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Weekly Update from the Open Journal of Astrophysics 29/08/2026

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags arXiv:2507.03074v2, arXiv:2508.16759v2, arXiv:2509.25399v2, arXiv:2512.18076v2, arXiv:2602.21863v3, arXiv:2603.22400v2, arXiv:2604.07068v2, arXiv:2604.22048v3, arXiv:2604.27161v2, arXiv:2606.30129v2, arXiv:2608.23459v1, arXiv:2608.26513v1, Astrophysics of Galaxies, Cosmology and NonGalactic Astrophysics, Diamond Open Access, Diamond Open Access Publishing, Earth and Planetary Astrophysics, High-Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, Open Access, Open Access Publishing., Solar and Stellar Astrophysics on August 29, 2026 by telescoper

After a very busy week, it’s time once more for another Saturday update of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Since the last update we have published a further twelve papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 189 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 637. As I pointed out on Wednesday this week is the first during which we have published at least one paper in each of the six categories on astro-ph.

I continue to include the posts made on our Mastodon account (on Fediscience); these announcements also show the DOI for each paper. The Mastodon account has regular updates and announcements from OJAp too.

In the past on these posts I have included the article keywords as tags, but this is quite a lot of effort to do for little benefit so I’ve decided just to tag the arXiv category (i.e. folder) and arXiv ID for each paper as well as the lede from the journal platform.

The first one up this week was published on Monday 24th August 2026 in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies. “Energy-Space Analysis of Tidal Stripping in Stellar-Dark Matter Systems“, by Bradley Arias (UC Berkeley, USA), Nicole E. Drakos (U. Hawaii, USA) and James E. Taylor (U. Waterloo, Canada), uses simulations to explore how tidal stripping shapes the stellar distribution of dwarf galaxies, also suggesting a pathway for the formation of galaxies deficient in dark matter

You can find the officially accepted version on arXiv here and the announcement on Fediverse here:

The second paper for this week, also published on Monday 24th August but in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics is “Second Order Closures for the Radiative Transfer Equation: Some Are Unstable” by Nickolay Y. Gnedin and Harley Katz (U.Chicago, USA). This study explores higher-order closure relations in cosmic reionization simulations, finding that direct generalizations of M1 and OTVET are physically unstable, limiting second-order closure options.

The overlay looks like this:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The third paper of the week, yet another one published on Monday 24th August this time in the folder Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics is “Differentiable Forward Modeling for Efficient and Accurate Shear Inference” by Ismael Mendoza and 7 others on behalf of the LSST Dark Energy Science Collaboration. This study presents a modern implementation of the Bayesian shear inference framework for measuring cosmic shear signal in dark energy optical surveys, requiring no external calibration to handle noise bias.

The overlay is here:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The fourth paper of the week, published on Tuesday 25th August in the folder Solar and Stellar Astrophysics is “BLG723.31.34651 as an eclipsing Roche lobe-filling sdOB+WD binary” by Alekzander Kosakowski, Charles E. Derbyshire, Sydney Jetton and Brad N. Barlow (University of North Carolina, USA).

The overlay is here:

The officially-accepted version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The fifth paper of the week is “Differentiable Halo Mass Prediction and the Cosmology-Dependence of Halo Mass Functions” by Jim Buisman, Florian List and Oliver Hahn (U. Vienna, Austria). This was published on Tuesday 25th August in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics; it presents a novel approach using a differentiable neural network model for predicting dark matter haloes abundance and their cosmology dependence, achieving competitive accuracy in identifying protohalo regions.Abstractfor Differentiable Halo Mass Prediction and the Cosmology-Dependence of Halo Mass Functions.

The overlay is here:

The officially-accepted version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The sixth paper of the week is “An astrometric search for planets in debris disk systems” by Elisabeth M Penderghast & Benjamin C Bromley (U. Utah, USA), Scott J Kenyon (Smithsonian Astrophys. Obs., USA) and Joan R Najita (NSF NOIRLab, USA). This was published on Tuesday 25th August 2026 in the folder Earth and Planetary Astrophysics. This study uses Gaia astrometric data and machine learning to identify stars with debris disks that may host undiscovered planets, providing potential subjects for future analyses.

The overlay is here:

You can find the officially-accepted version of the paper on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

Paper number seven for the week is “Precision Spectroscopy for 1.7 Million Galaxies from SDSS-IV: Improved Spectral Measurements and Catalogs for eBOSS” by Owen Matthews Acuña (U. Wisconsin Madison, USA) and 8 others based at various instititions in the USA. This was published on Tuesday 25th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies. The paper presents an extensive spectroscopic catalog and other data products for the EBOSS galaxy sample, opening the door to a new generation of studies in galaxy evolution and cosmology.

The overlay for this paper looks like this:

The officially-accepted paper can be found on arXiv here and the fediverse announcement follows

The eighth paper of the week, published on Wednesday 27th August in the folder High-Energy Astrophysical Phenomena is the one that completed our full house for the week. This study presents XRISM observations of the merging cluster Abell 2034, revealing the broadest emission lines yet seen in a galaxy cluster, indicating potential turbulence and core disruption.

The overlay is here:

You can find the official version on arXiv here and the Mastodon announcement is here

The ninth paper of the week is “Visualizing Disequilibrium: Tracing Two-Point Correlations to Specific Spatial Structures in the Milky Way” by Austin Hinkel and Josephine Vanzant (Thomas More U. USA). This paper, published on Friday 27th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies, presents an algorithm that enhances the Two-Point Correlation Function, enabling detailed visualization of spatial clustering and complex structures in the Milky Way.

The overlay for this one looks like this:

You can find the officially-accepted version of the paper on arXiv here and the fediverse announcement is here:

The tenth paper of the week is “Assessing Self-Absorbed Molecular Lines as Tracers of Gravitational Collapse” by Lillian Y. Cai (Priinceton U., USA) and Felix D. Priestley & Sarah E. Ragan (Cardiff U., UK). This paper, reveals that traditional observational techniques probably underestimate true infall velocities and mass accretion rates in collapsing prestellar cores due to non-uniform radial velocity profiles.

The overlay for this one is here:

The officially accepted version can be found on arXiv here and here is the fediverse announcement:

The penultimate paper of the week, the eleventh, is “The Impact of Non-Gaussian Line Spread Functions on Stellar Kinematic Recovery: Consequences for Dynamical Models” by David A. Simon (Oxford University, UK). This article was also published on 28th August 2026 in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies. It explores the impact of non-Gaussian line spread function (LSF) profiles on stellar kinematics recovery. A method was developed to reduce bias in dispersion, with a Python implementation available.

A screenshot of the overlay for this one is here:

The final accepted version can be found on arXiv here and the fediverse announcement is here:

The last paper of the twelve to announce this week is “Impact and interplay of ΛCDM analysis choices for LSST cosmic shear” by Naomi Clare Robertson and 11 others for the FLAMINGO Team and the LSST Dark Energy Science Collaboration. This was also published on Friday 28th August 2026, but in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics. The study forecasts cosmological parameter constraints for a cosmic shear analysis of the Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), emphasizing the need for improved methods. This is what the overlay looks like:

The final accepted version can be found on arXiv here and the fediverse announcement is here:

And that concludes the papers for this week, which turned out to be a bumper one! I’ll do another update next weekend.

2 Comments »

A “Full House” at the Open Journal of Astrophysics!

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags arXiv, Diamond Open Access, High-Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, Open Journal of Astrophysics, The Open Journal of Astrophysics on August 26, 2026 by telescoper

In my recent weekly updates of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics, the latest of which is here, I’ve remarked that we had built up quite a backlog of papers accepted but yet to be published. This is no doubt due to August being a holiday for many researchers. Well, we seem to be catching up rather rapidly. So far this week we have published eight new papers, and it’s only Wednesday!

The recent burst of activity has led to us establishing a first, a week in which we have published a full house of at least one paper in each of the six sections of astro-ph on the arXiv. As a reminder, these are they:

astro-ph.GA – Astrophysics of Galaxies. Phenomena pertaining to galaxies or the Milky Way. Star clusters, HII regions and planetary nebulae, the interstellar medium, atomic and molecular clouds, dust. Stellar populations. Galactic structure, formation, dynamics. Galactic nuclei, bulges, disks, halo. Active Galactic Nuclei, supermassive black holes, quasars. Gravitational lens systems. The Milky Way and its contents
astro-ph.CO – Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics. Phenomenology of early universe, cosmic microwave background, cosmological parameters, primordial element abundances, extragalactic distance scale, large-scale structure of the universe. Groups, superclusters, voids, intergalactic medium. Particle astrophysics: dark energy, dark matter, baryogenesis, leptogenesis, inflationary models, reheating, monopoles, WIMPs, cosmic strings, primordial black holes, cosmological gravitational radiation
astro-ph.EP – Earth and Planetary Astrophysics. Interplanetary medium, planetary physics, planetary astrobiology, extrasolar planets, comets, asteroids, meteorites. Structure and formation of the solar system
astro-ph.HE – High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena. Cosmic ray production, acceleration, propagation, detection. Gamma ray astronomy and bursts, X-rays, charged particles, supernovae and other explosive phenomena, stellar remnants and accretion systems, jets, microquasars, neutron stars, pulsars, black holes
astro-ph.IM – Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics. Detector and telescope design, experiment proposals. Laboratory Astrophysics. Methods for data analysis, statistical methods. Software, database design
astro-ph.SR – Solar and Stellar Astrophysics. White dwarfs, brown dwarfs, cataclysmic variables. Star formation and protostellar systems, stellar astrobiology, binary and multiple systems of stars, stellar evolution and structure, coronas. Central stars of planetary nebulae. Helioseismology, solar neutrinos, production and detection of gravitational radiation from stellar systems.

As of yesterday we had published in five of the six categories and were only missing a paper (in Number 4 – High-Energy Astrophysical Phenomena). Today, right on cue, from the queue, came this paper to complete the set:

There’s still a couple of days to go and we have more papers in the pipeline so it looks like I’ll have a busy time on Saturday morning when I do the next update!

1 Comment »

Weekly Update from the Open Journal of Astrophysics 22/08/2026

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags arXiv:2602.00820v2, arXiv:2604.18688v2, arXiv:2605.13472v2, arXiv:2606.06270v2, arXiv:2606.17270v2, arXiv:2607.00167v2, Astrophysics of Galaxies, Cosmology and NonGalactic Astrophysics, Diamond Open Access, Diamond Open Access Publishing, Open Access, Open Access Publishing., Solar and Stellar Astrophysics on August 22, 2026 by telescoper

Later than usual, it’s time once more for another Saturday update of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Since the last update we have published a further six papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 177 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 625.

I continue to include the posts made on our Mastodon account (on Fediscience); these announcements also show the DOI for each paper. In the past on these posts I have included the article keywords as tags, but this is quite a lot of effort to do for little benefit so I’ve decided just to tag the arXiv category (i.e. folder) and arXiv ID for each paper.

The first one up this week was published on Tuesday 18th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies. The article “Ghostly DLAs in SDSS DR16” by Patrick Petitjean (Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris, France). This study revisits the origin of proximate damped Lyman-alpha absorbers (PDLAs), associating most with the AGN or quasar host galaxy environment..

You can find the officially accepted version on arXiv here and the announcement on Fediverse here:

The second paper for this week, also published on Tuesday 18th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies is “Dust in the Average Galaxy: Attenuation, Emission, and Opacity from 0<z<7” by Caitlin M. Casey (University of California Santa Barbara, USA) and an international cast of 45 others. This study analyzes over 500,000 galaxies to understand dust emission and attenuation properties. Findings reveal UV/optical attenuation underestimates IR luminosity, and dust constraints are crucial for understanding star-forming galaxies.

The overlay looks like this:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The third paper of the week, yet another one published on Tuesday 18th August Astrophysics of Galaxies, is “First Light And Reionization Epoch Simulations (FLARES) XXI: The UV Indices of Galaxies in the Early Universe” by Connor Sant Fournier (University of Malta, Malta) and 7 others based in Malta and the UK. This study uses synthetic spectral modelling and cosmological simulations to assess UV absorption line indices as reliable tracers of stellar metallicity in high-redshift galaxies.

The overlay is here:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The fourth paper of the week is “White dwarf + M dwarf Detached Binaries in Long Period Radio Transients: Observed Binary Parameters, Evolution, and Population Constraints” by Antonio Rodriguez (Harvard-Smithsonian CfA, USA), Kareem El-Badry (Caltech, USA), Iris de Ruiter (U. Sydney, Australia), Kaustubh Rajwade (U. Oxford, UK), Edo Berger & Liam Connor (CfA) and Natasha Hurley-Walker (Curtin U., Australia). This was published on Wednesday 19th August in the folder Solar and Stellar Astrophysics. This article presents new findings on long period radio transients (LPTs), slow-pulsing radio sources, associated with M dwarf-white dwarf systems., suggests these systems are part of a significant Galactic population of such objects.

The overlay is here:

The officially-accepted version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The fifth paper of the week is “Cosmological Dynamics of Multi-Axion Quintessence” by Supakorn Katewongveerachart (Mahidol U., Thailand) and David J. E. Marsh, King’s College London, UK). This was published on Thursday 20th August 2026 in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics. This study explores dark energy dynamics, and their potential observational consequences, for a cosmological model with two, three or four axion fields.

The overlay is here:

The officially-accepted version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

Finally for this week, the sixth paper of the week is “How can we finally see the first light? Status and perspective in the search for Population III stars” by Alessandra Venditti (U. Texas Austin, USA) and 28 others from around the world. This was published on Thursday August 20th in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies. This review article discusses the ongoing search for the first stars (Population III), their formation, and characteristics. It highlights various observational strategies and the role of advanced technology in this quest. This can perhaps act as a reminder that we do publish review articles, as long as the Editorial Board and the reviewers consider them a useful contribution to the literature.

The overlay is here:

You can find the officially-accepted version of the paper on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

And that’s all for this week. We’re starting to clear the backlog of papers accepted through the summer but yet to be published, but it will probably take a few weeks to do so completely.

2 Comments »

The Cuts to LHCb – Guest Post by William Barter

Posted in Science Politics, The Universe and Stuff with tags CERN, LHCb, Particle Physics, Science and Technology Facilities Council, STFC, STFC Crisis, William Barter on August 19, 2026 by telescoper

The following is a guest post by William Barter, who recently finished a term as the ‘physics coordinator’ of LHCb-UK.

–o–

The European particle physics community recently undertook a two-year process to update our strategy – setting out the things that we, as a field, choose to prioritise. The highest priority in that update was “the full exploitation of the physics potential of the Large Hadron Collider”. Despite our consensus, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) has decided to pull UK funding for the next-generation upgrade of LHCb, one of four large experiments at the LHC. This decision was made for financial reasons; the science case for the upgrade is not in question, and current LHCb operations are fully funded. With this cut, we are experiencing the same pain as many of our astrophysics colleagues. Our plans and ambitions have been hit by self-defeating decisions from the same funding body.

For decades we have known that our current theory of fundamental quantum physics – the Standard Model of Particle Physics – is incomplete, but a fuller picture eludes us. The LHCb Upgrade offers a unique way to explore this science. Our experiment, operated by around 2000 scientists from 28 countries, is dedicated to the study of beauty and charm quarks, fundamental particles whose behaviour can be measurably influenced by Beyond Standard Model phenomena. Through these studies we hope to unlock a new understanding of how nature works at its most fundamental levels. The upgrade, planned for the 2030s, would enable us to take five times more data than is possible with our current experiment.

LHCb has a tremendous record of success. We are responsible for discovering more particles than any other particle physics experiment in history, including new forms of matter: pentaquarks and tetraquarks. The LHCb Upgrade would be the only experiment capable of finding many more. That’s not all. One of the only things we know about the physics that lies beyond the Standard Model is that we expect it to introduce differences in the behaviour of matter and antimatter, in order to explain why our universe is made out of particles rather than antiparticles. LHCb is uniquely able to make the dedicated and precise measurements needed to probe this physics in the quark sector. Measurements at LHCb are also directly sensitive to the quantum imprints of new fundamental particles. We are able to explore energy scales far beyond those directly accessible at the LHC. In the same way that the discovery of radioactivity gave us key insights into the weak force more than 80 years before the observation of the fundamental particle responsible, the W boson, new fundamental particles can also influence our measurements of beauty and charm quarks. It will take us at least another 50 years to reach the same energies that LHCb probes using future particle colliders. Put simply: the LHCb Upgrade offers a unique and compelling physics programme that complements and extends what is possible at the other LHC experiments.

These opportunities were already recognised by UKRI, who had previously committed to funding the upgrade. In addition to making physics sense, this investment met UKRI’s funding strategy. UKRI has the goal of securing “an average of £3 of additional investment for every £1 of public funding”. International partners were expected to contribute their share of the overall cost of the project on top of the UK contribution, leveraging almost five times the UK contribution. Given the widespread international support for the project, it was no surprise when the previous executive chair of STFC, the part of UKRI responsible for funding particle physics, nuclear physics, and astrophysics, included the fact that he had “secur[ed] the UK’s investment in the LHCb Upgrade” in his successful government-backed manifesto for the CERN Director General role. The recent backpedalling from UKRI therefore has broader consequences: it has raised difficult questions about which promises our international partners can trust the UK to keep. It’s hard to see how we can be relied on in future international collaborations if we are the reason that the LHCb Upgrade falls apart now.

And there are other, potentially larger, ramifications. Other future projects across the STFC remit have seen similar cuts. The decisions amount to a lack of ambition for fundamental research in the 2030s. One of the key purposes of STFC is to fund research over long timescales, understanding that Big Science areas like particle physics and astronomy require a stable approach that goes beyond any individual government spending review period. However, the decision to resile from new particle physics goals and commitments for the 2030s because of claimed cost overruns in the next few years completely rejects this mission. This will have a lasting impact: LHCb is simply one of the first examples, with the UK programme in particle physics, astrophysics, and nuclear physics due to contract significantly in the coming years as a result of UKRI’s choices.

So, where does this leave things? All is not lost. These decisions were communicated to us by UKRI at a strange moment, when the UK government was handing over between Sir Keir Starmer and Andy Burnham, while DSIT – the government department that oversees UKRI – was being disbanded, and while its replacement, BIST, was being set up. We know that Big Science is key to the UK’s scientific strategy: our work enthuses and inspires the next generation of scientists and researchers. The people we train enter the workforce skilled in modern data science techniques, ready to tackle the biggest problems with new approaches. There is still a window of opportunity for BIST to act and find a solution to the problem they’ve been handed. When news of the UKRI cuts broke, the incoming Secretary of State, Jonathan Reynolds, committed to investing in “the next generation of scientific facilities and infrastructure”. We now wait to see whether he means what he said, and if he will save UK particle physics, astrophysics, and nuclear physics from the self-defeating damage unleashed by UKRI.

7 Comments »

Quantum Dry

Posted in The Universe and Stuff with tags Dry Water, Physics, Quantum Dry, superfluid, viscosity on August 18, 2026 by telescoper

I was taken aback by the description “QUANTUM DRY” but then I remembered Chapter 40 of the Feynman Lectures on Physics on the topic of The Flow of Dry Water, by which is meant the flow of a fluid with zero viscosity (i.e. inviscid flow). I therefore infer that the material of which this product is composed is a quantum superfluid, i.e. a quantum fluid with zero viscosity. Can someone point me to the scientific literature on superfluid anti-perspirants?

A Little Light Relief…

Posted in Biographical, Maynooth, The Universe and Stuff with tags 1919 Eclipse Expeditions, 1919 Solar Eclipse, Maynooth University on August 17, 2026 by telescoper

I thought I’d pass on a little amusement arising from last week’s Eclipse Event in Maynooth. I gave a very short and non-technical talk about the famous 1919 Eclipse Expeditions which I have mentioned many times on this blog. As you probably know there were two expeditions, one to Sobral in Brazil and the other to the island of Principe, off the coast of Equatorial Guinea. Here’s a nice and very informative old graphic (from the London Illustrated News) about the expeditions, showing the two locations:

I finished my talk and had one or two questions but we had to move on to the next speaker, who happened to be giving the last talk of the day.

After the session finished I was packing up some things to take back to the office before heading to the pub when a little boy came up to me and asked: “So which expedition were you on, the one to Brazil or the one to Africa?”

Oh how I laughed. 😐

1 Comment »

Weekly Update from the Open Journal of Astrophysics 15/08/2026

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags arXiv:2511.01361v3, arXiv:2601.02886v3, arXiv:2604.06314v2, arXiv:2604.23823v2, Astrophysics of Galaxies, blazars, cosmic homogeneity, cosmological principle, Cosmology and NonGalactic Astrophysics, Diamond Open Access, Diamond Open Access Publishing, dust grains, galaxy evolution, galaxy formation, gamma-ray astronomy, GLIMPSE survey, High-Energy Astrophysical Phenomena, high-energy cosmic rays, hydrodynamic simulations, neutrinos, Open Access, Open Access Publishing., peculiar velocities on August 15, 2026 by telescoper

Although it’s still holiday season for some, it’s time once more for another Saturday update of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Since the last update we have published a further four papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 171 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 619.

I continue to include the posts made on our Mastodon account (on Fediscience); these announcements also show the DOI for each paper.

The first paper to report this week was published on Monday 10th August in the folder High-Energy Astrophysical Phenomena. “Search for neutrino emission from blazar γ-ray flares accounting for possible neutrino time delays” by Egor Podlesny & Foteini Oikonomou (Norwegian University of Science & Technology, Trondheim, Norway) investigates high-energy neutrino emissions associated with blazar flares, using data from IceCat-1, MOJAVE, CGRaBS, and Fermi-LAT. A slight correlation was found, consistent with the null hypothesis.

You can find the officially accepted version on arXiv here and the announcement on Fediverse here:

The second paper for this week, published on Tuesday 11th August in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics is “The velocity coherence scale: a novel probe of cosmic homogeneity and a potential standard ruler” by Leonardo Giani (Swinburne University of Technology), Cullan Howlet (U. Queensland), Chris Blake (Swinburne), Ryan J. Turner (Australia National University) and Tamara M. Davis (U. Queensland) – all in Australia. This paper argues that velocity coherence scale, a measure that identifies the transition point of galaxy motion from correlated to anti-correlated, could potentially characterize the onset of cosmic homogeneity.

The overlay looks like this:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The third paper of the week, also published on Tuesday 11th Augus, but in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies, is “A GLIMPSE of the 99%: a census of the faintest galaxies during the epoch of reionization and its implications for galaxy formation models” by Hakim Atek (Sorbonne Université, Paris, France) and 21 others based around the world.

The overlay is here:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The fourth and final paper of the week was published on Wednesday 12th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies: “Dust and Grain Size Evolution in Galaxy Simulations: What Matters and What Does Not” by Massimiliano Parente & Desika Narayanan (U. Florida, USA) and Paul Torrey (U. Virginia, USA) presents the first implementation of an evolving dust grain size distribution within a model of galaxy evolution, successfully reproducing key observational constraints and exploring the mechanisms shaping galaxies.

The overlay is here:

The officially-accepted version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

That’s all for this week. We’re just ticking over at the moment, and steadily building up a backlog of papers to publish while we wait for authors to put their final versions on arXiv. I have a feeling there’s going to be a big splurge sometime. Will it be next week? We’ll find out next Saturday!

1 Comment »

Weekly Update from the Open Journal of Astrophysics 08/08/2026

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags air showers, arXiv:2601.14887v3, arXiv:2604.13154v2, arXiv:2604.24908v2, arXiv:2605.05004v2, Astrophysics of Galaxies, Circumgalactic Medium, Cosmology and NonGalactic Astrophysics, Diamond Open Access, Diamond Open Access Publishing, Galactic Outflows, Gravitational Lensing, high-energy cosmic rays, Hubble Space Telescope, hydrodynamic simulations, Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, Open Access, Open Access Publishing., peculiar velocities, quasars, star-forming galaxy, structure functions, Turbulence, ultra-high energy cosmic rays on August 8, 2026 by telescoper

Although it’s holiday season for some, it’s time once more for another Saturday update of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Since the last update we have published a further four papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 167 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 615.

I continue to include the posts made on our Mastodon account (on Fediscience); these announcements also show the DOI for each paper.

The first paper to report this week was published on Tuesday 4th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies with the title “Small-scale turbulence alongside large-scale turbulence in a z=1.87 star-forming galaxy with an outflowing wind, revealed by multi-point structure functions” by Itzhak Goldman (Afeka College, Israel). A previous study by the author found evidence of large and small scale turbulence in the star-forming galaxy CSWA13, suggesting that star clusters and large clumps within the galaxy could be driving this turbulence.

The overlay for this paper is here

You can find the officially accepted version on arXiv here and the announcement on Fediverse here:

The second paper for this week, published on Thursday 6th August in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies, is “From Clumps to Sheets: Geometry Controls the Temperature PDF of Multi-Phase Gas” by Zirui Chen and S. Peng Oh (UC Santa Barbara, USA). This study uses 3D hydrodynamic simulations to show that the temperature probability distribution functions (PDFs) of multi-phase turbulent gas differ significantly under interstellar medium (ISM) and circumgalactic medium (CGM) conditions.

The overlay looks like this:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The third paper of the week, published on Thursday 6th August in folder Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics is “First Detection of Extensive Air Showers Using a Small-Aperture Fluorescence Telescope” by M. Zotov (M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University, Russia) and 7 others based in Russia and Armenia. The study reports the first-ever detection of extensive air showers from ultra-high-energy cosmic rays using a compact fluorescence telescope, employing both conventional and deep learning analysis methods.

The overlay is here:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The fourth and final paper of the week was published on Friday 7th August in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics: “TDCOSMO XXVI: Uniform Lens Modeling of Eight Doubly Imaged Quasars“, by Ryan Brady (Stony Brook University, USA) and 9 others based all around the world, presents a new method for analyzing doubly imaged quasars using the Hubble Space Telescope, revealing that arc surface brightness is key to precision in mass model measurements.

The overlay is here:

The officially-accepted version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

That’s all for this week. We have about a dozen more papers accepted and waiting for the authors to put the final version on arXiv, which they will presumably do when they’re back from holiday. I’ll do an update next weekend and we’ll see!

1 Comment »

Weekly Update from the Open Journal of Astrophysics 01/08/2026

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags arXiv:2408.00922v2, arXiv:2510.25824v2, arXiv:2512.03168v4, Bayesian Methods, Bulk Flow, Cosmology, Cosmology and NonGalactic Astrophysics, Dark Energy Survey, Diamond Open Access, Diamond Open Access Publishing, Galactic Outflows, Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics, Markov Chain Monte Carlo, neural networks, Open Access, Open Access Publishing., peculiar velocities, Photo-z, Photometric Redshifts, ray tracing, Self-Organizing Maps on August 1, 2026 by telescoper

It’s time once more for another Saturday update of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Since the last update we have published a further three papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 163 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 611.

I continue to include the posts made on our Mastodon account (on Fediscience); these announcements also show the DOI for each paper.

The first paper to report this week was published on Tuesday 28th July in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics. “The Origins of the Bulk Flow” by Richard Watkins & Trajan Clark (Willamett U., USA) and Hume A Feldman (U. Kansas, USA) analyzes the origin of large-scale bulk flow using the CosmicFlows-4 catalog, finding that it is largely influenced by structures beyond 200 h^-1 Mpc, challenging previous assumptions.

The overlay for this paper is here

You can find the officially accepted version on arXiv here and the announcement on Fediverse here:

The second paper for this week, also published on Tuesday 28th July in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics is: “Enhancing weak lensing redshift distribution characterization by optimizing the Dark Energy Survey Self-Organizing Map Photo-z method” by A. Campos (Carnegie Mellon U., USA) and the DES collaboration (113 authors). This study improves the Self-Organizing Map methodology for estimating redshift distribution in galaxies, notably reducing overlap between redshift bins, in preparation for the Dark Energy Survey Year 6 data.Abstractfor Enhancing weak lensing redshift distribution characterization by optimizing the Dark Energy Survey Self-Organizing Map Photo-z method.

The overlay looks like this:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

The third paper of the week, published on Thursday 29th July in the folder Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics is “The Ray Tracing Sampler: Bayesian Sampling of Neural Networks for Everyone” by Peter Behroozi of the University of Arizona (USA). This paper presents a new family of Markov Chain Monte Carlo sampling methods based on ray tracing, offering higher resilience to heating for stochastic gradients and other advantages.

The overlay for this one is here:

The final, accepted version can be found on arXiv here and the Mastodon announcement is here:

That’s all for this week. It’s been a bit slower than previous weeks no doubt because of the holiday season.

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The STFC Cuts

Posted in Artificial Intelligence, Science Politics, The Universe and Stuff with tags Artificial Intelligence, e-Merlin, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Michele Dougherty, Quantum Technology, Science and Technology Facilities Council, Square Kilometre Array, STFC, UKRI on July 28, 2026 by telescoper

News came out yesterday of the results of the latest funding prioritization exercise by the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). The total savings being made by cuts to astronomy and particle physics are less than the funds allocated to just one AI lab! It seems STFC has to bear the brunt of savings needed so that UKRI, the organization under which STFC sits, can gamble much more on Artificial Intelligence and Quantum Technology. It seems to me that these are two bubbles ready to burst and the decision to sink money into them is not only unwise, it places the UK science base at serious risk of collapse.

Anyway, you can find the list of specific cuts here. Radio astronomy is hit particularly hard. The interferometric network e-Merlin is not prioritized and its funding will run out in 2028. That puts Jodrell Bank Observatory in danger of complete closure unless an alternative source of funding can be found. The last time STFC had a financial crisis was in 2009 and e-Merlin might well have been cut then but survived thanks to political intervention at the highest level. I suppose that could happen again, but I wouldn’t bet on it. More bad news is that the UK Square Kilometre Array Regional Centre, with SKA itself already financially troubled, is also earmarked for cuts.

The 76m Lovell Telescope at Jodrell Bank, now under threat of closure

And that’s just radio astronomy and Jodrell Bank is one of the highest-profile casualties. There are cuts and cancellations in many other areas too; see here for a full list.

The Astronomer Royal for Scotland, Catherine Heymans, has used her platform to campaign against these damaging and short-sighted cuts to UK astronomy, including on social media:

Just off #BBCR4 World at One, arguing the importance of discovery science (like Jodrell) for long-term economic growth. I said I was heartbroken at the news: evidence just look at how exceptionally excited me & @mamaphysikerin.bsky.social were when we got to stand inside Lovell back in 2017 🥰 🔭🧪
— Astronomer Royal for Scotland | Catherine Heymans (@astroroyalscot.bsky.social) 2026-07-27T12:38:30.873Z

The same can’t be said for the Astronomer Royal herself, Prof. Michele Dougherty. The reason for that is Prof. Dougherty is also Executive Chair of STFC and is therefore responsible for implementing the cuts. How it is possible for her to remain in both posts is nothing short of a scandal. Such a glaring conflict of interest cannot be allowed to stand. Indeed, Prof. Dougherty was elected to serve as President of the Institute of Physics from October 2025 but stepped down in January 2026 citing concerns of a conflict of interest with her role at STFC. It’s a slap in the face to the Astronomy community that it is not deemed worthy of such consideration.

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