine how the […]

CryoPAF commissioning data for Staveley-Smith et al. 2026 were taken on 2024 November 18 for the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). The LMC data consist of 66 minutes of azimuth-elevation tracks of 49 discrete pointing centres with all 72 beams, i.e. ∼80 sec per pointing. The 7 × 7 pointing pattern used to observe the LMC, with the closepack72 beam footprint shown at each pointing position.

Murriyang cryoPAF: spectral-line results and noise-reduction methods

February 24, 2026

Staveley-Smith et al. present spectral-line results from the new cryogenic phased array feed (cryoPAF) on Murriyang, the Parkes radiotelescope. The cryoPAF offers a significant improvement in field of view, aperture […]

The cryoPAF closepack72 beam footprint defining the arrangement of beams within the field of view. The radius of each blue circle is 0.1 deg; the hatched red circle represents the approximate beam size at 1.4 GHz (∼0.24 deg). From Staveley-Smith et al. 2026

Murriyang cryoPAF: spectral-line results and noise-reduction methods

February 23, 2026

Staveley-Smith et al. present spectral-line results from the new cryogenic phased array feed (cryoPAF) on Murriyang, the Parkes radiotelescope. The cryoPAF offers a significant improvement in field of view, aperture […]

Welcome to the ATNF Daily Astronomy Picture (ADAP), brought to you by staff and users of the Australia Telescope National Facility (ATNF). Our aim is to present science and engineering results, research highlights from recent publications, technical updates, telescope pictures, conference summaries, etc.

Our site was inspired by the fabulous Astronomy Picture of the Day – @APOD and the ASTRON/Jive Daily Image – @dailyimage.

We welcome all ATNF users to submit an image related to our facilities (Parkes, ATCA, Mopra, ASKAP and LBA), together with a brief description and credits. Submissions can be emailed to the ADAP curator, (phil.edwards [at] csiro.au).

The ADAP was created in December 2014 by Baerbel Koribalski and Simon Johnston. Over 2500 ADAPs have now been published. Vince McIntyre, Nathan Pope, and Andrew O’Brien are acknowledged for their dedicated technical support. The ADAP is currently curated by Phil Edwards.