Astronomers now call recently-discovered flares from supermassive black holes in distant galaxies quasi-periodic eruptions. “Giant black holes regularly flicker like a candle but the rapid, repeating changes seen in GSN 069 from December onwards are something completely new,” said one scientist.

Astronomers think the object they’ve labeled C/2019 Q4 – discovered August 30 – came from a place far, far away. If confirmed, it’s only the 2nd interstellar object ever detected, after ‘Oumuamua in 2017.

It’s a huge bipolar gas structure, hundreds of light-years across, centered on our galaxy’s center and near the galaxy’s central supermassive black hole. Astronomers found it with the new, supersensitive MeerKAT telescope in South Africa.

The lakes on Saturn’s moon Titan are filled with liquid methane, not water, and some are surrounded by steep rims. A new study suggests these features might have been caused by explosions of warming nitrogen, which created Titan’s lake basins long ago.