Canis Major – Astronomy Now

NGC 2217, is a galaxy in transition

23 June 2022 Keith Cooper

NGC 2217, in the constellation of Canis Major and located about 65 million light years away, is a galaxy in transition.

Don’t miss the Geminid meteor shower 13–14 December 2018

13 December 2018 Ade Ashford

The December Geminid meteor shower is generally regarded as the richest and most reliable of the major annual shooting star displays. This year the predicted peak occurs close to 12h UT on 14 December, though high rates of activity should be encountered between 8pm GMT on Thursday, 13 December and 5pm GMT the following evening.

Interacting galaxies produce eye-shaped “tsunami” of stars

5 November 2016 Astronomy Now

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimetre/submillimetre Array (ALMA) have discovered a tsunami of stars and gas that is crashing midway through the disc of a spiral galaxy known as IC 2163. This colossal wave of material — which was triggered when IC 2163 recently sideswiped another spiral galaxy dubbed NGC 2207 — produced dazzling arcs of intense star formation that resemble a pair of eyelids.

See planet Venus dazzle at greatest brilliancy in the pre-dawn sky

17 September 2015 Ade Ashford

Early risers wishing to see Venus as a dazzling ‘morning star’ need only glance low to the east in the pre-dawn sky. The planet reaches greatest brilliancy on Sunday, 20 September when, for a couple of mornings, it can be seen outshining brightest nighttime star Sirius in the southeast by a factor of seventeen times. Can you see your shadow cast by Venus?

Picture This

Buried in the heart of a giant

2 July 2015 Astronomy Now

This is a young open cluster of stars known as NGC 2367, an infant stellar grouping that lies at the centre of an immense and ancient structure on the margins of the Milky Way, captured by the Wide Field Imager (WFI) camera on the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile.