FORT DAVIS — Ten high school students are spending the week at McDonald Observatory learning to use telescopes to support a study of one of the biggest mysteries in science today: dark energy. They are also sharing their experiences using social media.

FORT DAVIS, Texas — Astronomers from The University of Texas at Austin and Wesleyan University have used the Hobby-Eberly Telescope at UT Austin’s McDonald Observatory to confirm that a Jupiter-size planet in a nearby solar system is dissolving, albeit excruciatingly slowly, because of interactions with its parent star. Their findings could help astronomers better understand star-planet interactions in other star systems that might involve life.

News release provided by University Co-Op

GALVESTON — The University of Texas at Austin is naming an innovative astronomical instrument doing groundbreaking work at McDonald Observatory after pioneering energy producer, real estate developer, and philanthropist George P. Mitchell and his late wife Cynthia Mitchell. University representatives including McDonald Observatory Director David L. Lambert and Chief Astronomer Gary Hill, along with members of the UT-Austin Astronomy Program Board of Visitors, will celebrate the event with Mr. Mitchell and his family at a private event in Galveston today.

FORT DAVIS, Texas — The first of a planned suite of telescopes of the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope (LCOGT) Network achieved first light recently at The University of Texas at Austin's McDonald Observatory.

 “We're thrilled,” said LCOGT Scientific Director Tim Brown, “to have our first telescope in such a well-supported site, with superbly dark skies.”

The detonation of a mountain peak at Las Campanas Observatory in Chile today initiated site preparation for the construction of the Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT). The blasting will create a level foundation for the construction of the telescope.

The event was streamed live online courtesy of the US Embassy in Chile, and the video now is available at the Carnegie Institution's YouTube channel.

AUSTIN — In recognition of his discoveries regarding the formation of black holes and galaxies, astronomer Karl Gebhardt will receive the 2012 Edith and Peter O’Donnell Award in Science from The Academy of Medicine, Engineering and Science of Texas (TAMEST).

The O’Donnell Award honors outstanding young Texas researchers in medicine, engineering, science and technology innovation. TAMEST will present the awards during its ninth annual conference, “Energy for Life — from Human Metabolism to Powering the Planet,” Jan. 12-13 in Houston.

TUCSON — On Jan. 14, the second 8.4-meter (27.6 ft) diameter mirror for the Giant Magellan Telescope, or GMT, will be cast inside a rotating furnace at the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory Mirror Lab underneath the campus football stadium. The mirror lab will host a special event to highlight this milestone in the creation of the optics for the Giant Magellan Telescope.

AUSTIN — A team of astronomers including Karl Gebhardt and graduate student Jeremy Murphy of The University of Texas at Austin have discovered the most massive black holes to date — two monsters weighing as much as 10 billion suns and threatening to consume anything, even light, within a region five times the size of our solar system.

The research is published in the December 8 issue of the journal Nature, in a paper headlined by graduate student Nicholas McConnell and professor Chung-Pei Ma of The University of California, Berkeley.