 Astronomers using the U.S. National Science Foundation Green Bank Telescope reveal new process of star formation, challenging existing models
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 For the first time, groundbreaking research spearheaded by Professor Li-Xin Li from the Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics at Peking University, alongside his Ph.D. student Jia-Yin Shen, and Associate Professor Cheng Peng from the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Sciences at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, delves into the dynamics of multi-boundary spacetimes formed by gluing multiple bulk spacetimes along a shared interface. Their innovative work has been featured in the famous journal Physical Review Letters.
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 Beneath the apparent diversity and complexity in morphology, galaxies show underlying simplicity and have universally bimodal distributions of normalized specific angular momentum of stars, according to a study led by KIAA/PKU researchers Dr. Bitao Wang and Prof. Yingjie Peng. These two prevailing galaxy populations, dominated respectively by chaotic random motion and ordered bulk rotation, are shown to have experienced contrasting evolutionary histories. The work is published in the Sept 27 issue of Nature Astronomy.
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 Recently, a team of astrophysicists, including Dr. Haoxiang Lin and Prof. Zhuo Li from the Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics (KIAA), Peking University and the GECAM (The Gravitational wave high-energy Electromagnetic Counterpart All-sky Monitor) team led by Prof. Shaolin Xiong from Institute of High Energy Physics (IHEP), Chinese Academy of Sciences, has two groundbreaking papers about GRB 221009A, recently published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, shedding new light on the physics of GRB jets.
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 A research team led by Ke Wang at KIAA used the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) to observe two typical filamentary giant molecular clouds (GMCs) in the center of the Milky Way's spiral arms (also known as the "skeleton" structure), and discovered cold neutral hydrogen commonly associated with molecular CO emission. From the complex HI spectral-line cubes observed by FAST, the astronomers extracted HI narrow self-absorption (HINSA) signals to single out cold neutral hydrogen condensed from ambient warm and hot medium. HINSA marks cold atomic gas, and its association with molecular CO emission shows ongoing transition from atomic to molecular gas, i.e., the formation of GMCs.
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 In a powerful match-up of technique, instrumentation, and target, an international team of astronomers led by Jessica Speedie, under the supervision of her advisor Prof. Ruobing Dong, who recently joined KIAA, observed the well-characterized protoplanetary disk around AB Aurigae and found observational evidence that matches the alternative “top-down” theoretical sequence of planet formation.
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