This documentary chronicles the history of the telescope from the time of Galileo and features interviews with leading astrophysicists and cosmologists from around the world, who explain concepts ranging from Galileo’s first use of the telescope to view the moons of Jupiter to the latest discoveries in space.
The documentary was created to coincide with the International Year of Astronomy … Read the rest of this article
The Monkey Head Nebula (also known as NGC 2174) is a star-forming region in which bright, newborn stars near the center of the nebula illuminate the surrounding gas with energetic radiation. This radiation, along with strong stellar winds, erodes away the lower density gas. Pockets of higher density gas resist this erosion, and form pillars and peaks along the inner … Read the rest of this article
Irish amateur astronomer Dave Grennan has done it again, discovering his third supernova from his back garden in Raheny, Dublin.
The the new ‘Type 1c’ supernova was spotted nearly two weeks ago. Its existence was only confirmed yesterday (April 27, 2014) by a team of professional astronomers in China and the discovery announced by the International Astronomical Union.
It has … Read the rest of this article
Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have applied a new image processing technique to obtain near-infrared scattered light photos of five disks observed around young stars in the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes database. These disks are telltale evidence for newly formed planets.
If astronomers initially miss something in their review of data, they can make new discoveries by revisiting … Read the rest of this article
Two instruments that played critical roles in discoveries made by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope now are on display in an exhibit at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington.
“Repairing Hubble” recognizes the 24th anniversary of Hubble’s launch into space aboard space shuttle Discovery on April 24, 1990. The exhibit features Hubble’s Corrective Optics Space Telescope Axial Replacement … Read the rest of this article
When we gaze up at the night sky, we are only seeing part of the story. Unfortunately, some of the most powerful and energetic events in the Universe are invisible to our eyes – and to even the best optical telescopes.
Luckily, these events are not lost; they appear vividly in the high-energy sky, making them visible to space-based telescopes … Read the rest of this article
Using NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope, astronomers have discovered the first Earth-size planet orbiting a star in the “habitable zone” — the range of distance from a star where liquid water might pool on the surface of an orbiting planet. The discovery of Kepler-186f confirms that planets the size of Earth exist in the habitable zone of stars other than our … Read the rest of this article
NASA’s Orion spacecraft has proven its mettle in a test designed to determine the spacecraft’s readiness for its first flight test — Exploration Flight Test-1 (EFT-1) — later this year. EFT-1 will send the spacecraft more than 3,600 miles from Earth and return it safely.
The spacecraft ran for 26 uninterrupted hours during the final phase of a major test … Read the rest of this article
Even though NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope is 24 years old, astronomers are still coming up with imaginative, novel, and groundbreaking new uses for it. The latest is an innovative technique that improves Hubble’s observing accuracy to the point where rock-solid distance measurements can be made to Milky Way stars 10 times farther away than ever accomplished before.
To do this, … Read the rest of this article
Titan, Europa, Io and Phobos are just a few members of our solar system’s pantheon of moons. Are there are other moons out there, orbiting planets beyond our sun?
NASA-funded researchers have spotted the first signs of an “exomoon,” and though they say it’s impossible to confirm its presence, the finding is a tantalizing first step toward locating others. 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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