Interstellar Updates

 

These are items of interest to the interstellar exploration community that we’ve found in our quest for information that will help us advance toward our goals.  If you know of anything we’ve overlooked, or any sources of such information we should monitor, or if you would like to be added to our IRG-updates mailing list and receive these updates in you email every weekday, please send that information to info@irg.space.

You can now search our database of interstellar updates and find items of interest to you.

March 23, 2026 updates

Test of a 34 GHz EOM laser frequency comb at ESPRESSO
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stag426/8529013

ExoIris: Fast Exoplanet Transmission Spectroscopy in Python
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-3881/ae47ee

A Robust Launching Mechanism for Free- floating Planets from Host Stars with Close-in Planets
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae36a4

Probing the limits of habitability: a catalogue of rocky exoplanets in the habitable zone
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/547/3/stag028/8526432

A Planetary Illusion’s Funeral: Non-detection of a Gaia DR3 Exoplanet Candidate, and the Role of Intermediate-precision Radial Velocities in Gaia Exoplanet Follow-up
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.19402

Three outstanding physical questions for K2-18 b and other temperate sub-Neptunes
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.19803

Observations of Exocomets
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.19978

High-resolution mid-IR spectroscopy of SVS 13-A with EXES/SOFIA: The surprisingly high CH3OH/H2O ratio in the planet-forming zone of a solar mass protostar
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.19992

Retrieving the Red Edge on Earth-like Planets with Heterogeneous Clouds and Surfaces
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.20033

March 20, 2026 updates

Probing the limits of habitability: a catalogue of rocky exoplanets in the habitable zone
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/547/3/stag028/8526432

A Mass Transferring Brown Dwarf Binary on a 57 Minute Orbit
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ae486e

Wind accretion onto planets orbiting an evolving Solar-like star and their detectability
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18525

Narrowband Radio Technosignature Search toward 3I/ATLAS with FAST
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.19023

Adventitious carbon breaks symmetry in oxide contact electrification
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-10088-w

Proton Irradiation of Primitive Atmospheres of Young Exoplanets and early Earth: N20 Greenhouse Warming and Prebiotic Synthesis
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18206

TOI-4552 b: A new ultra-short period rocky world revealed by NIRPS and TESS
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18233

Gamma Ray Bursts Effects on Extinction and Survivability in the Galaxy
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18250

Turbulence destroys thermal lobes around Mars-sized planetary embryos
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18337

Atmospheric supply of HCN is not the rate limiting step for prebiotic chemistry across rocky exoplanets
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18769

Organosulfur Chemistry on sub-Neptunes: Implications for hazes and biosignatures
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18923

TOI-1333Ab is on a well-aligned orbit. An aligned hot Jupiter around an F-type star with a mutually inclined stellar companion
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.19129

A Minimal Four-Thruster System for Comet-Based Interstellar Navigation
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.16981

Lifetime of micron-sized water-ice particles in the Solar System: Implications for interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stag541/8530543

Interstellar Object 3I/atlas: Observational Data Supports Universal Mechanics
https://zenodo.org/records/19023995

A Phenomenological Parameterization for Anomalous Accelerations of Interstellar Objects: Thermodynamic Activity as a Scaling Proxy
https://zenodo.org/records/19013581

Differential Multi-Star Decorrelation for Exoplanet Detection in Triple Systems: The Challenging Case of Polaris
https://zenodo.org/records/19141803

The influence of hypothetical exomoons on planetary thermal phase curves
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.18437

Identifying Exoplanets with Deep Learning. VI. Enhancing Neural Network Mitigation of Stellar Activity RV Signals with Additional Metrics
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-3881/ae45fd

The Exploration of Exoplanets Based on The Transit Method
https://drpress.org/ojs/index.php/ajst/article/view/33322

GSF-22 -Resonant Chains on the Scale Manifold: From Kepler Projection to Corridor Capture in Exoplanet Systems
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/402124699_GSF-22_-Resonant_Chains_on_the_Scale_Manifold_From_Kepler_Projection_to_Corridor_Capture_in_Exoplanet_Systems?channel=doi&linkId=69b71b49a5bf176ab5507b7a

Two Methods for Defining Jacobi Coordinates in the Planetary Problem
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1134/S1063454125700840

Prediction of thermally driven quasi-1D superionic states in carbon hydride under giant planetary conditions
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-70603-z

Towards a single-laser-diode-pumped 15-GHz Ti:sapphire astrocomb
https://opg.optica.org/oe/fulltext.cfm?uri=oe-34-4-6025

Comb-mode sweeping in a 650 nm–1030 nm astrocomb
https://opg.optica.org/oe/fulltext.cfm?uri=oe-34-5-8569

Ortho-Para Chemistry of H₂CO in the Protoplanetary Disk TW Hya
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13172

Semianalytical Accretion-tracer Emission: Forming Planets Are Intrinsically Faint
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2604

On the Dual Nature of Atmospheric Escape
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae4a12

March 19, 2026 updates

Can cyanide radicals drive molecular backbone growth on interstellar icy grains?
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.15138

Infrared spectra of methane-containing ice mixtures for JWST data analyses
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa58069-25/aa58069-25.html

The gas-phase nitridation processes of large, astronomically relevant polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons cations in the interstellar medium
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa58396-25/aa58396-25.html

Broadband infrared spectroscopy of methanol isotopologues in pure, H2O-rich, and CO-rich ice analogues
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa57702-25/aa57702-25.html

Searching for Molecular Signatures in 14 Transiting Exoplanets with SPIRou
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17574

Spin crossover in FeO under shock compression
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17136

AMKID: A large KID-based camera at the APEX telescope
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa58596-25/aa58596-25.html

Scale-Aware Navigation of Astronomical Survey Imagery Data on High Resolution Immersive Displays
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17337

An Analysis of Large Astronomical Detector Controller Systems and Implications for Future ESO Detector Systems
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17389

Stellar characterization with photometric colors from J-PLUS and 2MASS surveys
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17083

Revealing the Spectral Properties of Galactic Interstellar Medium by Survey Observations
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17464

Planetesimal formation via the streaming instability persists under turbulence driven by magnetorotational instability
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17195

How initial disc conditions sculpt the atmospheric composition of giant planets
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa56632-25/aa56632-25.html

Stars stably accreting from substellar objects
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.17039

Precise determination of circumstellar disk lifetimes
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa54921-25/aa54921-25.html

The ESO SupJup Survey IX. Isotopic evidence of a recent formation for Luhman 16AB
https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/full_html/2026/03/aa58089-25/aa58089-25.html

Trajectory Stability and Signature Diagnostics for Comet-Based Interstellar Navigation
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.16982

March 18, 2026 updates

A chemical perspective on planet formation in reduced systems
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.15955

Experimental evidence for granular shear-flow instability in the Epstein regime
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.15810

Kepler-56: A Case Study of Planetary Cannibalism around an Evolved Star
https://zenodo.org/records/19059786

Dayside Clouds and an Elevated C/O Ratio in the Atmosphere of the Ultra-hot Jupiter WASP-19b
https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.02797

GEMS JWST: A sub-Solar metallicity atmosphere for giant planet TOI-5293Ab orbiting a rapidly changing M-dwarf
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.16464

Bottom-up Formation of Phenol (C6H5OH) in Interstellar Analog Ices of Acetylene and Water Exposed to Ionizing Radiation
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ae48fa

BOWIE-ALIGN: Exploring degeneracies in the muted transmission spectrum of the aligned hot Jupiter NGTS-2b with NIRSpec/G395H
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stag528/8527737

A complete set of canonical nucleobases in the carbonaceous asteroid (162173) Ryugu
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1038/s41550-026-02791-z

Inferring the mass and size of 3I/ATLAS from its non-gravitational acceleration
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.15735

Design of high thermal stability achromatic coherent-dispersion spectrometer
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0030401826002786

A Catalogue of Orbital Periods of Cataclysmic Variables and Candidates from TESS Observations
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/advance-article/doi/10.1093/mnras/stag514/8524018

Explainable machine learning workflows for radio astronomical data processing
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.16350

March 17, 2026 updates

Exploring the surface of HD 189733 via Doppler shadow analysis of planetary transits
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13463

Dust traps and gas kinematic signatures in a crescent structure of a planet-forming disk
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13510

The JWST Early Release Science Program for Direct Observations of Exoplanetary Systems. VIII. Molecular Mapping Performance with JWST/MIRI MRS: VHS 1256 b as a case study
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13543

Mass Production of 2023 KMTNet Microlensing Planets. II: Two Planets and A Brown Dwarf
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.13887

A user-friendly package and workflow for generating effective homogeneous rheologies for the study of the long-term orbital evolution of multilayered planetary bodies
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.14444

Constraining Small Planet Compositions for Future Missions
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.14552

A Panchromatic JWST Spectrum of a Giant Starspot on the Fully Convective M-dwarf TOI-3884
https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.15414