March 2015 – Page 2 – Astronomy Now

Astronomers upgrade their cosmic light bulbs for studying the fabric of space

27 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Researchers identify the best Type Ia supernovae for gauging cosmic distances, potentially improving these measurements with a precision of more than two times that achieved before, up to six billion light-years away. These findings will help light the way to understanding dark energy.

Supermassive black hole blasts star-making gas from galaxy’s core

26 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Many galaxies blast huge, wide-angled flows of material outward from their centres, pushing to their outer edges enough dust and gas each year that otherwise would have formed more than a thousand stars the size of our Sun. A team led by University of Maryland scientists has found the driving force behind these massive molecular outflows.

NASA’s plan to bring back an asteroid gets downsized

26 March 2015 Stephen Clark

NASA announced Wednesday its planned mission to redirect an asteroid to an orbit near the moon for visits by astronauts will not bring back an entire object, but will instead retrieve a sizable boulder from an asteroid’s surface.

Wandering Jupiter swept away super-Earths, creating our unusual Solar System

25 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Researchers from Caltech and UC Santa Cruz say that Earth belongs to a second generation of planets in our Solar System after Jupiter swept clear the first, resulting in the formation of a planetary system unlike any other astronomers have yet found.

With memory restored, Opportunity rover completes marathon on Mars

25 March 2015 Stephen Clark

NASA’s Opportunity rover trekking across Mars completed a marathon’s worth of driving Tuesday, extending its record-setting exploration of the red planet as engineers installed a software fix to overcome a problem with the aging robot’s flash memory.

See the crescent Moon glide through Taurus over two nights

24 March 2015 Ade Ashford

As twilight fades to dark on the evenings of March 24th and 25th, observers in the British Isles can see the waxing crescent Moon’s passage through Taurus, passing some of the constellation’s highlights.

The dwarf galaxy that reveals the history of the universe

24 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Dwarf galaxy I Zw 18 stands out for its extreme scarcity of heavy elements, a characteristic typical of primeval galaxies. A map of ionised helium in the galaxy has just been published, indicating the presence of peculiar stars similar to the first that ever shone in the universe.

UK headquarters for the world’s largest telescope?

23 March 2015 Astronomy Now

The Square Kilometre Array Organisation’s decision to extend its selection process to decide where to site the permanent headquarters of the array is welcomed by the Institude of Physics and the Royal Astronomical Society, backing a bid for the UK’s Jodrell Bank Observatory to be the host.

Active asteroid spun so fast that it exploded

23 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Astronomers used the 10-metre Keck II telescope in Hawaii to examine a so-called active asteroid, P/2012 F5, that mimics a comet with a tail, but ejects dust like a shot without an obvious reason. The researchers found that it had a very fast spin rate and probably fragmented.

A 2-day-old crescent Moon meets Venus in the evening sky

22 March 2015 Ade Ashford

Nearly 60 hours after its starring rôle in Friday morning’s spectacle, the crescent Moon has an attractive conjunction with planet Venus, the second brightest nighttime body, low to the west at dusk on Sunday, March 22nd.