Clipmarks | invictus's 'astronomy' clips

Astronomers see 'youngest planet'

Wed, 02 Apr 2008 13:25:07 GMT

clipped by: invictus

An embryonic planet detected in a far off galaxy could be less than 2,000 years old, astronomers say.

The ball of dust and gas, which is in the process of turning into a Jupiter-like giant, was detected around the star HL Tau by a UK team.

Research leader Dr Jane Greaves said the planet's growth may have been kickstarted when another young star passed the system 1,600 years ago.

Details were presented at the UK National Astronomy Meeting in Belfast.

The scientists studied a disc of gas and rocky particles around HL Tau, which is 520 light-years away and thought to be less than 100,000 years old.

But there is an intriguing suggestion that the gas giant, which is some 14 times the size of Jupiter, could be even younger.

Tags: planets, universe, astronomy, cosmology, science

'Hundreds of worlds' in Milky Way

Mon, 18 Feb 2008 01:52:48 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Scientists say there may be many more worlds in our solar system

Rocky planets, possibly with conditions suitable for life, may be more common than previously thought in our galaxy, a study has found.

New evidence suggests more than half the Sun-like stars in the Milky Way could have similar planetary systems.

There may also be hundreds of undiscovered worlds in outer parts of our Solar System, astronomers believe.

Future studies of such worlds will radically alter our understanding of how planets are formed, they say.

New findings about planets were presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Boston.

Tags: astronomy, space, milky way, galaxies, life, science

Asteroid flyby today - no impact risk

Tue, 29 Jan 2008 12:27:52 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: www.spaceweather.com

Asteroid 2007 TU24 is flying past Earth today. There's no danger of a collision, but the 250m-wide space rock is close enough (1.4 lunar distances) to photograph through backyard telescopes as it speeds through the constellation Cassiopeia glowing like a 10th magnitude star. NASA radars are monitoring the flyby and may produce new images of the rock by week's end. [ephemeris] [3D orbit]

Tags: astronomy, science, asteroids, space, solar system

Close Encounter with Mars

Mon, 17 Dec 2007 23:56:56 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: spaceweather.com

Ready your telescopes! On Tuesday evening, Dec. 18th, Mars makes its closest approach to Earth until the year 2016. At a distance of only 55 million miles, Mars outshines every star in the night sky (it is slightly brighter than Sirius) and draws attention to itself with its distinctive red color. Plus, it looks great through a backyard telescope:

Tags: astronomy, planets, backyard astronomy, mars, science

Galaxy is 'blasted' by black hole

Mon, 17 Dec 2007 20:35:34 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

A powerful jet of particles from a "supermassive" black hole has been seen blasting a nearby galaxy, according to findings from the US space agency.

Galaxies have been seen colliding before, but this is the first time this type of galactic violence has been seen by astronomers.

This could have a profound effect on any planets in the jet's path and could also trigger a burst of star formation.

The findings are to be published in the Astrophysical Journal.

They were obtained using Nasa's space-based Chandra X-ray Observatory, its Hubble Space Telescope, and Spitzer Space Telescope, as well as the Very Large Array (VLA) and Merlin radio telescopes on the ground.

Tags: universe, galaxies, collision, astronomy, black hole, science

A new and large sunspot at last

Sat, 08 Dec 2007 15:27:29 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: spaceweather.com

Sunspot 978 popped over the sun's eastern limb on Dec. 6th and it has quickly become one of the largest sunspots of the year. Pete Lawrence of Selsey UK photographed the active region yesterday:

"The image was taken through a Coronado Calcium-K PST," says Lawrence. "Its nice to see something tangible crossing the solar disk again." Sunspot 978 poses no threat for strong solar flares but this could change if its rapid growth continues. Stay tuned!

Tags: sun, astronomy, sunspots, science

"Exploding Comet" Photo Gallery

Sun, 11 Nov 2007 17:20:07 GMT

clipped by: invictus
clipper's remarks: Many good shots of Comet 17P/Holmes, taken by backyard astronomers around the world.

Clip Source: spaceweather.com

Summary: Comet 17P/Holmes shocked astronomers on Oct. 24, 2007, with a spectacular eruption. In less than 24 hours, the 17th magnitude comet brightened by a factor of nearly a million becoming a naked-eye object in the evening sky. Look for a golden 2.5th magnitude fuzzball in the constellation Perseus after sunset.

Tags: astronomy, comets, comet holmes, images, photography

Exploding Comet update - New images

Mon, 29 Oct 2007 22:55:08 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: spaceweather.com

Exploding Comet 17P/Holmes is now larger than Jupiter. Astronomer Eric Allen of Quebec's Observatoire du Cégep de Trois-Rivières combined images he captured on three consecutive nights (Oct. 25, 26 and 27) and placed them beside a picture of Jupiter scaled to the same distance as the comet:

The diaphanous and curiously spherical cloud surrounding the comet's core is now large enough to physically swallow the King of Planets!

And that's just for starters. The growing comet subtends an angle (4 arcminutes) as large as the Moon's Sea of Tranquillity. Last night in Higham Ferrers, England, Dave Eagle photographed "the Moon and Comet Holmes with the same setup to show how big this strange comet is."

Although the comet is not as bright as Jupiter or a lunar mare, it is visible to the unaided eye. Look north after sunset for a magnitude +2.5 fuzzball in the constellation Perseus: sky map.

Tags: astronomy, comets, exploding comet, images, science

Erupting comet brightens up the sky

Wed, 24 Oct 2007 20:36:07 GMT

clipped by: invictus
clipper's remarks: Astronomers in Japan and Europe report that Comet 17P/Holmes is undergoing a spectacular eruption. The 17th-magnitude comet has brightened by a factor of five hundred thousand or more during the past 24 hours becoming a naked eye object in the evening sky.

Clip Source: www.astro.uni-bonn.de

A most amazing eruption is occuring on comet 17P/Holmes which was at 17 mag. at best but on October 24 suddenly began to brighten like crazy: Now (afternoon UTC) it has already reached 3rd magnitude and is easily visible to the naked eye, as reports from Japan indicate: "Perseus does not look 'Perseus' familiar to us due to the bright stellar object now."

The comet looks like a bright, yellow star, and only magnification reveals a fuzzy coma around the dusty core. Holmes was discovered in 1892 thanks to a similar outburst, and hope is that the further development will be similar now: the coma should expand over time but stay bright for a week or more.

Tags: astronomy, comets, science

Radio burst from space mystifies astronomers

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 01:08:42 GMT

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Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Astronomers who stumbled upon a powerful burst of radio waves said on Thursday they had never seen anything like it before, and it could offer a new way to search for colliding stars or dying black holes.

They were searching for pulsars -- a type of rotating compacted neutron star that sends out rhythmic pulses of radiation -- when they spotted the giant radio signal.

It was extremely brief but very strong, and appears to have come from about 3 billion light-years away -- a light-year being the distance light travels in a year, or about 6 trillion miles.

"This burst appears to have originated from the distant universe and may have been produced by an exotic event such as the collision of two neutron stars or the death throes of an evaporating black hole," said Duncan Lorimer of West Virginia University and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory.

Tags: astronomy, pulsars, radio signals, science

Star catalogue revised & refined

Sat, 29 Sep 2007 01:04:00 GMT

clipped by: invictus

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Hipparcos' data underpins the system of cosmic measurement

The most accurate catalogue of the distances to more than 100,000 stars has just been released.

Cambridge astronomer Dr Floor van Leeuwen has spent the past 10 years checking and recalculating data gathered by the Hipparcos satellite.

It collected the information in the 1990s, but questions were raised about apparent errors in the results.

Dr van Leeuwen, who saw a flaw in the way Hipparcos worked, has now corrected the star distances.

The catalogue (Hipparcos - The New Reduction of the Raw Data) will allow astronomers to probe more deeply into the properties of stars and galaxies.

Astronomers can only determine the physical properties of stars by comparing their luminosity with their distance from Earth. Without an accurate measurement of distance, the star's true luminosity or size cannot be known.

Tags: astronomy, stars, hipparcos, stars catalogue, science

Colossal tail trails dying star

Wed, 15 Aug 2007 22:49:59 GMT

clipped by: invictus
clipper's remarks:

"The fact that Mira's tail only glows with ultraviolet light might explain why other telescopes have missed it."

Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

A distant star that hurtles through space at extraordinary speeds has a huge, comet-like tail trailing in its wake, astronomers say.

The appendage, which measures a colossal 13 light years in length, was spotted by Nasa's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (Galex) space telescope.

The researchers said that nothing like it had ever been spotted around a star.

They believe the star, known as Mira, will help them to study what happens as stars meet their demise.

Mira (also called Mira A) has captivated astronomers for more than 400 years.

It sits about 350 light-years from Earth in a constellation known as Cetus, and is accompanied in orbit by a smaller secondary star, called Mira B, forming a binary system.

Billions of years ago, Mira would have been much like our Sun, but as it now enters its death-throes it has swollen into a type of star known as a red giant.

Yet despite centuries of study, its spectacular tail had remained undetected.

Tags: astronomy, space, mira, cetus, binary stars, science

Celestial show begins this weekend

Fri, 10 Aug 2007 20:22:44 GMT

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Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

The annual Perseid meteor shower will reach its peak during the early hours of Monday, but it will be visible from Saturday night until Tuesday morning.

The celestial show will be most apparent in the north-eastern part of the sky near the Perseus constellation.

If the skies remain clear, it will offer stargazers the best opportunity for a few years to see the Perseids.

The shower this year coincides with a new Moon, providing sky watchers with the dark skies necessary for excellent observing conditions.

The best viewing conditions will be where the sky is clearest and darkest. However, meteors should be visible, to a lesser degree, in cities despite light pollution and smog.

Both hemispheres will receive good views but the prime locations will be Western Europe and North America.

As an added bonus, watchers should be able to see Mars, which will be in view as a bright red dot in the eastern sky after midnight.

Tags: astronomy, night sky, meteor shower, perseids, backyard astronomy

The Sun Flies Like a Bullet

Tue, 07 Aug 2007 22:17:42 GMT

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Clip Source: discovermagazine.com

The Sun Flies Like a Bullet

Our solar system, which careers around our galaxy’s center at nearly half a million miles per hour, isn’t round. It isn’t even symmetrical. Instead, says George Mason University astrophysicist Merav Opher, the sun’s domain is shaped like a slightly squashed bullet and tilts up to 90 degrees away from the plane of the magnetic field of the rest of the Milky Way.

Opher got her results by working with particle and radio-wave data from the two Voyager probes, which are now more than 100 times as far from Earth as we are from the sun, near a boundary known as the termination shock. There, the barrage of particles blasting out from the sun—the solar wind—is slowed by our motion through the galaxy. Using the Voyager data, researchers can now monitor the magnetic field at the edge of our solar system.

Tags: astronomy, sun, solar system, milky way, science

Saturn's ring mystery is solved

Fri, 03 Aug 2007 11:20:24 GMT

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Clip Source: news.bbc.co.uk

Saturn's ring mystery is solved

Cassini images of Saturn's G ring captures its single, bright arc

Scientists have made a significant step forward in understanding the dynamics of Saturn's magnificent and mysterious system of rings.

The behaviour of one ring in particular - the G ring - has baffled experts.

Its dust particles should ebb away because there are no nearby moons to hold them in place or replenish them.

But the Cassini probe has shed new light on the faint, narrow ring; showing that it interacts with a much more distant Saturnian satellite.

The work, published in Science, also unveiled the ring's odd structure.

The G ring is one of Saturn's outermost rings: it is more than 168,000km from the centre of the planet and more than 15,000km from the nearest moon.

"It's a dusty ring," explained Matthew Hedman, a research associate at Cornell University and lead author of the study. "Like the E ring and F ring, it is primarily composed of tiny grains of ice just a few microns across."

Tags: astronomy, space, planets, saturn