Articles about Astronomy
Doorstep Astronomy: See the Big Dipper (SPACE.com)
As soon as darkness falls these evenings, step outside and look skyward. What is the most prominent and easiest star pattern to recognize? If you live in the Northern Hemisphere you only need to look overhead and toward the north where you will find the seven bright stars that comprise the famous Big Dipper.
9 May 2008, 4:05 am | click here for more
Cassini to Skim the Surface of Enceladus
On March 12 the spacecraft will pass only 50 km above the surface of the moon Cassini to kiss Enceladus on March 12 Bad Astronomy Blog Download time: Mar 7 2008 7:26 AM ET In a few days, the phenomenal Saturn ... via Dome News
9 Mar 2008, 9:03 am | click here for more
The coldest brown dwarf ever observed
An international team of astronomers has discovered the coldest brown dwarf star ever observed. This finding, to be published in Astronomy & Astrophysics, is a new step toward filling the gap between stars and planets.
9 Apr 2008, 9:04 pm | click here for more
Canadian astronomers on hunt for meteor
Astronomers from The University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, have captured rare video of a meteor falling to Earth. The physics and astronomy department has a network of all-sky cameras in Southern Ontario that scan the sky monitoring for meteors. Associate Professor Peter Brown, who specializes in the study of meteors and meteorites, says on March 5, 2008, at 10:59 p.m. EST, these cameras captured video of a large fireball.
7 Mar 2008, 3:03 pm | click here for more
XMM-Newton discovers part of the missing matter in the universe
(Astronomy & Astrophysics) A team of Dutch and German astronomers have discovered part of the missing matter in the Universe using the European X-ray satellite XMM-Newton. They observed a filament of hot gas connecting two clusters of galaxies. This tenuous hot gas could be part of the missing "baryonic" matter. Their findings are being published in Astronomy & Astrophysics.
6 May 2008, 9:05 pm | click here for more
UW paper in Science shows how some solids mimic liquids on nanoscale
A University of Waterloo physics and astronomy research team, in a paper to be published Feb. 1 in Science, shows how some solids behave like liquids on the nanoscale. The UW researchers, professor James Forrest and then-graduate student Zahra Fakhraai, take a major step forward in discovering how to measure polymer substances using nanoscale technology. They explore the properties of the large class of natural and synthetic materials on the nanoscale.
31 Jan 2008, 9:02 pm | click here for more
Astronomy Picture of the Day: Linking Spiral Arms
Linking spiral arms, two large colliding galaxies are featured in this Hubble Space Telescope view, part of a series of cosmic snapshots released to celebrate the Hubble's 18th anniversary. Recorded in astronomer Halton Arp's Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies as Arp 272, the pair is otherwise known as NGC 6050 and IC 1179.
30 Apr 2008, 2:04 pm | click here for more
Tracking Space Transients
Berkeley astronomy professor Joshua Bloom compares the analysis of a gamma ray burst to a crime scene investigation. Blowing something up in a mere second creates a forensics scene and a search for fingerprints. Bloom uses this technique to find new types of gamma ray bursts and explain their origins.
27 Feb 2008, 8:02 am | click here for more
New organic molecule in space
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy in Bonn have detected for the first time a molecule closely related to an amino acid: amino acetonitrile. The organic molecule was found with a 30 meter radio telescope in Spain and two radio interferometers in France and Australia in the "Large Molecule Heimat", a giant gas cloud near the galactic center in the constellation Sagittarius.
25 Mar 2008, 8:03 pm | click here for more
TierneyLab: Winner of Astronomy Quiz
Why does a two-day weekend start on Saturday? That was one of the puzzles in the Lab Astronomy Quiz. You can still take the astronomy quiz and get your score instantly, but the prize is no longer available. We have a winner: Neal Sumerlin, who lives in Lynchburg, Va. He gets a copy of "The [...].
25 Apr 2008, 9:04 am | click here for more
Astronomer suggests conserving lunar crater for radio astronomy
London, March 24 : An astronomer has suggested that a crater in the center of the far side of the moon should be conserved, as it is an ideal location for setting up a future radio telescope to detect radio waves of all kinds that are impossible to detect on Earth.
24 Mar 2008, 2:03 am | click here for more
A giant of astronomy and a quantum of solace
Cerro Paranal, the 2600m high mountain in the Chilean Atacama Desert that hosts ESO's Very Large Telescope, will be the stage for scenes in the next James Bond movie, "Quantum of Solace."
23 Mar 2008, 8:03 pm | click here for more
Radio telescope reveals secrets of massive black hole
(National Radio Astronomy Observatory) At the cores of many galaxies, supermassive black holes expel powerful jets of particles at nearly the speed of light. Just how they perform this feat has long been one of the mysteries of astrophysics. Now, using the unrivaled resolution of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Very Long Baseline Array, astronomers have watched material winding a corkscrew outward path and behaving exactly as predicted by a leading theory.
22 Apr 2008, 9:04 pm | click here for more
Science with the solar space observatory Hinode
Astronomy & Astrophysics is publishing a special feature this week dedicated to the new results obtained with the solar space observatory Hinode, recognizing the impact of Hinode on various branches of solar physics.
20 Mar 2008, 4:03 pm | click here for more
Astronomy missions involving CU-Boulder selected for further study by NASA
NASA has awarded the University of Colorado at Boulder $1 million to lead the study of a space observatory to find Earth-like planets in distant solar systems and open the search for life outside our solar system.
20 Feb 2008, 8:02 pm | click here for more
Edinburgh astronomers deliver 'origins' camera
Today the Science and Technology Facility Council's UK Astronomy Technology Centre at the Royal Observatory Edinburgh shipped its biggest and most complex ever instrument. The giant camera known as SCUBA-2 will be transported to the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope.
20 Feb 2008, 8:02 pm | click here for more
Google Sky
When I look up into the sky, I have no idea what I’m looking at. I’ve never owned a telescope, and I’m just not into astronomy as much as much as some people are. Outer space is truly amazing, and I’m not saying that I don’t have any interest in it, but I have to admit that I don’t know very much about the specific constellations and so on. For someone like me, it helps to be able to discover and learn about what’s going on above my head easily, and Google Sky enables me to navigate the universe at my own pace. Many of us are familiar with Google M...
2 May 2008, 11:05 pm | click here for more
Astronomy technology brings nanoparticle probes into sharper focus
Georgia Tech and Emory University researchers have created a technology based on astronomy software that provides more precise images of single molecules tagged with nanoprobes. The clearer images allow researchers to collect more detailed information about a single molecule, such as how the molecule is binding in a gene sequence, taking scientists a few steps closer to truly personalized and predictive medicine as well as more complex biomolecular structural mapping.
18 Feb 2008, 8:02 pm | click here for more
Long Nights, 90 Below. What More Could Astronomers Want?
The whitest place on Earth could be the coolest place on the planet for astronomy.
18 Feb 2008, 5:02 pm | click here for more
NASA looks at future astronomy missions
"The exciting new astrophysics mission concept studies we are funding will seed preparations for astronomical space missions and paradigm-shifting discoveries across the early 21st century" The U.S. space agency has selected 19 science teams to conduct year-long studies of new concepts for its next generation of major space observatories. via Daily India
18 Feb 2008, 1:02 pm | click here for more
Two New Ways to Explore the Virtual Universe, in Vivid 3-D
The WorldWide Telescope allows anyone to see stars and planets thousands of light-years away.
12 May 2008, 9:05 pm | click here for more
Stars of astronomy to shine at Queen's University Belfast
The risk of asteroid impact will be just one of the topics discussed in Belfast next month when Queen's welcomes 650 of the world's leading space scientists and astronomers.The scientists will be attending the largest ever Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting, which runs from Monday, March 31 to Friday, April 4.
12 Mar 2008, 6:03 pm | click here for more
Why don't amateur astronomers report seeing UFOs?
The fact they don't -- despite spending more time looking at the sky than anyone -- is what Bad Astronomy blogger Phil Plait calls *his* favorite reason for not believing that UFOs are alien spacecraft. Plait also shares another writer's "snarky" list of Top 10 reasons not to believe. Tin-foil brigade howling in 4, 3, 2, 1 ...
10 May 2008, 8:05 pm | click here for more
1 moon, 2 planets 3 radio telescopes
Beautiful astronomy pod, Love the way Venus look in the sky
10 Mar 2008, 10:03 am | click here for more
Underground Astronomy
Most scientists who study the cosmos keep their eyes fastened firmly on the sky. Not Professor Bernard Sadoulet, who turns to an unconventional place: the bowels of the earth.
1 Apr 2008, 2:04 am | click here for more