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THE SEVENTH STARMUS FESTIVAL took place May 12-17 in Bratislava, Slovakia, and was a smashing success all around. Starmus stands for stars and music, and this celebration has grown into [...]

Do you remember the first time you truly discovered the universe? When I was a teenager, many moons ago, I bought my first telescope, a Celestron 8. I remember excitedly [...]

WHETHER YOU REALIZE IT OR NOT, YOU'RE PART OF A REVOLUTION. Let me explain. In the past, ideas to interpret the nature of things developed slowly. Before there was astronomy, [...]

During the American Civil War, astronomy played a significant role. In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln visited the U.S. Naval Observatory to indulge his interest in astronomy and seek a reprieve from the war. The observatory was manned by a young astronomer named Asaph Hall, who would later discover the two moons of Mars. The war was also marked by celestial events, such as the appearance of the Great Comet of 1861 and an aurora after the Battle of Fredericksburg. Additionally, the accidental shooting of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson in the moonlight during the Battle of Chancellorsville was recently explained by astronomers. The era of the Civil War also witnessed the rise of astrophysics. [Extracted from the article]

50 YEARS IN MID-SEPTEMBER 1982, I arrived at our little stone building at AstroMedia Corp. in Milwaukee for my first day of work. I had no idea what adventures awaited. [...]

As someone who has just moved to Arizona during the summertime, I'm getting to know the Sun pretty well these days. Although storms bubble up during this so-called monsoon season, [...]

One of the most exciting experiences for an amateur astronomer is when we get a new telescope or pair of binoculars and get a 'new view' of the universe. I [...]

Follow Dave on Facebook: facebook.com/davidjohneicher X (formerly Twitter): @deicherstar Instagram: eicher.david It's always an electric feeling standing under the Moon's shadow. A solar eclipse is a big-time astronomical event like [...]

We live in a world that often is not fair. Sometimes justice takes quite a while to arrive, and other times it never materializes at all. One such saga has [...]

Most of what we know about the universe is recent. A thousand years ago, everyone walked around believing that the motions of heavenly bodies influenced human activities on Earth. Now [...]

When I was a young lad, I was fortunate enough to live in a relatively small town in southwestern Ohio. Oxford hosted Miami University, but its native population was then [...]

In 2017, when astronomers discovered the asteroid 1l/2017 U1, it soon dawned on them that they had a weird object on their hands. The calculated orbit showed this elongated rock [...]

'It's going to be like going to another planet.' Every one of my friends who had been to Antarctica said this same thing. And it was true. In December, I [...]

The Starmus Festival, held in Bratislava, Slovakia, is a renowned science festival that combines the sciences and the arts to explore and improve the world. The festival attracts Nobel laureates, astronauts, scientists, and artists from various fields. This year's theme, Starmus Earth, focused on climate change and its impact on the planet. The festival featured talks by prominent figures such as Jane Goodall, Katharine Hayhoe, and Sylvia Earle, as well as concerts by musicians like Jean-Michel Jarre and Brian May. The festival also included the Stephen Hawking Medal Ceremony, where Laurie Anderson, Christopher Nolan, David Attenborough, and Sylvia Earle were honored. The event concluded with talks on space exploration and the future of the universe. [Extracted from the article]

This article provides an overview of deep-sky objects, such as clusters, nebulae, and galaxies. The author shares their personal experience of discovering the universe and acknowledges the limitations of existing information. The article discusses various types of deep-sky objects, including double stars, variable stars, open star clusters, and globular star clusters. It also highlights the significance of these objects in understanding galaxies and the vastness of the cosmos. Additionally, the article explores different types of nebulae, such as emission, planetary, supernova remnants, and reflection nebulae, as well as dark nebulae. It also covers various types of galaxies, including spiral, barred spiral, and elliptical galaxies. The author emphasizes the advancements in technology and knowledge that have contributed to a greater understanding and exploration of these celestial objects. [Extracted from the article]

Black holes are one of the greatest inventions astronomy enthusiasts have ever known. Hypothesized in 1783, not confirmed until 1990, they relentlessly teased astronomers for many decades. The idea of [...]

We finally are getting the astronomical event of the decade (in the U.S.) that countless astronomy enthusiasts have been waiting for. Seven years have passed since Americans witnessed the last [...]

Hey folks, if you didn't already know this, the universe is a dangerous place. Life can seem pretty nice down here on Earth--well, sometimes. But our daily lives carry us [...]

WITH THE SUCCESS OF Apollo 14 behind them and the near tragedy of Apollo 13 firmly in the past, Apollo's mission planners hiked the length and sophistication of the following [...]

In this often hectic life, we're never quite satisfied. We're always looking for improvements, stretching for more, wanting more, always seeking to expand our horizons. It's hardwired, just part of [...]

When I excitedly unboxed my first telescope, a Celestron 8, in 1976, I couldn't wait to get it under the stars. Those were exciting times, not really knowing what anything [...]

IN the wake of the near disaster with Apollo 13, NASA took precautionary plans with the following mission to tighten safety regulations and procedures. The eighth crewed mission in the [...]

On the evening of Oct. 4, 1923, near Los Angeles, a young astronomer got into his car and began a motorized trek up to Mount Wilson. There, he arrived at [...]

Waves crashed along the beach at Santa Monica, vast stands of forest speckled the mountains north of the city, and a mesmerizing network of roads crisscrossed here and there. In [...]

The universe is a magical place. Many people don't know this; they are born, go through their lives, and perish without ever realizing it. I'm not talking about magic the [...]

EDWIN HUBBLE REVOLUTIONIZED ASTRONOMY IN 1923 when he discovered that the 'Andromeda Nebula' was actually a distant island galaxy full of stars, gas, and dust. That breakthrough helped set the [...]

ON MARCH 9, the venerated science series Cosmos will return to TV on the National Geographic Channel. The esteemed astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson will again host the show, which will [...]

BY THE SPRING OF 1970, the Apollo program was rolling along at full speed. The first landing, and subsequent return trip with loftier scientific goals, were successes. Now, NASA had [...]

Few things in life are unique; that word gets overused ad infinitum. But the Starmus Festival, the international science gathering that has now taken place five times, really is like [...]

Sixty years ago, astronomers stumbled into a great mystery. Working at Caltech, Maarten Schmidt was busily studying the spectra of various radio sources scattered across the sky. In 1963, he [...]

FOUR MONTHS after the triumphant mission of Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins, NASA was ready for its first follow-up act. Apollo 12 began where the previous mission had [...]

BACK IN MY YOUTH, one of the astronomers I had the good fortune to befriend was the great Bart Bok (1906-1983). This was near the end of his life, long [...]

HE IS OFTEN CALLED THE 'THIRD MAN' OF THE MOST HISTORIC MOON MISSION EVER. Michael Collins did not walk on the Moon; instead, he orbited the lunar surface during that [...]

THE FLIGHT OF APOLLO 11, the mission chosen to attempt the first lunar landing, was scheduled to launch July 16, 1969. After the success of Apollo 10, it appeared that [...]

It could not have been set up any better. And its master architect, planetary scientist Alan Stern, had that in mind all along. On New Year's Eve and New Year's [...]

Before Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon, becoming the first human to step on another world, we had to be ready. A big part of the readiness came earlier [...]

ON THE EVENING of October 4, 1923, near Los Angeles, a young astronomer got into his car and began a motorized trek up to Mount Wilson. There, he arrived at [...]

WITH THE START OF THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY of the legendary Apollo missions, you might find yourself dreaming about what it would have been like to explore lunar craters up close. [...]

WHEN I WAS A TEENAGER, new to observing the sky, I spent a year wandering across the Milky Way armed with nothing more than a pair of 7x50 binoculars. Then [...]

Fifty years ago, men traveled a quarter of a million miles through space, and set foot for the first time on our planet's Moon. Today, this outrageously bold adventure seems [...]

Fifty years ago, Steve Walther, a young astronomy and journalism student, had a dream. At first a college project, Astronomy magazine was eventually launched in full force. The first issue [...]

Artificial intelligence is transforming our world. Will it take on the entire universe? Founded with the rise of computing machines in the 1950s, AI is now actively seeping into more [...]

* When we look up into a dark sky, we're accustomed to seeing the cosmos as an unimaginably faraway thing. Distances don't really register. The few things we can see [...]

And speaking of similarities to our star, a study of starspots on 20 of M67's stars by the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam and Johns Hopkins University conducted in 2016 showed that they (and probably the vast majority of the stars in the cluster) rotate at the same rate as the Sun. - M.E.B. FORNAX DWARF The Fornax Dwarf is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, and the second discovered. The star's rapid apparent motion is due to its proximity (12.8 light-years away) and its high velocity (150 miles per second [245 km/s]) toward our Sun. Kapteyn's Star is also the nearest star to our Sun that does not belong to the Milky Way's disk but to its halo, the spherical component of the galaxy made of older stars with fewer heavy elements. The seven galaxies that make up the Septet are magnitude 15.2 NGC 3745, magnitude 14.0 NGC 3746, magnitude 14.8 NGC 3748, magnitude 15.0 NGC 3750, magnitude 15.0 NGC 3751, magnitude 14.5 NGC 3753, and magnitude 14.3 NGC 3754. Seven of the galaxies in Abell 2151 are brighter than 14th magnitude: NGC 6047 (magnitude 13.5), NGC 6061 (13.6), IC 1194A (13.6), NGC 6055 (13.7), IC 1185 (13.9), NGC 6045 (13.9), and NGC 6056 (13.9). Astronomers classify the central star of the planetary nebula as a pre-degenerate star or a PG 1159 star. [Extracted from the article]

Black holes should be practically every-where. In the Milky Way Galaxy, you shouldn't be able to go across the street without hitting one. Stellar mass black holes result from dying, [...]

* This month, an exciting mission takes off from the launchpad. The JUpiter Icy Moons Explorer, better known as JUICE, heads for an encounter with our largest planet's satellites, beginning [...]