Astronomers are getting to know the neighbors better. Our sun resides within a spiral arm of our Milky Way galaxy about two-thirds of the way out from the center. It lives in a fairly calm, suburb-like area with an average number of stellar residents. Recently, NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, has been turning up a new crowd of … Read the rest of this article
Just received this statement from Planetary Resources about what’s been happening since they announced the formation of their company a few weeks ago, so things are progressing:
If you’re like us, you’ve always had a life-long dream to open the space frontier.
We’re not just talking about taking a few people into orbit, but opening the resources of space, to … Read the rest of this article
ESA’s Mars Express has provided images of a remarkable crater on Mars that may show evidence that the planet underwent significant periodic fluctuations in its climate due to changes in its rotation axis.
On 19 June 2011, Mars Express pointed its high-resolution stereo camera at the Arabia Terra region of Mars, imaging the Danielson and Kalocsa craters.
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High-Resolution Stereo Camera …
The faint, lumpy glow given off by the very first objects in the universe may have been detected with the best precision yet, using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope. These faint objects might be wildly massive stars or voracious black holes. They are too far away to be seen individually, but Spitzer has captured new, convincing evidence of what appears to … Read the rest of this article
Astronomers have found strong evidence that a massive black hole is being ejected from its host galaxy at a speed of several million miles per hour. New observations from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory suggest that the black hole collided and merged with another black hole and received a powerful recoil kick from gravitational wave radiation.
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The galaxy at the center …
Giant bubbles, towering pillars and cascading clouds of dust and gas fill the star-forming nursery of the Carina Nebula seen here in a stunning new view from Herschel to launch ESA Space Science’s image of the week feature.
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The Carina Nebula, by ESA’s Herschel space observatory. The image (enlarged view) shows the effects of massive star formation – …
Astronomers around the world looked to the sky on the night of June 5th and morning of June 6th to observe Venus as it passed across the face of the Sun for the last time this century. ESA’s Sun-watching space missions also tuned in for the solar spectacular.
ESA’s Proba-2 microsatellite, in low-Earth orbit, tracked Venus across the solar disc … Read the rest of this article
When Venus transited the sun on June 5th and 6th, an armada of spacecraft and ground-based telescopes were on the lookout for something elusive and, until recently, unexpected: The Arc of Venus.
“I was flabbergasted when I first saw it during the 2004 transit,” recalls astronomy professor Jay Pasachoff of Williams College. “A bright, glowing rim appeared around the edge … Read the rest of this article
NASA will host a 3-day NASA Social for 25 of its social media followers Aug. 3-5 at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. The NASA Social is scheduled to culminate in the landing of the Mars Science Laboratory’s Curiosity rover at Mars’ Gale crater. The landing is anticipated at approximately 1:31 a.m. EDT Aug. 6.
The event … Read the rest of this article
AAVSO Alert Notice 459Dr. Koji Mukai (Universities Space Research Association/NASA Goddard Space Flight Center) has requested AAVSO observers’ assistance in monitoring the SS Cyg-type dwarf nova RU Peg in support of target-of-opportunity observations with the NASA Swift satellite during an outburst.
His observations will be targeted during the … Read the rest of this article
The Sun Now (Visible light)
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The Sun Now (H-Alpha light)
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Aurora Oval
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Aurora Oval
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