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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.

Public invited to help name features on Pluto and its largest moon, Charon

21 March 2015 Astronomy Now

On July 14th, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft will flyby Pluto, offering the first close-up look at that small, distant world. You can help decide what names will be used on subsequent maps of the dwarf planet and its largest moon, Charon, as the SETI Institute announces the launch of its “Our Pluto” campaign.

Clouds fail to spoil the eclipse party

20 March 2015 Keith Cooper

While clouds did their best to obscure the solar eclipse, many observers have still been able to witness the Moon moving in front of the Sun.

Why do eclipses happen?

18 March 2015 Keith Cooper

Solar eclipses are relatively rare; they happen when the Moon moves directly and precisely in front of the Sun. Why are they so infrequent, and why do solar eclipses always come in pairs with lunar eclipses?

Moon impact! NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter finds new craters

17 March 2015 Astronomy Now

On 17th March 2013, an object hit the Moon’s surface in Mare Imbrium and exploded in a flash of light nearly 10 times as bright as anything ever recorded before. NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has found the new 19-metre-wide crater plus more than two-dozen others.

Eclipse 2012: Total eclipse, Total brilliance

12 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Our Managing Editor, Steven Young, travelled with Explorers Astronomy Tours to Australia in the hope that the clouds parted for long enough to see the total solar eclipse of November 2012.

Pluto-bound probe tweaks its trajectory

12 March 2015 Stephen Clark

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft fine-tuned its path toward Pluto on Tuesday, firing its rocket thrusters for 93 seconds to aim for a fleeting flyby of the distant dwarf planet July 14.

Dwarf galaxy’s gamma-rays hint at dark matter

11 March 2015 Astronomy Now

An excess of gamma rays detected coming from a recently discovered dwarf galaxy named Reticulum 2, which is 98,000 light years from Earth, could provide researchers with clues about dark matter, which is the mysterious stuff that makes up most of the Universe.

New dwarf galaxies discovered in orbit around the Milky Way

11 March 2015 Astronomy Now

Astronomers have discovered a ‘treasure trove’ of rare dwarf satellite galaxies orbiting our own Milky Way. The closest is about 95,000 light-years away, while the most distant is more than a million light-years away.

Venus revealed in high-resolution radar images from Earth

10 March 2015 Astronomy Now

By combining the powerful radar transmitter of the Arecibo Observatory and the Green Bank Telescope (GBT) — the world’s largest fully steerable radio telescope — astronomers were able to penetrate the visually opaque atmospheric veil of Venus to make remarkably detailed images of the surface of the planet without leaving Earth.