Archive – Page 298 – Astronomy Now

Rosetta gets ringside seat to smelly comet outburst

11 August 2015 Stephen Clark

Europe’s Rosetta spacecraft has recorded a brilliant beam of gas and dust shooting into space from Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the most spectacular such emission since the probe arrived at the tiny frozen world one year ago.

Galaxy survey charts the fading and slow death of the universe

11 August 2015 Astronomy Now

An international team of astronomers studying more than 200,000 galaxies has made the most comprehensive assessment of the energy output of the nearby universe. The Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) project confirms that the energy produced is only about half what it was two billion years ago and this fading is occurring across all wavelengths from the ultraviolet to the far infrared. The universe is slowly dying.

Kepler finds tenth transiting ‘Tatooine’ exoplanet

11 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Astronomers have discovered the tenth known ‘transiting circumbinary’ planet, which orbits two stars. Like the fictional planet “Tatooine” from Star Wars, this planet has two suns in its sky. Known as Kepler-453 b, the new planet is a gas-giant six times the diameter of Earth and lies in the habitable zone of its host pair of stars.

Hubble reveals galaxy gas flow and star birth regulated by black-hole jets

10 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Astronomers have uncovered a unique process for how the universe’s largest elliptical galaxies continue making stars long after their peak years of star birth. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope revealed brilliant knots and chains of hot, blue stars forming along the jets of active black holes found in the centres of giant elliptical galaxies.

“Ascent of Angels” by Brad Goldpaint

9 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Nomination number seven from the prestigious Insight Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition, an annual celebration of the most beautiful and spectacular visions of the cosmos by astrophotographers worldwide. The 2015 competition received 2700 spectacular entries from over 60 countries and the winners will be announced 17 September.

Last vestiges of surface water on Mars indicated by salt flat

9 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Mars turned cold and dry long ago, but scientists have discovered evidence of an ancient lake that likely represents some of the last potentially habitable surface water ever to exist on the Red Planet. University of Colorado Boulder researchers estimate that the lake was only about 8 percent as salty as the Earth’s oceans and therefore may have been hospitable to microbial life.

Corrected sunspot history suggests climate change not due to natural solar trends

8 August 2015 Astronomy Now

The Sunspot Number, the longest scientific experiment still ongoing, is a crucial tool used to study the solar dynamo, space weather and climate change. It has now been recalibrated and shows a consistent history of solar activity over the past few centuries. The new record has no significant long-term upward trend in solar activity since 1700, suggesting that rising global temperatures since the industrial revolution cannot be attributed to increased solar activity.

Ceres’ mysterious bright spots and 4-mile-tall pyramidal mountain in 3-D

8 August 2015 Astronomy Now

Since its arrival at dwarf planet Ceres on 6 March this year, NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has been slowly spiralling closer to this enigmatic little world. Mission scientist are nearer finding explanations for the intriguing bright spots in a crater named Occator and why an isolated mountain — as high as any in North America — is sitting in the middle of nowhere.

Hubble views the Little Gem Nebula

8 August 2015 Astronomy Now

This colourful bubble is a planetary nebula called NGC 6818, also known as the Little Gem Nebula, discovered by William Herschel in 1787. It is located in the constellation of Sagittarius, roughly 6,000 light-years away from us. The rich glow of the cloud is just over half a light-year across.

Perseid meteors set to light up 12-13 August skies

7 August 2015 Astronomy Now

From the evening of Wednesday, 12 August into the early hours of the following morning, it is the maximum of the annual Perseid meteor shower. This year, a new Moon makes prospects for watching this natural firework display particularly good. So, find somewhere away from the streetlights, settle into a garden lounger facing northeast, and enjoy the show!