The UK under a curtain of aurora

European Space Agency astronaut Tim Peake pictured during his 4 hour 43 minute spacewalk to replace a failed power regulator and install cabling on the International Space Station. Tim commented on this image: “Today’s exhilarating spacewalk will be etched in my memory forever — quite an incredible feeling!”

Astronomers circling the North Atlantic and in South America were treated to a spectacular total eclipse of the Moon that occurred at prime time for US-based stargazers Sunday night, 27 September and in the early hours of this morning for observers in Western Europe.

An instrument aboard the International Space Station has detected a binary star system made up of a fast-spinning pulsar and a compact white dwarf that orbit each other every 38 minutes, a record for an accreting millisecond X-ray pulsar.