10 Amazing Space Discoveries of This Year

This year has brought remarkable space discoveries, including the Vera Rubin Observatory’s first images and its discovery of a massive stellar stream, and the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) observing a giant stellar jet from the Milky Way’s outskirts. Other major findings include NASA’s study on the “celestial accident” that explains a riddle about Jupiter and Saturn, JWST’s look at a potentially habitable Earth-sized exoplanet, and continued progress in black hole research. 

2025 has been a banner year for space exploration, with telescopes like the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and Gaia uncovering cosmic wonders, while missions and ground-based observations reveal secrets of our solar system and beyond. Here are 10 standout discoveries that have reshaped our understanding of the universe:

1.JWST Confirms a Unique Exoplanet with an Alien Atmosphere

• Stellar jet: JWST observed an immense stellar jet emanating from a young star in the outskirts of our Milky Way galaxy.
• Habitable zone exoplanet: The telescope provided observations of a potentially habitable, Earth-sized exoplanet within its star’s habitable zone, the planet known as TRAPPIST-1 e.
• Star birth: JWST provided a glittering glimpse into the process of star birth. 

In January, JWST data revealed an exoplanet unlike any in our solar system, featuring an atmosphere neither hydrogen-rich nor water-dominated—potentially a new class of world that challenges planetary formation theories.

2.Potential Biosignatures Detected in Martian Mudstones

NASA’s Perseverance rover identified intriguing chemical signatures in ancient Martian rocks that could hint at past microbial life, bolstering the case for Mars’ habitability and guiding future sample-return missions.

Next steps

• Further analysis: The findings meet NASA’s criteria for “potential biosignatures,” meaning they warrant further investigation.
• Sample return: The only way to confirm if the features were made by microbes is to bring the rock samples back to Earth for detailed laboratory analysis.
• Sample collection: The Perseverance rover is collecting and caching samples from this area, and a sample return mission is being developed, although its future is uncertain. 

3.A New Moon Orbiting Uranus

Using JWST’s infrared capabilities, astronomers spotted a previously undetected moon around Uranus in August, offering fresh insights into the planet’s irregular satellite system and its chaotic formation history.

Yes, a new moon (S/2025 U 1) was recently discovered orbiting Uranus using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), with the discovery announced in August 2025. This discovery brings the total number of known Uranian moons to 29. 

Size and Location: The new moon is very small, with an estimated diameter of only about 6 miles (10 kilometers). It is an inner moon, located between the orbits of Ophelia and Bianca, at a distance of about 35,000 miles (56,250 km) from Uranus’ center.
Significance: Its small size and faintness likely caused it to be missed by the Voyager 2 spacecraft during its 1986 flyby, the only time a spacecraft has visited Uranus up close. The discovery is significant for understanding the dynamic and complex system of Uranus’ inner moons and rings, suggesting that more small, undiscovered moons may still exist. 

4.Gigantic Gas Bridge Linking Distant Galaxies

Observations uncovered a massive filament of gas stretching between two galaxies, spanning millions of light-years, which could explain how cosmic structures fuel star formation across vast distances.
Galaxies Involved: The bridge connects the dwarf galaxies NGC 4532 and DDO 137, located approximately 53 million light-years from Earth on the outskirts of the Virgo galaxy cluster.
Significance: Neutral hydrogen is the raw material for star formation, so observing how it is distributed helps astronomers understand the “baryonic cycle”—the flow of matter into, through, and out of galaxies—and the conditions under which stars form. The discovery highlights the powerful cosmic forces that shape galaxies, even in the peripheral regions of galaxy clusters.

5.Milky Way’s Colossal Ripple Wave

Astronomers have discovered a colossal, wave-like structure in the Milky Way’s disk, often described as a “colossal ripple wave”. This structure, a massive wave of gas and newborn stars, is one of the largest structures ever identified in our galaxy. 

ESA’s Gaia telescope mapped a galaxy-spanning wave of stars and gas rippling through the Milky Way, tens of thousands of light-years wide, suggesting our galaxy has a more turbulent history than previously thought.

Dimensions: It is a coherent, continuous, wavy structure of interconnected gas clouds that is approximately 9,000 light-years long and extends about 500 light-years above and below the mid-plane of the galaxy’s disk.

6.Most Distant and Powerful Cosmic Radio Ring

In October, astronomers detected an ancient “odd radio circle”—a double-ringed structure from nearly 10 billion years ago—pushing the boundaries of our understanding of enigmatic radio emissions in the early universe.

Object Designation: The newly discovered object is designated RAD J131346.9+500320, often referred to simply as the “most distant ORC.”
Details of the Discovery

Challenging Theories: ORCs, first discovered in 2020, have an unknown origin. While initial theories suggested shockwaves from merging supermassive black holes or galaxies, the structure of this new ORC—which includes a jet-like filament of gas—suggests a different explanation: powerful superwind outflows from active spiral galaxies may be responsible for shaping some of these rings. 

Designation: The object is named RAD J131346.9+500320.

Distance and Age: It is the most distant ORC found to date, at a redshift of around 0.94. This means its light has traveled for over 7 billion years to reach Earth, offering a view of the universe when it was only about half its current age (nearly 10 billion years ago).

Structure: It is a rare double-ringed structure, only the second such feature ever observed in an ORC. The rings themselves span nearly a million light-years across.

Discovery Method: The discovery was made using the Low-Frequency Array (LOFAR) radio telescope, with significant input from citizen scientists in the RAD@home Astronomy Collaboratory project. Human pattern recognition proved crucial in identifying the faint, complex structure that machine learning might have missed.

7.Hints of Supermassive Black Hole in Messier 83

JWST observations provided compelling evidence for a long-suspected supermassive black hole at the core of the nearby spiral galaxy M83, revealing how these monsters shape galactic evolution.

Details of the Discovery

• The Evidence: The key clue is the detection of highly ionized neon gas emissions near the galaxy’s center. The energy levels required to produce this highly ionized gas are far greater than what normal stellar processes, such as supernovae, can generate, making an Active Galactic Nucleus (AGN)—a growing supermassive black hole—the most plausible explanation.
• Previous Challenges: For decades, astronomers had searched for evidence of an active supermassive black hole in M83 without success, leading to the assumption that if one existed, it was dormant or obscured by thick dust. Previous instruments simply lacked the sensitivity to detect the faint, specific signatures observed by the JWST.
• JWST’s Role: The discovery was made using JWST’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), which can peer through the dust clouds that previously hid the galactic core from view.
• Next Steps: While the evidence strongly points to an AGN, alternative explanations (such as extreme shock waves in the interstellar medium) are still being explored. Researchers plan to conduct follow-up observations using other observatories, such as the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and the Very Large Telescope (VLT), to definitively confirm the presence of the supermassive black hole. 

8.Earth-Like Exoplanets in Habitable Zones

Multiple Earth-sized worlds were found in the habitable zones of distant stars via JWST and TESS, including K2-233b with potential biosignature gases, reigniting debates on extraterrestrial life.

The TRAPPIST-1 System

• Location: 40 light-years away.
• Details: This system hosts at least seven Earth-sized, rocky planets. TRAPPIST-1e, 1f, and 1g are within the conservative habitable zone. Ongoing studies using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) are actively examining their atmospheres for signs of water and other biosignatures. 

Kepler-452b

• Location: 1,400 light-years away.
• Details: Often called an “Earth Cousin,” it is about 1.6 times the size of Earth and orbits a G-type (Sun-like) star at a similar distance to Earth-Sun distance. Its 385-day orbit is very close to an Earth year. 

Proxima Centauri b

• Location: The closest exoplanet to Earth, at only 4.2 light-years away.
• Details: This planet is roughly Earth-mass and located in the habitable zone of its host red dwarf star. However, the star’s frequent, intense flares raise questions about the planet’s atmospheric retention and actual habitability. 

TOI 700 d and e

• Location: About 100 light-years away.
• Details: Both are Earth-sized planets orbiting a quiet red dwarf star. TOI 700 d was discovered earlier, and TOI 700 e was confirmed in early 2023, adding another potentially habitable world to this system. 

9.Supermassive Dark Stars: The Universe’s First Lights?

JWST data suggested the earliest stars might have been colossal “dark stars” powered by dark matter annihilation rather than fusion, offering a radical new model for the cosmic dawn.

• Alternative First Stars: They present an alternative or precursor to the “Population III stars”—the first generation of conventional, fusion-powered stars predicted by standard cosmology, which would have been massive, hot, and short-lived.
• Characteristics: Dark stars are predicted to be enormous—hundreds of thousands of times the mass of the Sun and tens of thousands of times brighter. They would be cold enough that their light would be primarily in the infrared spectrum. 

10.Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Zips Through Our Solar System In

In July, this third confirmed interstellar visitor was tracked hurtling at 58 km/s, providing a rare snapshot of material from another star system and clues to the origins of our own solar neighborhood.

The official designation for interstellar objects uses the prefix “I” (for Interstellar Object), not “3I”.

Only two confirmed interstellar objects have been observed zipping through our solar system to date: 1I/’Oumuamua (2017) and 2I/Borisov (2019). There is no “3I” currently recognized or named “ATLAS”.

Comet ATLAS (C/2019 Y4), a different object, was a long-period comet that fragmented in 2020 and was not interstellar. 
Discovery Tools: Objects like ‘Oumuamua and Borisov were detected using surveys like the Pan-STARRS telescope (for ‘Oumuamua) and by amateur astronomers (for Borisov).

Upcoming surveys like the Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time are expected to find more such objects.