Basic astronomy and night sky information
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab has released this simulated but rather stirring flyover of the dwarf planet Ceres, the largest denizen of the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Using hundreds of images from NASA’s Dawn spacecraft, a team at Germany’s national space center (DLR) created a video that gives you a close-up of the most striking features of this little world.
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With binoculars or a small telescope, just one degree northwest of the star zeta (ζ) Tauri in the horns of the constellation Taurus, the Bull, you can see the famous Crab Nebula, the remnant of a massive star that exploded nearly 1,000 years ago. The Crab Nebula takes its name from a drawing made by the Irish amateur astronomer Lord Rosse in 1844 using his 36-inch telescope at Birr Castle in Ireland. The drawing resembles a horseshoe crab [Read more…] about The Crab Nebula
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It’s been 170 years since the eighth (and so far last) major planet, Neptune, was discovered in our solar system. Pluto, of course, was discovered in 1930, heralded as the ninth planet, but then demoted by consensus of the astronomical community, largely at the behest of the Caltech astronomer Mike Brown who reasoned that Pluto was not large enough to gravitationally clear its path of other bodies, one of the three criteria for a major planet. In the ten years since Pluto’s demotion, Brown has been asked if there are any other planets in our solar system. His answer: “Nope, that’s it.” [Read more…] about A Ninth Planet Discovered?
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There’s a ‘planet fest’ in the eastern sky before sunrise in late January and early February 2016 as the five brightest planets– Mercury, Venus, Saturn, Mars, and Jupiter– make an appearance in a long incline from the eastern horizon, well past the meridian, and on towards the southwest. If you’re up early in the next two weeks, 45-60 minutes before sunrise, this is an opportune time to look to the slowly brightening sky to see this alluring array of bright planets [Read more…] about Five Bright Planets Visible in the Morning Sky
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The Jellyfish Nebula, also called IC 443, is the sprawling remnant of a massive star that exploded as a supernova some 3,000 to 30,000 years ago in a gas-strewn patch of the Milky Way in the constellation Gemini. As you can see in the above image by Jeff Johnson, the shock wave from the explosion produced the particularly intricate lacework of nebulosity that makes up the Jellyfish. The nebula, which is about 5,000 light years away, is adjacent to a rich region of star formation called Sharpless 249. [Read more…] about The Jellyfish Nebula
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