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Shreejaya Karantha

Shreejaya Karantha

Author

Shreejaya Karantha is a science writer and astronomy communicator based in Udupi, India. Curious about the universe and everything in it, she holds an MSc in Physics with a specialisation in astrophysics. Her work has appeared in Live Science, Sky & Telescope, and The Hindu newspaper. She works with The Secrets of the Universe as a research specialist. She enjoys writing about black holes, galaxies, and the early universe with a particular soft spot for little red dots and anything gloriously weird in space.

Articles by Shreejaya Karantha

Phys.org / A 21-hour dip could help explain Tabby's star's decade-long dimming mystery

Since 2016, an ordinary-looking F-type star called KIC 8462852, nicknamed Tabby's star, has behaved anything but ordinarily. In a new study published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society on July 6, researchers ...

8 hours ago
Phys.org / Astronomers finally measure the full size of the largest known galaxy

Researchers have obtained the deepest images ever taken of IC 1101, allowing them to identify the galaxy's outer edge for the first time. The observations confirm it as the largest known galaxy, spanning roughly 520 kiloparsecs, ...

Jul 31, 2026
Phys.org / First 3D map reveals hidden thermal structure of nearby interstellar medium

Astronomers have built the first three-dimensional map of gas temperature in the space surrounding our solar system, revealing a far messier and more dynamic picture than current models predict. The study was submitted to ...

Jul 29, 2026
Phys.org / Astronomers catch massive galaxy assembling piece by piece 1.2 billion years after Big Bang

Astronomers have discovered a remarkably tiny group of six young galaxies just 1.2 billion years after the Big Bang. This may be a rare glimpse of how some of the universe's largest galaxies formed. The paper outlining the ...

Jul 24, 2026
Phys.org / JWST captures rare glimpse of early black hole growing inside network of young galaxies

Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have captured one of the clearest views yet of how an early supermassive black hole may grow within a network of young galaxies. The compact active galaxy, seen just a billion ...

Jul 23, 2026
Phys.org / Astronomers catch a recurring black hole eruption in real time

For the third time in 35 years, the black hole at the center of the galaxy IC 3599 has erupted, and this time, astronomers were watching it closely. IC 3599, a galaxy roughly 280 million light-years away, has flared this ...

Jul 21, 2026
Phys.org / A century-old stellar mystery may finally have an explanation

For more than a century, astronomers have puzzled over a strange discrepancy in the historical record. Theta Eridani, a modest star in the constellation Eridanus, is the third-brightest star in its constellation, with a magnitude ...

Jul 19, 2026
Phys.org / A new stellar census strengthens the case for a 13.8-billion-year-old universe

Astronomers have used the ages of more than 155,000 stars in the Milky Way to independently estimate the age of the universe, and their findings may be good news for the standard cosmological model. The new research was reported ...

Jul 15, 2026
Phys.org / Heavy-element exotic dust may solve a neutron star merger mystery

When neutron stars merge, they create a powerful explosion called a kilonova that flings out neutron-rich material, some of which decays into heavy elements through a process called the r-process. Recent observations of kilonovae ...

Jul 14, 2026
Phys.org / JWST's 'overmassive' early black holes may not be so massive after all

Astronomers studying a population of unusually X-ray-silent and overmassive black holes discovered by the James Webb Space Telescope have found that they may not be as massive as they appear. The new paper, outlining a plausible ...

Jul 8, 2026
Phys.org / JWST finds the most distant barred galaxy candidate in the early universe

Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have identified what may be the most distant barred spiral galaxy ever discovered, dating to a time less than 1.2 billion years after the Big Bang. The paper outlining its ...

Jul 7, 2026
Phys.org / 'Cosmic wallflowers' may hold the key to the origin of globular clusters

Astronomers using computer simulations have investigated whether a class of star clusters nicknamed "cosmic wallflowers" could be the long-sought ancestors of the globular clusters we see orbiting galaxies today. Their paper, ...

Jul 7, 2026
Phys.org / Astronomers may have caught an early galaxy in the process of dying

Astronomers have spotted many "red and dead" galaxies in the early universe. These are massive systems that stopped forming stars surprisingly early in cosmic history. Now, they may have found evidence of one in the act of ...

Jul 4, 2026
Phys.org / One of the most distant 'leaky' galaxies ever found may reveal how the universe reionized

Astronomers have identified one of the most distant candidate galaxies known to leak ionizing radiation—the same kind of radiation thought to have transformed the early universe during the epoch of reionization.

Jun 30, 2026
Phys.org / Reanalysis suggests 'Phoebe' is a variable star, not a primordial black hole

A new study debunks a recent claim that astronomers may have detected a lunar-mass primordial black hole. In a reanalysis of observations from the Dark Energy Camera (DECam), researchers found that the star nicknamed "Phoebe" ...

Jun 28, 2026