Professional Documents
Culture Documents
From April 1, 2018 through April 30, 2018, all of our Maksutovs and Quattro imaging
Newtonians will be on sale. Don’t miss out on some of the best savings of the year!
©2018 Sky-Watcher USA. Specifications subject to change without notice. 20-18005.
If you’re in New York on April 21-22, come visit us at the Northeast Astronomy Forum!
For information on all of our products and services, or to find an authorized Sky-Watcher USA dealer near you, just visit www.skywatcherusa.com.
Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter!
Make Some History with a Tele Vue
Telescope of Your Own!
Vue-NP101is. During totality of the 2017 total solar eclipse, he imaged a lifetime!
the star field around the Sun in an attempt to make the most accurate
optical measurement to date of Einstein’s prediction of starlight deflection. His goal was
to use off-the-shelf equipment available to any amateur astronomer. Hear Don present his
history-making results, and why he chose a Tele Vue telescope, at NEAF 2018; then stop by
the Tele Vue booth to see the scope, speak with Don, and choose a Tele Vue telescope of your
own! Whether you make family or scientific history with it, Tele Vue’s line of APO refractors
Booths 524-526
are heirloom-quality instruments, built in New York, to stand the test of time and challenges
of space! Follow our blog at Televue.com for Don’s and other Tele Vue owners’ stories.
Tele Vue ® 32 Elkay Dr., Chester, New York 10918 (845) 469-4551.
@televueoptics
televue.com
Vi s i o n a r y
Online Content Code: ASY1805
Enter this code at: www.astronomy.com/code
to gain access to web-exclusive content
MAY 2018
VOL. 46, NO. 5
4 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Black Holes, Tides,
and Curved Spacetime:
Understanding Gravity
E D TIME OF Taught by Professor Benjamin Schumacher
IT KENYON COLLEGE
FE
LIM
R
LECTURE TITLES
70% 1. The Strangest Force
7
RD 3. Revolution in the Heavens
E
E R BY J UN 4. Universal Gravitation
5. The Art of Experiment
6. Escape Velocity, Energy, and Rotation
7. Stars in Their Courses—Orbital Mechanics
8. What Are Tides? Earth and Beyond
9. Nudge—Perturbations of Orbits
10. Resonance—Surprises in the Intricate Dance
11. The Million-Body Problem
12. The Billion-Year Battle
13. From Forces to Fields
14. The Falling Laboratory
15. Spacetime in Zero Gravity
16. Spacetime Tells Matter How to Move
17. Matter Tells Spacetime How to Curve
18. Light in Curved Spacetime
19. Gravitomagnetism and Gravitational Waves
20. Gravity’s Horizon—Anatomy of a Black Hole
21. Which Universe Is Ours?
22. Cosmic Antigravity—Inflation and Dark Energy
23. The Force of Creation
24. The Next Revolution
How our
Managing Editor Kathi Kube
Senior Editors Michael E. Bakich, Richard Talcott
Associate Editors Alison Klesman, Jake Parks
Copy Editors Dave Lee, Elisa R. Neckar
Editorial Assistant Amber Jorgenson
solar system
ART
Graphic Designer Kelly Katlaps
Illustrator Roen Kelly
Production Specialist Jodi Jeranek
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS
formed
Bob Berman, Adam Block, Glenn F. Chaple, Jr., Martin George,
Tony Hallas, Phil Harrington, Korey Haynes, Jeff Hester, Liz
Kruesi, Ray Jayawardhana, Alister Ling, Steve Nadis, Stephen
James O’Meara, Tom Polakis, Martin Ratcliffe, Mike D.
Reynolds, Sheldon Reynolds, Erika Rix, Raymond Shubinski
EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD
Buzz Aldrin, Marcia Bartusiak, Timothy Ferris, Alex Filippenko,
Adam Frank, John S. Gallagher lll, Daniel W. E. Green, William K.
Hartmann, Paul Hodge, Edward Kolb, Stephen P. Maran, Brian
O
ne of the most history. Emspak’s story tells into their weirdo orbits, and May, S. Alan Stern, James Trefil
fundamental ques- the sordid tale as it is now planetary scientists now
tions we innately shaping up for planetary believe that migration of Kalmbach Publishing Co.
have as humans is scientists. planets played a major role CEO Dan Hickey
Senior Vice President, Sales & Marketing Daniel R. Lance
the simple notion The idea that our solar in the early history of our Vice President, Content Stephen C. George
Vice President, Consumer Marketing Nicole McGuire
of where we came from. In system’s early history must be solar system. Art and Production Manager Michael Soliday
astronomy, that question very different from the con- Many planetary scientists Corporate Advertising Director Ann E. Smith
Circulation Director Liz Runyon
can be asked on a variety ventional notion came along now believe that Jupiter New Business Manager Cathy Daniels
Retention Manager Kathy Steele
of scales — where did we as suddenly. Fueled by com- formed relatively close to the Single Copy Specialist Kim Redmond
creatures come from? Where puter modeling and by obser- Sun and pushed outward ADVERTISING DEPARTMENT
did our solar system come vations made by the Kepler early on, clearing a lane and Phone (888) 558-1544
Advertising Sales Manager Steve Meni
from? Our galaxy? he uni- space telescope, the new view shoving material outward, Advertising Sales Representative
Dina Johnston, djohnston@kalmbach.com
verse at large? of the solar system is radical as it also left a “tail” of Ad Services Representative
This month’s cover story compared with the old. debris in its wake. Saturn Christa Burbank, ads@astronomy.com
by science journalist Jesse Scientists now know that then formed, and both plan- RETAIL TRADE ORDERS AND INQUIRIES
Selling Astronomy magazine or products in your store:
Emspak takes on the ques- protoplanets bounced around ets moved inward in a kind Phone (800) 558-1544
Outside U.S. and Canada (262) 796-8776, ext. 818
tion of the origin of the solar the early solar system “like of spirograph wobble, fling- Fax (262) 798-6592
system. For many years, billiard balls,” in Emspak’s ing other objects inward and Email tss@kalmbach.com
Website www.Retailers.Kalmbach.com
astronomers thought they words, and that our solar outward. After depleting CUSTOMER SALES AND SERVICE
had a neat answer, with the system is very different from material near them, the two Phone (877) 246-4835
Outside U.S. and Canada (813) 910-3616
Sun and its retinue of planets most others we see around largest planets made their Customer Service Astronomy@customersvc.com
having coalesced from a us. The so-called Late Heavy way outward once again. Digital Astronomy.Digital@customersvc.com
Back Issues Astronomy.SingleCopy@customersvc.com
dusty disk, the debris clear- Bombardment pummeled the The details of how we got CONTACT US
ing out once our star began inner solar system, and we the solar system we have Ad Sales adsales@astronomy.com
Ask Astro askastro@astronomy.com
nuclear fusion. From there, it can still see its effects on the today are incredible. These Books books@astronomy.com
was a simple matter of Jupiter ancient surfaces of Mercury are still ideas being worked Letters letters@astronomy.com
Products products@astronomy.com
dominating the gas giants, by and the Moon. on, but they clearly show Reader Gallery readergallery@astronomy.com
Editorial Phone (262) 796-8776
happenstance, and Earth Compared with the mod- that forming the solar sys-
taking on the role as the most els, the real Mars in our tem was a far more compli- Copyright © 2018 Kalmbach Publishing Co., all rights reserved. This pub-
lication may not be reproduced in any form without permission. Printed
massive of the terrestrial solar system is far less mas- cated task than anyone in the U.S.A. Allow 6 to 8 weeks for new subscriptions and address
changes. Subscription rate: single copy: $5.99; U.S.: 1 year (12 issues)
planets by pure luck. They sive than astronomers would imagined until just a few $42.95; 2 years (24 issues) $79.95; 3 years (36 issues) $114.95. Canadian:
Add $12.00 postage per year. Canadian price includes GST, payable in
also believed that our solar expect it to be. Scads of years ago. U.S. funds. All other international subscriptions: Add $16.00 postage per
year, payable in U.S. funds, drawn on a U.S. bank. BN 12271 3209 RT. Not
system is typical, and that small objects like asteroids responsible for unsolicited materials.
most solar systems around us and Kuiper Belt objects have Yours truly,
ought to resemble ours. been scattered into eccen-
Studies over the past tric, oddball orbits.
few years have upset the Something catastrophic or
apple cart of how our solar extremely energetic had to David J. Eicher Follow Astronomy
system formed and its early have pushed these bodies Editor
6 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
'HGLFDWHGWR
&UDIWVPDQVKLS
$XWR$GMXVWLQJ
*72 0RWRU*HDUER[HV
$EVROXWH(QFRGHU
2SWLRQ
9'&
Life on Mars
What to Know Before We Go
David A. Weintraub
press.princeton.edu ZZZDVWURSK\VLFVFRP
0DFKHVQH\3DUN,/86$
3K
27TH ANNUAL
NORTHEAST ASTRONOMY
FORUM & SPACE EXPO
APRIL 21-22, 2018
WORLD’S LARGEST ASTRONOMY, TELESCOPE & SPACE EXPO!
OVER 120 VENDORS, PRO/AM & ASTRONOMY WORKSHOPS,
SOLAR OBSERVING & WORLD-CLASS SPEAKERS FEATURING:
JOHN MATHER NOBEL LAUREATE & PROJECT SCIENTIST FOR
THE JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE
MIKE LEINBACH SPACE SHUTTLE LAUNCH DIRECTOR
Presented by
TOM MULDER BOEING CST STARLINER, NAVIGATION,
CONTROL, AND MISSION DESIGNER
PLUS MANY OTHERS!
SHOW HOURS: SAT 8:30-6 PM, SUN 10-5 PM
SUNY ROCKLAND COMMUNITY COLLEGE
SUFFERN, NY (ONLY 30 MINS FROM NEW YORK CITY) Sponsored by
BUY TICKETS, GET INFO, HOTEL ROOMS AT:
ROCKLANDASTRONOMY.COM/NEAF
DON’T MISS THE NORTHEAST FEATURING IMAGING Paddy Gilliland Rachel Freed Dennis Conti Randy Shivak
ASTRO IMAGING CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS, LECTURES David Lindemann Warren Keller Richard Crisp Ron Brecher
APRIL 19-20, 2018 AT NEAF & VENDOR EXHIBITS Bob Stephens Gary Walker John O’Neal and more!
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 7
QG
HOT BYTES >>
TRENDING
TO THE TOP
LUNAR LAVA
SNAPSHOT
J. WILLIAM SCHOPF/UCLA CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF EVOLUTION AND THE ORIGIN OF LIFE; TOP FROM LEFT: NASA/LRO/SETI/MARS INSTITUTE/P. LEE; GOETHE
Life in the
universe
may be
common
New research from experts
in early life on Earth
points toward life in the
universe at large.
8 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
NEW PRODUCT “Nearest Stars”
a 3D desktop sculpture of the 22 stars
JMI is now owned by Keeping it “Beautifully” Simple
known to be within 12 years of our Sun FARPOINTASTRO.COM Almost Zero Maintenance... Very little to go wrong
Using the most recent research data, each star is located correctly Almost Zero Operation Software... No Rotation
relative to our Sun within galactic coordinates and labelled on
the engraved brass base. The base shows the direction to the But Jim Burr can’t
center of the galaxy and concentric rings each 3 light years.
give up the New Next
Aircraft-grade
aluminum, brass, Generation 8” Binos
and steel, and
is 5” wide by How could he after 4 years of redesign?
5-1/2” tall
See them at NEAF
Unbelievable views, amazing
design inter-ocular spacing.
New faster focusing design,
folding tripod. $4,995
These will be the only ones
that will be made in the future.
domesales@astrohaven.com
http://www.armstrongmetalcrafts.com 303-233-5353 • info@jimsmobile.com 949.215.3777 www.astrohaven.com
MyScienceShop.com
Sales tax where applicable.
P29472
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 9
STRANGEUNIVERSE
BY BOB BERMAN
Apathy Now!
Would the discovery of extraterrestrial life
really change the world?
1 cm
A
re you ready for some want to say that. Because as I
exciting news about paid close attention the next
apathy? day, nobody talked about the
Back when Dan life-on-Mars discovery. People
Goldin was didn’t care. (That Goldin’s
administrator of NASA, his announcement later proved too The meteorite ALH84001 is a 4.5 billion-year-old chunk of Mars’ crust that arrived
on Earth about 13,000 years ago. In 1996, NASA announced that the meteorite
sister was one of my students. optimistic isn’t relevant here.) It might contain fossils of early martian life — a statement that didn’t have a major
She thoughtfully told me he was one more sign our culture impact on society or its view of science. NASA/JSC/STANFORD UNIVERSITY
totally loved Discover magazine is scientifically apathetic.
— especially my astronomy Fast forward to 2017. When I was hired to run here. Astronomers are keeping
page. Pleased to hear it, I fol- Someone in Sweden posted astronomy programs at the big everything secret.
lowed him closely after that, gorgeous Facebook photos of 2015 Wanderlust yoga festival The problem lies deeper than
which is why I vividly remem- atmospheric ice crystal phe- in Killington, Vermont, a staff the sad reality that fewer teen-
ber August 6, 1996, when he nomena. They showed halos, member met me at the office. agers are participating in out-
called a press conference to the upper tangent arc, the par- “Did you see the news?” she door hands-on nature hobbies
make a jaw-dropping helic circle, and other cool stuff. asked. “The Earth is flat.” like astronomy, bird-watching,
announcement: NASA’s analy- Then I read the comments. “What? Earth isn’t flat.” or canoeing. Nonetheless, many
sis of the Antarctic martian “Wake up, folks,” wrote the “Yes it is. They’ve proven it. are glued to screens with the
meteorite ALH84001 revealed first guy. “Here’s proof the gov- It’s all over the net.” potential to believe the fakery.
the possibility of life. Life on ernment is releasing metals “You don’t have to believe Our response? We mustn’t
Mars! It finally happened! into the atmosphere!” me,” I said. “Do you have any try to bring young people into
I quickly turned to my long- The next commentator friends in California?” real science too quickly.
suffering wife and yelled: “Now agreed. “Absolutely! Fifteen “Yes.” Instead, reality should be intro-
we’ll find out!” years ago I saw a ring around “Then during the next sunset duced incrementally. The first
I’d long suspected that the the Sun for the first time. Now here, phone your California step is a return to the situation
endlessly repeated adage that a decade ago, which was mere
“everything will change if we indifference. That’s an achiev-
find extraterrestrial life” was Ignorance of science able objective. To help, we’re
wrong, that it gave our apathetic seems only to be growing. offering a new bumper sticker:
citizenry too much credit, that “Apathy Now!”
people wouldn’t care if geeky We’ve founded NAP — the
scientists found evidence of I often see rings. The govern- friends. They’ll tell you their National Apathy Promotion.
some microscopic or plantlike ment is poisoning the air.” Sun is halfway up the sky. Yet Our goal is to get 1 million
organisms in a distant place. “You’re wrong,” I said to her it’s on the horizon here. So teenagers a year to say, “Don’t
Even today, that adage is still in my mind. “Early on, you Earth can’t be flat.” bother me with astronomy.” If
repeated like a mantra. Bill Nye’s never noticed rings —which are Her face had a “don’t bother you donate, my friends, we can
December 3 op-ed piece in The called halos, by the way — me” expression. I get the rea- replace the current insistence
New York Times said the same because you didn’t watch the soning: Our government lies. So that Mars is a secret alien mili-
thing: finding extraterrestrial life sky and don’t know about if it insists Earth is a ball, it tary base and that congressmen
would profoundly alter our refraction phenomena. Now means Earth is flat. are reptilians (no joke, Google
everyday attitudes. you’re aware of rings, so you Call it fake science or any- it) with a return to the NASA
Goldin’s announcement see them because they’re com- thing you want. It’s spreading. glory years of “I don’t care.”
wasn’t about some distant exo- mon. And, incidentally, metal- Climate change is not real. We It’s a lofty goal. But with
planet. This was Mars. It was lic particles can’t refract light never went to the Moon. White your help, we can succeed.
next door. So I figured, now and wouldn’t resemble ice crys- lines in the sky are from gov-
we’ll finally know how the pub- tal effects. They wouldn’t form ernment programs. A planet Join me and Pulse of the Planet’s
lic reacts. halos in the first place.” named Nibiru is on a collision Jim Metzner in my new podcast,
Astounding Universe, at
I don’t want to say I told you It’s no use. Ignorance of sci- course with Earth. Armageddon http://astoundinguniverse.com.
so. Actually, that’s not true. I do ence seems only to be growing. is coming. Aliens are already
10 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ASTROLETTERS
An authentic solar experience Jeff Hester responds
I really enjoyed David Eicher’s November I’m an Oklahoma boy who spent his teen-
2017 editor’s letter, “Making light of gal- age years sitting on a tractor. I’ve read
axies,” and the idea of viewing the real the Bible cover to cover. The reader and I
thing through a telescope. I live where might know and respect some of the same
there are fairly dark skies and sometimes people. But I write for Astronomy as a
try to challenge myself by searching for scientist, and think it’s important to do so
deep-sky objects, such as nebulae and without dissimulation.
faint galaxies. It’s not always about how If only creationism were a straw man!
bright and beautiful the object appears, Many who “believe in” evolution and
but rather knowing that you are looking the Big Bang accept the historical events
at a galaxy that could be 58 million light- but insist on a Guiding Hand. The
years away, although it only appears as a thing is, adding teleology to the mix
faint smudge through the eyepiece. It can rejects the very core of those theories.
ELLIOT PERLMAN
sometimes be frustrating trying to locate Repackaging creationism as “intelligent
the fainter objects, but it’s so rewarding design” doesn’t change the leopard’s spots.
when a deep-sky object is found. How did our universe give rise to tardi-
With all the available technology and grades and Trump supporters and other
access to online viewing, it’s refreshing to Stellar holiday décor bizarre creatures? As I have discussed in
read an article that embraces viewing the We saw the breathtaking totality in several columns, the Second Law of
night sky with your own telescope. McMinnville, Oregon, in 2017. The glass- Thermodynamics and Darwinian evolu-
— Tom Bryant, Danville, KY es made for great Christmas tree orna- tion get you there.
ments while we await the 2024 eclipse. The reader raises related questions that
— Elliot Perlman, Providence, RI would make for fun conversation over a
Lone velocity beer. What caused the Big Bang? A coun-
Astronomy often writes about the velocity terintuitive implication of quantum
of various bodies traveling through space, From nothing to everything? mechanics is that events require no direct
but without indication of what that veloc- Most Christians I know believe in evolu- cause. From eternal inflation to a collision
ity is relative to. An assumption is often tion and in a universe created by the Big between string theory branes, most cred-
possible, such as the Sun for the Voyager Bang. Because of this, it was with amuse- ible ideas describe the Big Bang as the
spacecraft or the Milky Way for the ment that I read Mr. Hester’s responses result of a quantum fluctuation. Why does
Andromeda Galaxy, but in the Ask Astro to criticism of “intelligent design.” The anything exist? Based on the general form
section of the December issue, I read spectacle of him sallying forth with pen- of field equations, theoretical physicists
that the Milky Way is traveling through nants unfurled to do battle with the straw argue that absolute nothingness is unsta-
space at 1.3 million mph (580 km/s). This man of creationism will stick with me for ble. The reader also implicitly raises the
doesn’t make sense unless the reader a while. anthropic principle, but I’m out of space to
knows what the velocity is relative to. In I would have been much more respond. Stay tuned.
the future, please encourage your writ- impressed had he addressed the idea that
ers to include a point of reference when in a void without even space, where there
discussing the velocity of bodies moving was no place or space for time to elapse in, Astronomy’s musical impact
through space. amid the infinite timeless nothingness, for A quick note to say that I really enjoyed
— John Patterson, Hollywood, MD no reason, and at no particular time, tons the article in the January issue, “The real
of energy exploded (and maybe six to music of the spheres,” about music and
Astronomy responds eight times more dark stuff and maybe 15 the continual influence and pull that
Sorry for any confusion. The speed we times more dark energy) to create a huge the heavenly bodies have had on artists
were quoting is relative to the cosmic amount of space. Randomly. Out of abso- through the centuries. It featured great
background radiation, which serves as a lutely nothing. And in such a fashion that information about musical and astronom-
standard reference frame when consider- 13 some billion years later, here we are ical history. Thank you!
ing the universe as a whole. amid black holes and aardvarks and uni- — Mallory Duff, Hampstead, MD
cycles and liberals and all sorts of other
unlikely phenomena.
We welcome your comments at Now I’m just a dumb old Iowa farm boy Correction
Astronomy Letters, P. O. Box 1612, and retired Army first sergeant, but it The “Wonders of the Big Dog” article on
Waukesha, WI 53187; or email to letters@ seems to me that although Mr. Hester may p. 68 of the January 2018 issue states that
astronomy.com. Please include your be every bit as clever as he thinks he is, the Sirius and its white dwarf companion star,
name, city, state, and country. Letters rest of us are not nearly as lunkheaded as Sirius B, are separated by 4". However,
may be edited for space and clarity. he dearly seems to believe. they have a maximum separation of 11.2",
— Steven Imerman, Springfield, MO which will occur in 2025.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 11
ASTRONEWS ORIGIN STORY. The first meteorites found to contain both liquid water and complex organic compounds may have
originated from a dwarf planet in the asteroid belt, such as Ceres.
E
ven though Mars’ atmosphere is just
1 percent as dense as Earth’s, the
Red Planet’s surface still experiences
plenty of weathering and erosion. In
2008, researchers captured a full-
scale avalanche on Mars as material
plunged down a 2,300-foot (700 meters)
slope into a valley. These types of geological
events often expose structures beneath the
martian surface, revealing layers of rock,
dry (carbon dioxide) ice, and even water ice.
In a study published January 11 in
Science, researchers using the Mars
Reconnaissance Orbiter investigated eight
steep and eroded slopes, known as scarps, at
DEEP BLUE. In this color-enhanced image of an eroding cliff on Mars taken from above, water ice appears in
various sites across Mars. At each spot, they blue. The top third of the image shows the martian surface leading up to the cliff’s edge, while the bottom third
found thick shelves of relatively pure water is the valley below. NASA/JPL/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA/USGS
ice as little as 3 feet (1 m) below the surface.
Some of these ice deposits were massive — weathered slopes, the researchers believe the valley below. Based on this, the
more than 330 feet (100 m) thick. the ice is “cohesive and strong.” The team researchers estimated the ice is retreating
Scientists have spotted frozen water on also found that the ice appears banded, horizontally at a rate of a few millimeters
Mars’ surface many times before, but this showing layered variations in its blue color. each year, likely because of exposed ice sub-
is the first time observations have revealed This suggests that the massive ice deposits limating (transforming directly from a solid
so much about its layering, thickness, are composed of many distinct layers that to a gas) as it contacts the thin martian air.
purity, and prevalence. have been squished together over time, pre- The discovery of these large reservoirs of
According to the paper, “the ice exposed serving a record of Mars’ climate history. pure water ice adds yet another piece of
by the scarps likely originated as snow that However, because there are few craters near evidence supporting the increasingly held
transformed into massive ice sheets, now these sites, the authors suggest the ice was theory that water ice not only remains on
preserved beneath less than one to two formed relatively recently, in the past mil- Mars, but also is surprisingly common.
[meters] of dry and ice-cemented dust or lion years or so. Although the ice sheets could obviously
regolith near ±55° latitude.” In 2008, the Although the deposits formed quickly serve as sources of water for future manned
Phoenix Mars lander discovered similar ice (geologically speaking), they also recede a missions to Mars, scientists still need to
deposits along martian scarps, but they tiny bit each summer, the researchers say. characterize them and estimate their size
were in regions much closer to the planet’s In one scarp, the team found that over the first. But with the Mars 2020 rover just a
north pole. course of only three martian years, multiple few years away, the discovery of eight more
Since the ice deposits highlighted in the meter-wide boulders had dislodged them- tantalizing sites ripe for investigation is still
study were found intact along the scarps’ selves from the ice deposits, tumbling into an exciting find. — Jake Parks
Stellar disks
can form rings
without planets
NO PLANET REQUIRED. Astronomers spot
disks of gas and dust around young stars by
placing a “mask” (the dark region in the image’s
center) over the star to block its light. This disk
around the star HD 141569A shows complex
structure; rings and other patterns are often used
as proxies for forming exoplanets, which are
thought to carve out lanes as they grow. But new
NASA/HUBBLE/KONISHI ET AL. 2016
12 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ASTRONEWS MARTIAN METHANE. New measurements taken by the Curiosity rover indicate that atmospheric methane — a sign
of life on Earth — changes with the seasons on Mars.
A SINGLE BEACON.
QUICK TAKES Cepheid variable star V1 in M31 A Cepheid variable
identified by Edwin
STELLAR STROLL Hubble in the
Walking Among the Stars is a Andromeda Galaxy,
virtual reality project that lets designated V1, allowed
users explore the Cassiopeia A him to measure the
supernova remnant in 3-D. January 26, 2011 galaxy’s distance,
•
LIFE LAG
December 30, 2010 proving that it was not
a nebula inside the
Research suggests the presence December 21, 2010 Milky Way. Cepheid
of life can change a world’s variables change
atmosphere enough to alter brightness predictably
how quickly the planet spins. with time via a
•
TABBY’S BELT
December 17, 2010 relationship called
the Leavitt Law. NASA, ESA,
AND THE HUBBLE HERITAGE TEAM
A circumstellar disk is the most
(STSCI/AURA)
likely explanation for the
periodic dimming of Tabby’s Star
— not an alien megastructure.
•
PULSAR PILOTING
Researchers proved that
spacecraft can navigate
autonomously with a GPS-like
system that tracks narrow
New surveys help calibrate a century-old law
A Cepheid variable star pulsates over Recent work to improve Cepheid vari- “When we looked at a star’s spec-
beams of radiation from pulsars.
•
SPACE SWEATS
hours or days. As its physical size
changes, its temperature, surface
able measurements was presented in
January at the 231st Meeting of the
trum across its entire pulsation cycle,
we found no significant differences
gravity, and brightness change as American Astronomical Society in in the results. … We’re getting reli-
Prolonged periods of
weightlessness cause persistent
well. In the early 1900s, Henrietta Washington, D.C. able results every time we look,” she
fevers in astronauts and Leavitt spotted a relationship Kate Hartman, an undergraduate said in a press release.
significantly increase body between a Cepheid’s brightness and from Pomona College working with That means APOGEE accurately
temperatures during exercise. the time period over which it varies. Rachael Beaton, the NASA Hubble measures the chemical composition
•
ASTROVIROLOGY
This relationship, called the Leavitt
Law, allows astronomers to calculate
and Carnegie-Princeton postdoctoral
fellow at Princeton University, exam-
of Cepheid variables, regardless of
where or when they’re seen. Now
A January paper in Astrobiology the star’s intrinsic brightness and ined Cepheid variables in the Sloan the catalog’s data can be confidently
calls on astronomers to broaden determine the distance to the star. Digital Sky Survey’s Apache Point paired with other up-and-coming
their search for life in the Cepheids remain vital distance indi- Galactic Evolution Experiment surveys, such as Gaia, which mea-
cosmos by also combing space cators and tracers of galactic evolu- (APOGEE) catalog to determine sures distances via parallax, to fur-
for viruses. tion, and it’s important to ensure these whether APOGEE produces reliable ther test and calibrate the Leavitt
•
FIRST LIGHT
stars are mapped and measured accu-
rately in large surveys, where a single
information about these unique stars.
Hartman studied several images of
Law so astronomers can reliably use
Cepheid variables of all compositions
The Keck Observatory’s newest image could catch the star at any ran- the same variable taken over time to to map and study our galaxy and
instrument, the Near-Infrared dom point during its pulsation period. measure the elements in the star. others nearby. — A.K.
Echellette Spectrometer, saw
first light with an image of the
planetary nebula NGC 7027.
•
CLAPPED IN IRON
WHAT’S IN A COMET? FAST
FACT
Kepler has revealed that iron-
rich stars are more likely to host MaS distribution of 67P BUILDING BLOCKS. Recent
shorter-period planets, while results from the Rosetta mission’s The comet 46P/
iron-poor stars tend to have COSIMA instrument team have Wirtanen was
longer-period planets. highlighted the “ingredients” Rosetta’s original
Minerals
•
CASTING CALL 55%
Organic
material
present in Comet 67P/Churyumov-
Gerasimenko, based on analysis of
target, but a
delay in launch
The first six hexagonal segments 45% dust grains emitted as the comet date led the team
of the Extremely Large neared the Sun. Researchers studied a
to select 67P as
Telescope’s 130-foot (39 meters) small subset of 30 grains (out of over
the spacecraft’s
main mirror have been 35,000 collected) that ranged from
0.01–1 millimeter in size, and found destination.
successfully cast.
•
UPPER LIMIT
they all have a similar composition,
revealing the makeup of the comet.
A Johns Hopkins University
Chemical composition of 67P About 45 percent of 67P is organic, making it one of the most
carbon-rich bodies currently known in our solar system. The
astrophysicist proposed a new
30% 30% 30% 5.5% 1.6% 0.6% 2.4% comet’s minerals are non-hydrated, meaning they lack water
upper boundary for the mass of
compounds. While the comet does of course include water,
a planet: between 4 and
scientists believe the fact that it is frozen as ice prevented the
Magnesium
Hydrogen
10 Jupiter masses.
• water from mixing with the minerals.
Oxygen
Carbon
Silicon
Other
NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson 67P and other comets can help astronomers better piece
recently became the first person together the history of the solar system and of Earth, as comets
to collect unknown organisms are thought to have delivered a significant percentage of the
and sequence their DNA while materials that compose the planet — and paved the way for
in space. — J.P. life to form. — A.K.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 13
SECRETSKY
BY STEPHEN JAMES O’MEARA
by the appearance of long and
bright “super-outbursts” that
can last weeks. At minimum,
TV Corvi lies dormant at 19th
magnitude before an outburst
T
his month, I’m chal- celestial equator and the third The Small Cluster Nebula (NGC 7129)
lenging you to go brightest in the entire sky. A combines a star cluster with three
after some diminu- mere 8.3 light-years distant, it nebulous regions. A 6-inch telescope
will reveal the cluster. To spot the
tive objects that sails through the background nebulae, move up to at least a 10-inch
spice up the night stars at nearly 5" a year. scope. KEN CRAWFORD
sky with their hidden beauty. Red dwarfs are the smallest
I have selected seven dwarf stars in our galaxy. Lalande Stars of the Week, “Rare is the
objects you can search for. 21185 possesses only about half naked-eye star that has a lumi-
First up is the white dwarf the Sun’s mass and spans only nosity and mass less than that
central star of planetary nebula about 40 percent of its diam- of the Sun.” But with a magni-
IC 2149, in the northern part of eter. It appears red because the tude of 4.5, the yellow/orange
the constellation Auriga the star has a cool surface tempera- dwarf star Xi Boötis can be
Charioteer. Lying just 40' west- ture of 6,400° Fahrenheit spied under a dark sky without
northwest of Pi (π) Aurigae, (3,800 kelvins). In 2017, astron- effort. You’ll find it nearly a
IC 2149 is an “inside out” plan- omers discovered an exoplanet fist-width due east of the
etary nebula. Visually, planetar- The trick to observing Leo I (top) orbiting Lalande 21185. They orange giant star Arcturus
is to move the brilliant blue star
ies usually appear as gaseous Regulus just outside the field of view christened it Lalande 21185b. It (Alpha Boötis). I call it “yellow/
rings or butterflies with nearly of your eyepiece. BERNHARD HUBL is several times larger than orange” because Xi is an easily
impossible-to-spot central stars. Earth, but several times smaller accessible double star (at a dis-
But IC 2149 is a planetary neb- the view. Doubling the diffi- than Neptune. tance of about 22 light-years,
ula with a magnitude 11.3 cen- culty, the galaxy’s light covers Sailing northward along the one of the closest to our Sun)
tral star surrounded by a tiny an area measuring 12' by 9', so Milky Way into the constella- consisting of a magnitude 4.6
and almost inconspicuous neb- a dark sky and moderate mag- tion Cepheus the King, we yellow dwarf and a magnitude
ula 8.5" in extent. nification are required. At a encounter a cosmic rosebud, 6.8 orange dwarf companion
You’ll find our next target, distance of 800,000 light-years, NGC 7129 — a dwarf nebula some 7" away. So you get two
newly designated dwarf planet Leo I may be the farthest satel- (with a diameter less than 10' dwarfs for the price of one!
1 Ceres, in the northeastern lite system orbiting our galaxy. when photographed through a I’ll finish with Snow White.
part of Cancer the Crab. Ceres We now proceed to an enig- blue filter) 2.6° northwest of Well, actually, you’ve probably
reached perihelion April 22, matic object: the dwarf nova magnitude 4.5 Xi (ξ) Cephei, already seen her — the Milky
when it shined at magnitude TV Corvi (Tombaugh’s star). the heart of the celestial king. Way. Astronomers investigating
7.8 and sailed about 1° north- Lowell Observatory astrono- This evolved HII (star-form- the color of our galaxy used
east of Iota (ι) Cancri. On mer and discoverer of Pluto ing) region belongs to a com- Sloan Digital Sky Survey data
May 1, the minor world is Clyde Tombaugh found this plex molecular cloud some collected on hundreds of galax-
within 30' of the magnitude 6.7 star on plates he took in 1931, 3,300 light-years distant that ies resembling ours and found
star 70 Cancri. It then heads during his trans-Neptunian skirts the upper regions of the its color resembles that of
southeast toward magnitude planet search. He considered it Cepheus Bubble — a giant dust freshly fallen snow seen about
4.5 Kappa (κ) Leonis on the a nova. Not until Astronomy ring with an apparent diameter an hour after dawn. So, it seems
15th, and about 1° northwest of contributing editor David Levy of about 10°. NGC 7129 is itself the Milky Way is aptly named.
magnitude 4.3 Lambda (λ) researched Tombaugh’s discov- a little bubble of hot gas created As always, let me know how
Leonis on the 31st. ery in 1989 did we learn that it by the three B stars within its you fare by sending emails to
The dwarf spheroidal galaxy has repeated outbursts. cavity. Visually the 7'-by-7' sjomeara31@gmail.com.
Leo I appears as a magnitude TV Corvi, in fact, appears to nebulosity centers on a trap-
10 glow only 20' north of be composed of two dwarf ezoid of stars, which causes the Stephen James O’Meara
Regulus (Alpha [α] Leonis), the objects: a white dwarf and a nebula to appear patchy. is a globe-trotting observer
Lion’s brightest star. Glare substellar brown dwarf donor. As star expert Jim Kaler who is always looking for the
next great celestial event.
from the luminary hampers The variable is characterized tells us in his online column
14 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ASTRONEWS DIM DETECTIONS. By using Hubble to peer deep into the Orion Nebula, astronomers discovered the
largest population of brown dwarfs yet, identifying 20 small, failed stars.
200
regularly spaced orbits.
The number of graphics processing units in the new ARTS super- The finding, published January 3 in
computer, which aims to discover one fast radio burst per week. The Astronomical Journal, is based on 909
planets in 355 systems discovered by the
Kepler telescope. Two major patterns
arose when astronomers examined the
data statistically. First, neighboring exo-
planets tend to have similar masses.
Second, their orbits are regularly spaced
from one planet to the next. By compari-
son, our solar system’s inner planets have
mismatched sizes and are widely spaced.
“These patterns would not occur if the
planet sizes or spacings were drawn at
random,” said study leader Lauren Weiss
of the Université de Montréal in a press
release. That indicates the planets in the
systems surveyed — and possibly most
extrasolar systems — remain relatively
undisturbed since their formation from a
disk of debris around their young star.
Based on current models of planet for-
mation, planets should easily form in such
a disk with a compact configuration that
leaves them similarly sized and at regular
intervals. Astronomers believe our solar
system appears different because Jupiter
and Saturn moved inward to disrupt any
TIM SCHOON
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 15
FORYOURCONSIDERATION
BY JEFF HESTER
Gifts
to the
future
Amateur astronomy
can change lives.
Y
ou amateur astrono-
mers out there are an
odd lot. (I get to say A beautiful deep-sky object like the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51), viewed at a star paty with a moderate-size telescope, can spark people
that because I started to see the universe in a new way. Just one telescopic look has altered the future of many young folks. BOB FERA
out as an amateur
myself.) Think about it. You on a limb and say that maybe It’s good that we are coming I’ve known many amateur
dump tons of time and money those thousand hours or so sit- to better understand this stuff, astronomers and spoken to
into telescopes, cameras, and ting in math classrooms could because the times, they are countless clubs and gatherings
the like. Every chance you get, have been better spent. Granted, a-changing. Watch an IBM over the years. You are an
you head off into the hinterland if you don’t own a tool, you can’t Watson commercial, catch a interesting and passionate lot
where you sit up all night, freez- use it. But if you don’t need a self-driving cab, or read a news with a great deal to offer. Cool
ing your keister, and stare into tool for something you care story written by a computer. science, hands-on hardware,
an eyepiece to catch a glance of about, why bother to pick it up? Day after day, more and more recording and working with
some ghostly apparition. Your None of this surprises teach- jobs are being taken over by new data, star parties, questions
family thinks you are nuts. ers who are worth their salt. and rapidly evolving technolo- that have intrigued humankind
Aren’t the spectacular pictures When counseling undergradu- gies. Today’s student won’t have for millennia — your hobby is
on Google Images enough? ates, I made it a point to discuss a single career; she will likely tailor-made for Project Based
Of course they aren’t! what college is about: “You have dozens of job titles, most of Learning. Places like the Buck
Astronomy is a passion, and that aren’t really here to get a job or which have yet to be invented. Institute for Education and
Messier collection means some- even a degree. You certainly The future doesn’t need workers Edutopia (the George Lucas
thing. I understand that. But aren’t here to collect A’s, or at who have been trained to put Educational Foundation) have
where did your passion come least I hope not. What you are nut B on bolt A. The future what you need to get started.
from? What got you hooked? here for is to start becoming needs interesting, capable, cre- Your chance to help shape the
I’m going to hazard a guess that who you will be for the rest of ative, curious individuals future might be as close as a
it didn’t have much to do with a your life!” To quote Plutarch shaped by diverse and wide- phone call from your club to a
classroom sage on a stage. Don’t (a.d. 46–120): “The mind is not ranging experiences. nearby school.
get me wrong, classrooms are a vessel that needs filling, but Schools are beginning to You are the sorts of people
important. After a quarter- wood that needs igniting.” catch up with this need. “Project whose passion inspires. I know,
century of teaching, at least I What is new is a growing Based Learning” is fancy jargon because when I was a kid, you
hope they are. But as a student, understanding of what’s going for curriculum that is built not inspired me. Very few of the
my own attitudes and interests on behind the curtain as we around chapters in textbooks, students you work with will go
had more impact on what I got learn, deep inside our brains. but around authentic, engaging, on to become astronomers. But
out of a class than anything a The sum total of your life’s and complex questions, prob- what you share will become a
teacher or professor said. experiences blends together into lems, and challenges. It is messy, part of who those students are,
Experiences are what matter. your own unique internal creative, collaborative, draws on how they think, and what they
Since time immemorial, uni- model of the world, different individual strengths, and always do for the rest of their lives.
versity faculty members have from that of any other person. produces something to show for They might just change the
bemoaned the “sorry state of Your brain uses that ever- the effort. More than just way that you experience the
affairs with today’s students.” changing internal model to another fad, Project Based world, too.
How is it possible, we astronomy construct the predictions and Learning is a real world
professors ask, that after years simulations that become your approach to education that Jeff Hester is a keynote speaker,
of math classes, students can’t conscious reality. That internal works with rather than against coach, and astrophysicist.
figure out a simple inverse- model is what largely makes how our brains are wired. Follow his thoughts at
jeff-hester.com.
square law? I’m going to go out you you. This is where you come in.
16 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ASTRONEWS VIEWING THE INVISIBLE. The April 2017 campaign to image the supermassive black hole in the heart
of the Milky Way is expected to release its results later this year.
May 4
elements inside the nebula that formed our Aug. 2
solar system. — Amber Jorgenson 10° 19
ASTRONOMY: ROEN KELLY
17
Sept. 1 April 4
5°
$350
16 20
March 5
MILLION 0°
Azimuth West
The upper cost of a THE “EVENING STAR.” Even at its dimmest, Venus shines nine times
new earth science mission line brighter than the night sky’s brightest star, Sirius. But Venus stands out even From 40° north FAST
more when it lies far from the Sun. This chart plots the planet’s positions latitude, Venus FACT
recommended to NASA by the for an observer at 40° north latitude an hour after sunset. Notice that Venus
reaches its peak altitude in late May and early June, more than two months
peaks at an
altitude of 16°
National Academies of Sciences, before its August 17 greatest elongation. That’s because the ecliptic — the in early June.
apparent path of the Sun and planets across our sky — makes a steeper
Engineering, and Medicine. angle to the western horizon in springtime. — Richard Talcott
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 17
BINOCULARUNIVERSE
BY P H I L H A R R I N G TO N
A great glob
under the radar
The cluster M5 lies in an interesting neighborhood. M5 in Serpens is one of the most brilliant globular clusters in the northern sky, and an
attractive target for binoculars. ADAM BLOCK/MOUNT LEMMON SKYCENTER/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA
I
f you were asked to name to be evenly distributed along While most of the Milky 24,500 light-years away and
the greatest visual observer the Milky Way. From this, he Way’s globular clusters are may contain as many as
of all time, whom would reasoned that the Sun must be clumped in Sagittarius, 500,000 stars crammed into a
you choose? There are in the very center. Of course, Scorpius, and Ophiuchus, a few space about 165 light-years
many worthy candidates, that isn’t correct. That’s renegades are out there. This across. By contrast, M13 —
but my vote would have to go to because, unbeknownst to him, month, let’s examine a loner summer’s Hercules Cluster,
the 18th-century astronomer cosmic dust blocked his view found in western Serpens. M5 which we visited in this col-
William Herschel. He had quite (as well as ours) along the plane may be off the beaten path, but umn in July 2016 — holds
a track record, including the of the galaxy beyond about this recluse is one of the most about 300,000 stars.
discovery of the planet Uranus 6,000 light-years. magnificent globulars any- Before we bid farewell to this
as well as thousands of deep-sky It would be another century where in the sky. month’s binocular universe,
objects. That’s a pretty good run. and a half before Harlow Gottfried Kirch discovered let’s take a look at an asterism
Herschel did more than just Shapley discovered our solar M5 on May 5, 1702, from drawn among several stars to
look at the sky, however. He also system’s true position in the Berlin, Germany. His notes the south and east of M5.
tried to understand what he was Milky Way. By studying the described it as a “nebulous star.” Added together, they remind
looking at. Based on his studies distances to globular star clus- Although Kirch was Germany’s me of a sailboat. The boat’s bow
of how stars appear distributed ters, Shapley found that most first Astronomer Royal at the is marked by 5 Serpentis, while
along the hazy band of the seemed to be distributed in a time, those notes remained 6 and 8 Serpentis symbolize the
Milky Way, Herschel concluded spherical volume centered not unpublished until after Charles deck. The hull extends to
that the Milky Way is shaped on the Sun, but instead on a Messier independently found 4 Serpentis and SAO 140444,
like a flattened disk. We know distant point in the direction of M5 on May 23, 1764. Messier the faintest star in the pattern.
today that he was exactly right. the constellation Sagittarius. He described it as a “beautiful neb- Finally, the sails’ mast extends
When it came time to know- concluded that globular clusters ula; it does not contain any east-northeast from 6 to 10
ing his place in the Milky Way, must hover around the core of star.” It was only after Herschel Serpentis. The sailboat looks
however, Herschel was way off. the Milky Way — a conclusion viewed it through a larger tele- capsized in the evening sky, but
He noticed how stars appeared we know today to be correct. scope 27 years later that its true if you happen to pull an all-
nature became clear. nighter this month, come back
To find M5, cast off from just before the onset of morn-
Arcturus and slide southeast- ing twilight. That’s when the
ward to 4th-magnitude Zeta (ζ) Serpent’s Sailboat asterism
Boötis. Continue from there will be most apparent, as it
α twice the distance along a approaches the western
slightly more easterly course horizon.
M5
until you come to a not-quite If you have a favorite bin-
5 right triangle of stars. The tri- ocular target that you’d like
angle’s brightest star, positioned to share with the rest of us,
Sail at the not-quite right angle, is I’d love to feature it in a
3rd-magnitude Unukalhai future column. Drop me a
[pronounced oo-NOO-kul-hi line through my website,
and also known as Alpha (α) philharrington.net. Until next
ε
Serpentis]. Next, turn southwest time, don’t forget that two eyes
toward the 5th-magnitude star are better than one!
5 Serpentis. M5 will be just to
its north-northwest. Through Phil Harrington is a longtime
binoculars, it looks like a fuzzy contributor to Astronomy and
The author describes this asterism near cluster M5 as the “Serpent’s Sailboat.” It’s an star, just as Kirch described. the author of many books.
easy binocular target. TONY HALLAS Estimates say that M5 is
18 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ASTRONEWS LESS LOSS. Direct observations of the ozone hole over the past 20 years show that there is now 20 percent less
ozone depletion each Antarctic winter than there was in 2005.
Wind Ionized
bubble region
Time Time
4.58 Myr 4.38 Myr
1 Myr = 1,000,000 years
3 MILLION BILLION
The mass contained in the “El Gordo”
galaxy cluster, in solar masses.
FRB resides near a
strong magnetic field
Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are brief
but powerful blasts of radio ener-
Faraday rotation ever observed
from an FRB, indicating its source
gy thought to come from neutron must sit in a highly magnetized,
stars. The sole repeating FRB, plasma-rich region of space.
FRB 121102, has already allowed “This sort of enormous Faraday
astronomers to pinpoint its loca- rotation is extremely rare. … We
tion in a dwarf galaxy 3 billion realized it was a huge clue about
light-years away. Now, new where this bizarre source resides,”
measurements showing that the said team member Victoria Kaspi of
bursts are influenced by a nearby McGill University in a press release.
strong magnetic field are helping Astronomers now have two
astronomers further narrow down theories for the environment
its location within the galaxy. around FRB 121102: Either its
The results come from a study source is near the galaxy’s central
ESO/L. CALÇADA/SPACEENGINE.ORG
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 19
ASTRONEWS NEIGHBORLY BEHAVIOR. Nearby star Tau Ceti may host two potentially habitable worlds slightly larger than Earth,
as well as two other planets with temperatures too extreme for life.
T
he universe is teeming with many more “We were astonished when we realized that
NASA/JPL/MSSS
massive stars than previously believed, 30 Doradus has formed many more massive
according to a study published January 5 stars than expected,” Fabian Schneider, a Hintze
in Science. Since massive stars play a cru- research fellow in the Department of Physics at
GOING, GOING, GONE. In 2001,
cial role in shaping our universe — the University of Oxford and lead author of the NASA’s Mars Orbiter Camera captured
through stellar winds, supernova explosions, and study, said in a press release. the top photo during a period of little
the production of heavy elements — an excess of Chris Evans, the principal investigator of atmospheric activity. A month later
heavyweights has far-reaching implications. VFTS and co-author of the study, added: “In (bottom photo), a global dust storm
had shrouded the Red Planet’s surface.
Researchers discovered the surplus of massive fact, our results suggest that most of the stellar
stars in the Tarantula Nebula (30 Doradus), some mass is actually no longer in low-mass stars, but
160,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic
Cloud. This region only began producing stars
a significant fraction is in high-mass stars.”
The researchers were not only surprised by
Global dust
about 8 million years ago, so it serves as a perfect
laboratory to study young, massive stars.
the number of massive stars they found, but also
that stars with masses up to 200 solar masses
storms on Mars
The team used ESO’s Very Large Telescope,
part of the VLT-FLAMES Tarantula
were common, said co-author Hugues Sana
from the University of Leuven in
may allow gas
Survey (VFTS), to gather detailed
spectroscopic observations of nearly Massive
Belgium. Only recently have astron-
omers reached the consensus that
to escape
Mars is occasionally enveloped
1,000 massive stars in the region. By 200-solar-mass stars exist at all, and
meticulously analyzing 247 of these
stars play a this study clearly shows such stars
by intense storms that kick up
dust and haze, hiding large
stars (with masses between 15 and crucial role 200 to 300 times the mass of the Sun swaths of the surface from view.
A January 22 study in Nature
200 solar masses), the team deter- can be born.
mined the mass distribution of stars in shaping Although the study examined
Astronomy, using data collected
by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance
born in the nebulous nursery. They
translated this catalog of stellar
our universe. only behemoth stars in one particu-
lar region, the researchers hope to
Orbiter, links dust storm activity
on the Red Planet with the escape
birth weights into an initial mass expand their study soon to deter- of gas from its atmosphere.
The study found that during
function (IMF), which mathematically describes mine how universal their findings are. If the
mild storms, water vapor rises
the expected distribution of masses within a overabundance of massive stars in the Tarantula along with the air being pushed
population of stars. An IMF gives astronomers Nebula is not a fluke, astronomers will need to upward by the storm, leading to
an idea of how many stars of a particular mass re-evaluate many of their basic assumptions subtle hydrogen loss from the
will likely form in a certain population, such as about the universe. upper atmosphere. Bigger storms
likely mean more loss. This pro-
inside a star cluster or throughout a galaxy. “Our results have far-reaching consequences cess may have helped transform
Astronomers once believed that massive stars for the understanding of our cosmos. There Mars into an arid planet.
were relatively rare in the universe, with less might be 70 percent more supernovae, a tripling The last global dust storm in
than 1 percent of all stars born with masses of the chemical yields, and toward four times the 2007 caused more than a hun-
dredfold increase in water vapor,
greater than 10 times the mass of the Sun. But ionizing radiation from massive star popula-
recent reanalysis of the data has
this assumption was based on older IMFs cre- tions,” said Schneider. “Also, the formation rate shown. Astronomers are now
ated using plenty of data from low-mass stars, of black holes might be increased by 180 percent, preparing for a global dust
and little data from high-mass stars. directly translating into a corresponding storm expected later this year.
The new study fills out the high-mass portion increase of binary black hole mergers that have Observing such a storm with
more advanced technology could
of the IMF, suggesting that massive stars are recently been detected via their gravitational corroborate the study’s initial
much more common than prior IMFs indicated. wave signals.” — J.P. findings. — A.J.
20 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ASTRONEWS SINK IN. The surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa may be so porous
that visiting spacecraft would sink into the world.
The four outer planets have PLANETARY BODY. Science fiction movies sometimes show bad
FAST no solid surfaces. If you things happening to spacesuits. Indeed, films like The Martian and Total
FACT started at the top of their Recall attempt to visualize what would happen if a suit depressurized.
But how long could an astronaut last without that first level of
atmospheres, you’d fall for
protection? Here are some rough estimates. — Michael E. Bakich
about a minute (choking all
the way) before the intense
atmospheric pressure
crushed you.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 21
New insights into
HOW THE
SOLAR
SYSTEM
FORMED
Recent observations reveal
that chaos and mayhem
ruled our planetary system’s
first days. by Jesse Emspak
22 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
N
NOT LONG AGO, THE ORIGIN OF THE SOLAR
SYSTEM SEEMED AN ORDERLY AFFAIR. A cloud
of dust and gas coalesced around a nascent Sun. Close to the newborn
star, volatile substances that vaporize at relatively low temperatures,
like water and other ices, turned into gas and left behind the rocky
planets. Farther out, gas giants formed beyond the “snow line,” where
these volatiles condensed. Earth became the most massive rocky planet
by happenstance, and Jupiter the accidental ruler among the giants.
24 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ten-thousandths of our planet. All that If the solar system arose
material had to go somewhere. in an orderly way from
a relatively uniform
Then, there’s the debris one would disk, Mars should be
expect around stars still early in their five to 10 times bigger
planet-forming stages. The problem is than it is. Astronomers
think Jupiter put the
simple: The collisions that build planets Red Planet on a diet
also break things apart. “When things by removing much of
crash into one another, they produce a the gas in its vicinity.
ESA/MPS/OSIRIS TEAM
lot of debris,” says Alan Jackson at the
Center for Planetary Sciences in Toronto.
And that debris should hang around for
millions of years.
So, if the collision models are correct,
you’d expect to find a lot more of this rubble
around other stars. It’s easier to see this
material than to see planets, says Jackson,
because the small fragments have much
more surface area than planets. “It’s why Kuiper Belt, Pluto is a good example. “The
we’ve known about the debris disk around very existence of Pluto in the orbit we see
Beta Pictoris since the 1980s,” he says. “How today means it had to be pushed into that
NASA/JPL-CALTECH/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA
many have debris? Nowhere near enough.” place,” says Michele Bannister, a planetary
Scott Kenyon, an astrophysicist at astronomer at Queens University in Belfast.
the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for In the asteroid belt, Ceres stands out.
Astrophysics, wrote a paper in August 2016 NASA’s Dawn mission revealed that Ceres
that suggests terrestrial planet formation looks different from many of its brethren
actually might be “quick and neat.” In this — it is richer in volatiles than one would
scenario, planets form in a few hundred expect. “Ceres didn’t form where it is,” says
thousand years, with less gas drag and less Morbidelli. He thinks it may be a refugee Ceres is the biggest object in the asteroid belt
between Mars and Jupiter. The dwarf planet
dust generation from the planets getting hit from farther out, beyond the snow line. appears richer in volatile substances than it
with leftover rocks. Something similar Other asteroids show signs of violence. should be, hinting that it formed farther from
might have happened here — though that Minton works with a team studying class C the Sun and moved inward.
still doesn’t explain Mars’ low mass. asteroids, the type that give birth to carbo-
naceous chondrite meteorites. Such mete-
Smoking guns orites show evidence of high-temperature In this theory, Jupiter formed about
Beyond the cleared-out inner solar system, processes: They have structures inside 3.5 astronomical units (AU; one AU is the
the asteroid belt and its more distant cous- them that look like metal droplets. “The average Earth-Sun distance) from the Sun.
in, the Kuiper Belt, apparently were dis- material looks like it was vaporized and The essentially fully formed planet cleared
rupted. Both belts have groups of worldlets recondensed. It takes a lot of energy to do out a “lane” in the protostellar disk while
whose orbits incline steeply to those of the that,” says Minton. “We think the mecha- also drawing material in ahead of it and a
planets. The only way that could have hap- nism was extremely high-velocity impacts.” huge “tail” behind it. The mass of this sur-
pened is if something scattered them. In the The evidence points to migrating planets rounding material exerted a strong torque
as the culprits. And the first to move was on the planet.
Jupiter, which fell into the inner system Because the gas-dominated disk had
according to a model called the Grand Tack. a large mass — much bigger than Jupiter
and the other early planets combined — it
Moving giants began to siphon away Jupiter’s momentum,
The Grand Tack was first outlined in a causing it to spiral inward. Meanwhile,
2011 Nature paper by Kevin Walsh of the Saturn formed soon after Jupiter, at about
Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, 4.5 AU. Experiencing torques like its larger
Colorado; Sean Raymond of the University cousin, the future ringed planet also spi-
of Bordeaux, France; David O’Brien of the raled inward. When Jupiter reached 1.5 AU,
Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, about where Mars is now, the migration
Arizona; Avi Mandell of NASA’s Goddard stopped. Jupiter and Saturn entered what
Space Flight Center; and Morbidelli. The is called a mean motion resonance, with
theory covers the period soon after the Saturn making two orbits for every three of
protoplanets took shape, before the solar Jupiter’s. The resonance created a kind of
system was more than a few million years braking effect. The migration took perhaps
The ice giant Neptune currently lies 30 AU from old. Instead of the planets forming roughly 100,000 years, a geological blink of an eye.
the Sun, but it likely was born only a quarter as simultaneously, the Grand Tack says As Jupiter and Saturn approached the
far out. Jupiter’s massive gravity captured both
it and its cousin, Uranus, in resonance and forced Jupiter developed first, followed by Saturn inner system, they flung other objects into
them outward. NASA/JPL and the ice giants, Uranus and Neptune. the Sun or out of the solar system entirely.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 25
Hal Levison of the Southwest Research
Institute; and Morbidelli proposed a theory
called the Nice model (named for the
French city in which it was formulated).
This scenario takes place after the dust and
gas in the planet-forming disk had dissipat-
ed at the conclusion of the Grand Tack. In
the Nice model, Uranus and Neptune
formed closer in than they are now and
migrated outward. Some later versions of
the theory have Uranus and Neptune
switching places, or even flinging a third
ice giant into deep space.
The clues are in models of the early
solar nebula. Estimates of its density don’t
The movements of the giant planets The battered lunar highlands testify to an leave enough matter in the outer reaches of
disrupted the distant Kuiper Belt and its most intense period of bombardment that lasted some
prominent member, Pluto. There couldn’t have 300 million years. The migration of the giant
the solar system to form planets, at least
been enough material in the outer solar system planets likely caused the barrage by jostling the not fast enough to yield ice giants. “It’s
to create Pluto in place. NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI distant Kuiper Belt. CONSOLIDATED LUNAR ATLAS/UA/LPL obvious you can’t form Neptune at 30 AU,”
says Steven Desch, a theoretical astrophysi-
cist at Arizona State University. Desch was
This cleared out the area that one day of super-Earths in the early solar system. among the proponents of the idea that
would be the asteroid belt, and left less But Jupiter and Saturn caused such a dis- Uranus and Neptune might have swapped
material in the region for Mars to grow. ruption in the inner system that the super- positions. Building Neptune requires a lot
Basically, Jupiter’s presence removed a lot Earths spiraled into the Sun. of hydrogen, some two Earth masses at
of the matter that could have gone into As Jupiter and Saturn tacked back to least. “There’s no model where you can
planet-building. the outer part of the solar system, they cap- grow Neptune to where it can accrete
Orbiting the Sun faster than Jupiter tured Uranus and Neptune in resonance, enough gas,” he says. “It’s got to be 10 Earth
itself, the remaining gas and dust inside keeping other large bodies from wandering masses to hold on to it. If you form it closer
Jupiter’s orbit exerted an outward force, into the inner solar system. “Without in — like 15 AU — then maybe it can grow
and the two giant planets started to retreat. Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune would be big enough to hold on to the hydrogen gas.”
“It’s a tidal effect,” says Morbidelli. “It’s the inside Mercury’s orbit,” says Morbidelli. Unlike the Grand Tack model, the Nice
same as the Earth which, rotating faster “Maybe there wouldn’t have been enough model plays out over millions of years.
than the Moon, pushes the Moon out. mass left to create terrestrial planets.” This is how Uranus and Neptune could
So the still massive inner disk wins — exchange enough angular momentum with
Jupiter moves out and drags Saturn with Nice ice, baby the Kuiper Belt to switch places. Although
it, thanks to the fact that Saturn is locked Getting the solar system to its current con- each interaction with a Kuiper Belt object
in resonance.” figuration requires a bit more rearrange- (KBO) wouldn’t do much, over time, many
Fortunately for us, Jupiter did “tack,” ment, however. In a series of papers pub- KBOs would be scattered toward the Sun
migrating out again, and the remaining lished in Nature in 2005, Kleomenis and the ice giants would20°be nudged to their
planetesimals formed a ring around the Tsiganis, then at the Observatoire de la current positions. Morbidelli doesn’t think
Sun centered in the region between where Côte d’Azur; Rodney Gomes of Brazil’s the planet-switching is likely, however. He
Earth and Venus are now. Mars, on the National Observatory in Rio de Janeiro; refers to it as a “dead hypothesis,” and
outer edge of that ring, was never able to
grow large. As the two giant worlds moved 80°
ever outward, they scattered material back
into the future asteroid belt.
Telltale 60°
Classical KBOs
Resonant KBOs
Scattered disk
The Grand Tack explains why Mars is
relatively small, the lack of super-Earths,
orbits Detached
and the dearth of mass in the asteroid The orbits of many Kuiper 40°
belt. It also can help solve the problem of Belt objects (KBOs) tip
significantly to that
Earth’s water. Many planetary scientists of the major planets.
think asteroids delivered the water. With Astronomers suspect that
Jupiter and Saturn scattering objects from the migrations of Uranus
20°
and Neptune likely
the current asteroid belt region, it’s plau- scattered these KBOs
sible that lots of water-rich objects would into their highly inclined
smack into Earth. orbits. ASTRONOMY: ROEN KELLY
One version of the Grand Tack model,
Sun
proposed by Konstantin Batygin at Caltech
and Greg Laughlin at the University of 0 50 100 150
California, Santa Cruz, posits the existence Astronomical units
26 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Grand Tack model
Jupiter forms
Jupiter
Saturn Uranus Neptune
Asteroids Comets
Debris disks, like this one around the star Beta Saturn migrates to 3:2 resonance; formation of the terrestrial planets
Pictoris, should be a lot more common if planets
take millions of years to form. Planet migration
can clear out debris quickly, however, leaving
such disks as rare commodities. ESO/A.-M. LAGRANGE ET AL.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 27
An organically
phrases to describe their dune produced by the action of wind
work, and write them in predominantly from one direction …
peer-reviewed journals and peri- with a gentle slope facing toward the
early 2017, the two of odicals, and speak them aloud in scien- wind and a steep slope, known as the
us, along with a few others, refreshed tific conferences and classrooms. slip face, facing away from the wind.” (It
the debate on the definition of planet Precedent is a key element in forming so happens that barchan sand dunes are
in scientific nomenclature. The definitions (just ask a lawyer!) that both all over the place on Mars!)
International Astronomical Union’s reflect and promote a useful schema for That definitions arise through pro-
(IAU) historic definitional vote in 2006 understanding the natural world. fessional and common usage are one
recognized only eight solar system Conversely, scientific definitions are blow against the legitimacy of the IAU’s
planets, and this has brought new focus almost never and should never be definitional vote. Another blow arises
to some underlying issues of importance handed down authoritarian- from the fact that scientists
to planetary science. Specifically, this style from a central voting of one discipline should not
debate touches on how words acquire body, particularly when sci- Words possess presume to define words for
their meaning and shape our thinking entists of different disciplines power beyond another. An illustration
in both science and everyday life. have different uses for the stems from considering the
Accordingly, the definition of planet is
communication:
PLUTO: NASA/JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY/SOUTHWEST RESEARCH INSTITUTE; ASTRONOMY: ROEN KELLY
28 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
hydrostatic equilibrium, regardless of its planet. Similarly, stars’ size and spectral subtypes of planets and how the solar sys-
orbital parameters. This is the definition diversity between red dwarf stars and blue tem is naturally organized outward from
we presented at the 2017 Lunar and supergiant stars parallels planets’ diversity the Sun, using a handful of planets as
Planetary Science Conference. Indeed, between small Kuiper Belt dwarf planets examples. This is analogous to learning the
planetary scientists already use and teach and giant planets. organization of the periodic table of the
such a geophysical definition of planet to Definitions, like numerical measure- elements without having to memorize all
promote a useful mental schema about ments, have uncertainty, or as scientists or even most of the 100+ names.
the round and non-round worlds we like to call it, an “error bar.” Many small Along with this teaching strategy,
study: At least 119 peer-reviewed papers quasi-round worlds fall into that uncer- scientists, educators, and students should
in professional, scientific journals implic- tainty on the small end of the size spec- ignore illegitimate scientific definitions
itly use this definition when they refer to trum, and deuterium-fusing large worlds that arise via voting, such as the IAU’s
grown Should we really define a word by voting? by Kirby D. Runyon and S. Alan Stern
round worlds (including moons) as plan- (brown dwarfs) fall into the error bars on planet definition. Instead, they should
ets. The publication history for these the large end. However, the geophysical adopt definitions that arise naturally
papers spans decades, hailing from both definition of planet has low enough through usage by experts in the field,
before and after the 2006 IAU vote. This uncertainty to still be useful to us. which reflect and promote a useful
overwhelming precedent cements the geo- The geophysical definition further mental schema about the natural world
physical definition’s legitimacy in profes- proves its worth when considering exo- and a more accurate picture of how
sional planetary science. planets orbiting other stars outside our science operates.
We realize that more than 100 objects solar system. As a thought experiment, Other scientists may find a different
in the solar system fit this geophysical assume our Milky Way Galaxy has a con- definition useful, such as one more con-
planet definition, yet this does not dilute servative 100 billion possible planetary cerned with orbits and gravitational
the word’s usefulness. Rather, subcatego- systems anchored by at least one star. effects on smaller worlds, as proposed by
ries of planets help us form a mental Assume a conservative 100 dwarf planets the IAU. However, such scientists should
schema to recognize planets’ diversity and like Pluto or Eris in each system. That’s not look to the IAU’s vote to cement their
then draw conclusions and insights based 10 trillion dwarf planets in just our gal- preferred definition, but should rather
on groupings of planets with similar axy. If one assumes five giant planets per use and teach the definition they find
properties. A few useful examples of planetary system, that’s only 500 billion useful. In parallel, they should not
diversity among planets include terrestrial giants in the galaxy compared to 10 tril- begrudge other scientists’ criteria for
planets (Mars), giant planets (Uranus), lion dwarfs. Thus, dwarfs outnumber what makes a definition useful to them.
dwarf planets (Pluto, Eris, etc.), and satel- giants 20 to 1 and are the rule rather Just as in the example about the use of the
lite planets (Europa). Each subcategory of than the exception. Re-formulating our term metal, each user community should
planet helps us recognize similarities and schema of what a planet is facilitates use planet definitions useful to them
differences: the domain of comparative such insights. without deferring to a central voting
planetology. For instance, Enceladus (an This new schema for planet — properly authority. And, just as other definitions
icy dwarf satellite planet) and Neptune (a defined by expert planetary scientists — arise organically, the definition of planet
giant planet) are very different types of will powerfully work itself out in grade may now be considered organic, drawing
planets in size, gravity, and orbits. Yet school classrooms. Rather than teaching to a close this public hand-wringing
both are round, contain high amounts of students the names of all the planets, debate and thawing hearts that had fro-
water, and are located within our solar teachers should emphasize the types and zen toward the planet Pluto.
system’s Middle Zone. (This usage further
illustrates the nonsensical claim by the Kirby D. Runyon S. Alan Stern is a plan-
IAU that dwarf planets are not planets; is a postdoctoral etary scientist who pri-
rather, dwarf planets are a subcategory of planetary geologist marily studies the outer
planets just as giant planets are.) Just as at the Johns Hopkins solar system. He is also
having approximately 400 billion objects Applied Physics the principal investigator
that fit the definition of star in our Milky Lab specializing on NASA’s New Horizons
Way Galaxy does not diminish the useful- in image analysis mission and formerly the
ness of the word star, likewise having to understand the associate administrator
many planets in our solar system does not evolution of planetary for NASA’s Science
diminish the usefulness of the word landscapes. Mission Directorate.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 29
In 2014, NASA released
this updated version
of the iconic Hubble
Ultra Deep Field image.
The original zoomed
in on a tiny section of
apparently empty sky in
the Southern Hemisphere
using both visible and
near-infrared light.
For Hubble Ultra Deep
Field 2014, astronomers
collected and included
ultraviolet data, which
helps reveal the youngest,
largest, and hottest stars
in the universe. NASA, ESA,
H. TEPLITZ AND M. RAFELSKI (IPAC/
CALTECH), A. KOEKEMOER AND Z. LEVAY
(STScI), R. WINDHORST (ARIZONA STATE
UNIVERSITY)
In an era of large-scale surveys,
citizen science projects, and new
machine-learning techniques,
unexpected discoveries should
be expected. by Mara Johnson-Groh
Seeking the
unknown in
COSMIC
DATA
In 1964 astronomers Arno A. Penzias and Robert
W. Wilson found themselves cleaning
pigeon poop out of the Holmdel Horn Antenna, a radio telescope
in New Jersey. The data from the instrument had weird, persis-
tent noise that they couldn’t get rid of. They tried looking for
places where errant radiation signals could sneak in, and even
redesigned a part of the telescope, but the noise endured. When
nothing else seemed to work, they trapped two pigeons that had
taken up roost in the telescope and scrubbed out their droppings,
yet the noise remained. Unbeknownst to them, they were trying
to remove a fundamental signature of our universe — the cosmic
microwave background.
Just over a decade later, Wilson and Penzias won the Nobel
Prize in Physics for their serendipitous discovery of cosmic micro-
wave background (CMB) radiation. Although the pair initially had
been searching for a halo around the Milky Way, they instead
found the first light of the universe, left over from right after the
Big Bang, when photons of light were just bursting forth.
Wilson and Penzias aren’t alone in making fortuitous break-
throughs. Indeed, unexpected discoveries are almost a hallmark of
astronomy. William Herschel discovered Uranus in 1781 while
looking for binary stars, originally identifying the planet as a
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 31
improve their chances of discovering the
unexpected. Perhaps the way to remain
on the cutting-edge of astronomy is to
look where no one has looked before.
Leaving no stone
unturned
Many unexpected discoveries in astron-
omy were possible simply because of new
technology. Galileo’s telescope allowed for
unprecedented views of the sky, uncov-
ering shocking surprises. Similarly, the
Hubble Space Telescope allowed astrono-
mers to look deeper into the universe
than ever before, revealing unimaginable
phenomena. Now, Ray Norris — an
astronomer at Western Sydney University
and the Commonwealth Scientific
and Industrial Research Organisation
in Australia — will tackle an under-
The 15-meter Holmdel Horn Antenna was built in 1959 at Bell Laboratories in Holmdel,
New Jersey, with the goal of performing pioneering work related to satellite communications.
observed section of the universe with a
While attempting to use the antenna for research in 1964, radio astronomers Robert Wilson new survey using radio waves.
and Arno Penzias accidentally made a discovery worthy of the Nobel Prize in Physics. NASA The Evolutionary Map of the Universe
(EMU) survey will use the Australian
Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder to
comet. Engineer Linda Morabito found energy, and showed that a seemingly study radio sources in the night sky. Its
volcanoes on Io while fiddling with empty section of the night sky was actu- goal is to combine breadth and depth to
image contrast to better see the back- ally burgeoning with untold numbers of seek out fainter sources spread across a
ground stars behind the jovian moon. galaxies. Nobody expected these discov- wider field of view than previously
Physicist Karl Jansky stumbled upon eries when Hubble launched. attempted. Currently, 2.5 million radio
X-rays emanating from the center of the With rapid advances in technology, sources are known. EMU expects to find
Milky Way while trying to improve astronomy is emerging into an era of big 70 million more.
trans-Atlantic phone calls. A U.S. spy surveys. Ultra-high-resolution imaging Radio sources are often among the
satellite originally detected gamma-ray and new collection techniques now allow most energetic and explosive objects in
bursts while looking for covert nuclear for unprecedented amounts of data to be the sky. Black holes, supernovae, and rap-
bomb explosions in the 1960s. And these recorded and stored. Astronomers are idly rotating neutron stars (pulsars) are
are just a few examples. already becoming overwhelmed with all known to emit radio waves. The EMU
While astronomy has progressed more data than they have time to process. survey expects to find many objects in
through dogged reconciliation of theory When scientists barely have the time to the early universe — some of known
and observation, it has also greatly ben- search the data for what they’re looking types and some new — that can tell us
efited from things no one could have for, how can they be expected to catch the how the first stars and galaxies formed.
expected at the time. Two decades on, paradigm-shifting details no one could And Norris has spent a lot of time think-
the Hubble Space Telescope has fulfilled have imagined? ing about how best to make those unex-
its key goals, but it has also discovered This new era of big-data astronomy pected discoveries.
proplyds (a type of planet-forming disk requires a new way of looking at data, “As telescopes develop, we’ll be getting
around a young star), unveiled dark and astronomers are developing ways to more and more data,” says Norris. “The
The cosmic microwave background (CMB) is the first light to travel This simulated image shows how the sky would have appeared
throughout the universe, left over from just moments after the Big Bang. to the Holmdel antenna, which was used by Penzias and Wilson
Over time, the light that makes up the CMB lost energy, stretching out its in 1965 to accidentally discover the cosmic microwave background.
wavelength toward the microwave and radio spectra. NASA/WMAP SCIENCE TEAM NASA/WMAP SCIENCE TEAM
32 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Bombshell breakthroughs
DISCOVERY OF
URANUS. On
March 13, 1781,
William Herschel
was searching
for binary
stars when he
unintentionally
discovered
Uranus. He
originally
mistook the plan- VOLCANOES ON IO. Engineer Linda Morabito inadvertently discovered Io’s volcano
et for a comet. Pele in an optical navigation image taken by Voyager 1. Following Pele’s discovery,
NASA/JPL-CALTECH hundreds of smaller volcanoes were detected on Io over the years. NASA/JPL/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA
problem is finding the things you don’t at the University of Cambridge, Bell was size of 40 Full Moons, LSST will take
expect, which hide among the things you charged with studying data from quasars images at multiple wavelengths ranging
can recognize and the noise in the data.” — distant active galaxies — coming from from visible to near-infrared. Every clear
Background and instrumental noise, a radio telescope. Amid all the signals, night, it will log as much as 30 terabytes
as Penzias and Wilson know all too well, she noticed a source that varied too fast of data. Over its 10-year expected life-
can be hard to quantify. As telescopes to be a quasar. She had discovered a new time, LSST plans on imaging each section
and instruments become increasingly type of star: pulsars. of the sky a thousand times, creating
complex, it becomes harder to under- This technique is the basis of surveys more than 30 trillion observations of
stand the signatures they leave in the like the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope 40 billion celestial objects.
data. But being able to distinguish (LSST), which will survey the entire sky This style of observation will naturally
between noise and small, unexpected sig- every few nights from its location in single out objects that change in bright-
nals is key in the search for the unknown. north-central Chile. ness, such as pulsars, supernovae, and
To tease out the unexpected discover- “There are some quantifiable reasons distant quasars, as well as moving objects,
ies, Norris is helping develop a project why everyone believes LSST to be a major like asteroids and other small bodies in
known as the Widefield ouTlier Finder, revolution for very rare objects and our solar system. The scientists hope it
or WTF. With the specific goal of aiding events,” says Željko Ivezić, project scien- may also help identify new variable activ-
in unexpected discoveries, WTF will use tist of LSST and professor of astronomy ity in the night sky.
complex algorithms and cloud computing at the University of Washington in Large-scale surveys have been carried
to pull out unusual signals in the data Seattle. “The volume, the high dimen- out before, but never to the extent that
and reduce the huge quantities of data to sionality of measurements, and the mea- LSST will go. Previously, the most exten-
manageable amounts. surement precision all bode well for sive survey was the Sloan Digital Sky
unexpected discoveries and discoveries of Survey (SDSS), which imaged only a
Seek and you will find rare objects and events.” quarter of the sky. LSST will use a tele-
If you can’t find somewhere new to look, Set to begin watching the night sky in scope nearly three times larger, providing
you can try looking harder than anyone 2021, LSST will provide continual sur- twice the resolution across a wider range
else. This method paid off for astronomer veillance of the heavens in an exhaustive of wavelengths of light, and it will view a
Jocelyn Bell. While a graduate student manner. With a wide field of view the greater portion of the cosmos.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 33
by having them explore real images to
identify simple objects or patterns in a
fun, gamelike way. With citizen science,
the types of routine analyses that would
typically require months of work by a few
scientists can now be done by many more
science enthusiasts at their leisure.
One of the first groups to enlist the
public’s help at the data processing stage
was a team of scientists at NASA’s Ames
Research Center. Using data collected by
the Viking orbiters, which were sent to
Mars in the 1970s, the team developed
ClickWorkers, an online site where the
public could identify and map craters on
the martian surface, in 2000. The initial
SKA ORGANIZATION
results showed the public was both enthu-
siastic about helping and capable of per-
forming tasks accurately. Soon after, the
project was expanded.
Using the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder, Ray Norris plans to carry out the
Evolutionary Map of the Universe (EMU) survey to investigate radio sources in the sky. Although “The majority of people participated
2.5 million radio sources are already known, EMU expects to take on another 70 million more. because they wanted to be a part of
research,” says Lucy Fortson, an astro-
physicist at the University of Minnesota
With the immense amounts of data Enlisting the public’s help in scientific who has worked extensively with citizen
LSST will produce nightly, it will be endeavours dates back more than a cen- science projects. “They felt that they
essential for researchers to stay on top of tury to birdwatchers tracking aviary wanted to do something meaningful with
the imagery. For this, LSST scientists migration patterns across North their extra time.”
have developed systems that automati- America. But it wasn’t until the rise of the Today there are numerous citizen sci-
cally process images by looking for differ- internet and the online gaming culture ence projects in astronomy, such as
ences between two exposures of the same that citizen science projects really took CosmoQuest, Milky Way Project, and
section of the sky that were taken at dif- off. The idea is simple: Engage the public perhaps most famously, Galaxy Zoo. In
ferent times. This automation will allow
any changes to be noticed within a min-
ute. However, the road to understanding Same size, different sight
the flagged events will still require hours Primary mirror
upon hours of analysis. diameter Field of view
“We need to develop these tools so that 8m-class telescope
they can operate on these quadrillions of
numbers,” says Ivezić. “Today we have
these tools if you want to apply them to
millions or even billions of objects. But if
you want to scale them up by a factor of a
thousand, it’s not a trivial thing. These 0.2°
tools can mean the difference between
amorphous piles of ones and zeros and 8m
potentially paradigm-shifting discoveries.”
34 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Galaxy Zoo, the public is asked to iden- Galaxies, clusters
tify the type of galaxy shown: Is it a disk? of galaxies, and
Is it edge-on? Is there a central bulge? clusters of clusters
These features can be quickly identified of galaxies join
with dark matter
by eye, but natural variations can make to form a grand,
them exceedingly difficult for computers weblike structure
to recognize and categorize. called the cosmic
web, a slice of
“Humans are actually very well
which is shown
designed to picking out serendipitous here. With the
discoveries in image datasets,” Fortson help of artificial
says. “By virtue of evolution, humans neural networks,
astronomers
have developed this amazing visual cor- hope to run
tex that can differentiate the unknown simulations like
unknowns from the knowns.” this to investigate
Of course, using the untrained public the cosmic web in
much greater detail
doesn’t come without its challenges. than previously
People make mistakes. Luckily, the large possible. NASA, ESA,
number of people involved in the identi- AND E. HALLMAN (UNIVERSITY
OF COLORADO BOULDER)
fication can be used to create averages
and a group consensus, which, over the
long run, can be even more accurate
than a single scientist’s identification. In
Galaxy Zoo, 40 different individuals
examine each galaxy to create a trusted
identification. By carefully processing “training set,” which is a series of exam- training set is not extensive enough, the
the results, individual people can even ples containing what the computer is computer will draw the wrong conclu-
be weighted differently depending on looking for — such as spiral galaxies. sions. Or, as astronomers are fond of
their identification success rate. In this Over time, and with enough examples, repeating, “Garbage in, garbage out.”
way, people whose identifications gener- the computer will become adept at The other drawback to artificial neu-
ally don’t agree with the group consen- identifying spiral galaxies, despite ral networks is that they require vast
sus can be flagged for rejection, so they their wide range of appearances. At datasets to “learn” from. Luckily, in the
don’t skew the end results. this point, the scientist can provide era of large-scale surveys, vast datasets
the computer with a sample of unidenti- are common. This means that artificial
Rise of the machines fied galaxies, and the machine will neural networks can quickly turn the
Once the masses have identified and return those that fit the criteria it problem of too much data into an advan-
categorized thousands of images, has assessed. tage. The larger the training set — which
significant work remains to analyze Machines can also be taught a much citizen scientists can help bolster — the
the data. This is where computers finally more difficult task: assessing how objects better the results.
come in. These machines are the heavy and their characteristics relate to one
lifters, allowing for complex calculations another. For example, scientists have used The future of
and comparisons that the artificial neural networks to unexpected discoveries
human brain would be hard- investigate how galaxies form “Our ability to collect these humongous
pressed to match on its own. LSST will clusters and how that group- datasets is developing in parallel with
While machines historically ing affects the numbers of our ability to interpret these huge data-
can only do exactly what they collect as stars the galaxies produce. sets,” says Ivezić. “Both directions are
are told, a subset of comput- much as 30 Only with the assistance of important — people who collect data and
ers are being taught to think computers are the scientists people who develop tools to analyze and
on their own. terabytes of able to compare the many interpret. Otherwise we’d just be stuck
Astronomers are using a
type of artificial intelligence,
data every physical properties at play,
such as galaxy mass, distance
with a huge pile of zeros and ones we
couldn’t make sense out of.”
called machine learning, to clear night. between galaxies, and previ- With the combination of large-scale
get computers to teach them- ous interactions between gal- surveys, a legion of citizen scientists, and
selves how to find patterns in axies. And by comparing new machine learning techniques, it
the data. A specific method of machine many hundreds of thousands of galaxies, seems many new unexpected discoveries
learning known as artificial neural scientists are able to make broad conclu- will soon emerge from the darkness. But
networks was designed based on how sions about our universe that are unbi- as for the nature of those discoveries?
the brain functions. These neural ased by small irregularities. Only time can tell.
networks draw connections in vast When encoded properly, artificial
webs of data, just as the human brain neural networks can provide profound Mara Johnson-Groh is a science writer and
does. To create these networks, a scien- insight to scientists; however, they can photographer who writes about everything
tist starts by showing the computer a also be easily misused. For example, if the under the Sun, and even things beyond it.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 35
SKYTHIS Visible to the naked eye
J
upiter rules the sky from the western horizon along (Alpha [α] Librae) and ending edges of the dark belts.
dusk to dawn. The king of with Venus. the month 0.9° northeast of Because the planet spins on
the planets reaches oppo- Venus treks eastward as this 3rd-magnitude star. its axis in less than 10 hours,
sition and peak visibility May progresses, arriving at
May 8, though it’s a star a point midway between the Jupiter at its best
attraction all month. The giant Bull’s horns (Beta [β] and
planet has plenty of company, Zeta [ζ] Tauri) on the 13th.
Arcturus
however. Venus entertains Four days later, a wafer-thin
us during the early evening crescent Moon stands 6° to
hours, while Mars and Saturn Venus’ left. Our satellite VIRGO
stand out after midnight. It’s appears only 9 percent lit
a cornucopia of planetary because it passed between the Spica
delights that promises to thrill Sun and Earth just two days C ORVUS
every observer. earlier. Venus, on the other
Let’s start our tour in the hand, lies on the far side of OPHIUCHUS
Jupiter
western sky shortly after sun- its orbit, and a telescope LIBR A
set. Venus shines at magnitude reveals a 12"-diameter disk
–3.9 and appears beautiful that is 84 percent lit.
against the backdrop of bright Venus continues its east- Antares
stars typically associated with ward sojourn all month. It SC OR PIUS 10°
winter. On May 1, the planet crosses into Gemini on
lies in Taurus about 5° north of May 19 and passes less than
the Hyades star cluster and 10° 1° north of the 5th-magnitude May 8, 11 P.M.
Looking southeast
east of the Pleiades (M45). The star cluster M35 on the 20th.
stars of Orion add to the stun- By month’s end, the planet The solar system’s largest planet peaks at opposition May 8, but it rules
ning scene as they sink toward resides in central Gemini. the background stars of Libra all month. ALL ILLUSTRATIONS: ASTRONOMY: ROEN KELLY
36 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
RISINGMOON
A fresh perspective on the Moon Furnerius and Mare Australe
The Moon’s nearside provides floor, the Moon’s face rises and
more than a thousand features drops from our perspective. As a
within range of small telescopes. waxing crescent May 18, it lies
But our satellite offers more than somewhat below us, and the cra- Furnerius
just the craters, maria, and moun- ter Furnerius looks like a bright
tain ranges visible at first glance. dimple on the face’s lower right.
Every month, Luna performs a As Luna rises up with each pass-
subtle dance with Earth that you ing day, the dimple moves away
just have to look for. from the limb and we see more
Turn to the “Path of the “under the chin.”
Planets” on p. 40–41 and locate By the 22nd, we catch the first
the blue curve showing the hint of a dark blemish — Mare
Moon’s path and the orange arc Australe — at the southeastern
depicting the Sun’s motion. Notice limb. This sea, the edge of a large
how the Moon swings below the farside basin, slowly reveals itself N
Sun and then rises above it, a until Full Moon on May 29. The Mare Australe
motion that stems from the tilt of Moon’s motion is at its peak, and it E
the Moon’s orbit relative to Earth’s. then slowly drops back down, but
As the two partners twirl the change near the limb occurs in This pair of features near the Moon’s southeastern limb reveals our
across the solar system’s dance darkness and out of sight. changing viewpoint during May. CONSOLIDATED LUNAR ATLAS/UA/LPL; INSET: NASA/GSFC/ASU
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 37
N
STAR b
DOME `
P E IA
CASSIO
¡
` LA
CE b
RT
How to use this map: This map portrays the A
f
c
sky as seen near 35° north latitude. Located
inside the border are the cardinal directions + CEP
LIS
DA R
_
and their intermediate points. To find S
HEU O PA L E
a
stars, hold the map overhead and _
AM
orient it so one of the labels matches
the direction you’re facing. The NE d
`
De
stars above the map’s horizon
ne
Polaris _
now match what’s in the sky.
b
¡
a
NCP
b
The all-sky map shows
CY
MINOR
G
how the sky looks at:
b
NU
d
URSA
M82
midnight May 1
S
r
D
11 P.M. May 15
M
RA 1
M8
27
CO c `
10 P.M. May 31 a
a
i
_
`
a
V
at midmonth
a
e g
`
VU
SAG
RS OR
a
_
_
LY
M57
`
LPE
A
f `
R
I T TA
Mizar b
CU
¡ a
c
L
HE
I
A
IC
d
/
RCU
AT
s
c
M13
N
M51
VE
+
LE
`
`
AQUIL A
S
c
NE
b
i
b
E
_
C O RO NA
BOREALIS
CA
E S
BO
A
O M NIC
E
ÖTE
C R
_
BE
¡
_
P
NG
S
_ 4
SE PUT
d
`
M6
`
CA
`
g
RP
Ar _
ctu
SCU
M6
la
EN
d
ru
OP
bo
s
S
ne
TUM
¡
HI
De
_
_
UC
STAR `
HU
M b
MAGNITUDES 5 c
i
a
S
b
M1
SE
Sirius
¡
VIRGO
CA
6
RP A
`
UD
0.0
EN
3.0 4
1.0 M10
S
4.0 a _ Spica US
d
2.0 5.0 RV
` CO C
Jup _ b a
Path of the Sun (ecliptic) i te r
An LI
STAR COLORS ta BR
b
¡
e
re A a
A star’s color depends s m `
/ m _
on its surface temperature. _ M
4
o
/
• The hottest stars shine blue SE SC HY
• Slightly cooler stars appear white
O
RP
IU
M83
•
¡
38 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018 S
Note: Moon phases in the calendar vary
in size due to the distance from Earth
MAY 2018 and are shown at 0h Universal Time.
SUN. MON. TUES. WED. THURS. FRI. SAT.
a
ell
MAP SYMBOLS
p
Ca
Open cluster
` _
1 2 3 4 5
Globular cluster
` Diffuse nebula
6 7 8 9 10 11 12
A
IG
Planetary nebula
e
R
U
A NW
Galaxy
X 20 21 22 23 24 25 26
¡
N
k LY
or
ast
NI
27 28 29 30 31
C
MI
_
c
GE
x
f
l u
Calendar of events
Pol
`
b
e
h
A
CANIS MINOR
`
CANCE
_
`
W
c
¡
a
LEO
b
RA
9 P.M. EDT
31 The Moon passes 1.6° north of
10 The Moon passes 2° south of Saturn, 9 P.M. EDT
Neptune, 5 A.M. EDT
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 39
PATH OF THE
PLANETS The planets in May 2018
CAS
Objects visible before dawn DR A
AND
L AC
LY R HER
PER CYG
BOÖ
T RI
C rB
ARI PS C
PEG V UL
Merc Sun
ury SGE
Uranus EQU
SER
TAU PS C
AQL SER Jupiter appears at its best
Celestial equator for the year in May
Neptune VIR
ERI AQR OPH
CET
SCT n
th e Moo
Vesta Path of
Mars
Pluto Saturn LI B
F OR S CL CAP
PsA
SGR Amphitrite
MIC C rA
GRU LUP
SC O
16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
31 30 29 28 27 26
The planets These illustrations show the size, phase, and orientation of each planet and the two brightest dwarf planets at 0h UT
for the dates in the data table at bottom. South is at the top to match the view through a telescope.
in the sky
Mercury Uranus
Mars
S
W E
N
Pluto
Saturn
Venus Ceres Neptune
10"
Jupiter
Planets MERCURY VENUS MARS CERES JUPITER SATURN URANUS NEPTUNE PLUTO
Date May 1 May 15 May 15 May 15 May 15 May 15 May 15 May 15 May 15
Magnitude 0.3 –3.9 –0.7 8.5 –2.5 0.3 5.9 7.9 14.2
Angular size 7.8" 12.1" 12.8" 0.5" 44.8" 17.8" 3.4" 2.3" 0.1"
Illumination 46% 85% 89% 96% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%
Distance (AU) from Earth 0.859 1.375 0.734 2.526 4.403 9.319 20.806 30.307 33.001
Distance (AU) from Sun 0.459 0.718 1.476 2.559 5.408 10.066 19.888 29.942 33.562
Right ascension (2000.0) 0h54.1m 5h34.9m 20h07.4m 9h19.6m 15h01.0m 18h36.0m 1h51.3m 23h09.6m 19h30.3m
Declination (2000.0) 2°41' 24°44' –22°12' 26°36' –15°48' –22°18' 10°53' –6°25' –21°33'
40 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
This map unfolds the entire night sky from sunset (at right) until sunrise (at left).
Arrows and colored dots show motions and locations of solar system objects during the month.
4
C RV C RT CM a
5
LEP
ERI 6
HYA FOR
ANT PYX
7
C OL CAE
PUP 8
Early evening 9
To locate the Moon in the sky, draw a line from the phase shown for the day straight up to the curved blue line.
10
Note: Moons vary in size due to the distance from Earth and are shown at 0h Universal Time.
11 Io
12
25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15
13
14
15 Europa
The planets 16
in their orbits 17
Venus Arrows show the inner planets’
monthly motions and dots 18 Callisto
Ceres
depict the outer planets’ posi-
19
Mercury tions at midmonth from high
above their orbits. 20
Earth
21
Mars
22
23
Jupiter 24
25
26
Uranus 27
ILLUSTRATIONS BY ASTRONOMY: ROEN KELLY
Jupiter 28 Ganymede
Opposition is May 8
Neptune 29
Saturn
30
31
Pluto
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 41
— Continued from page 37
Track down Jupiter’s satellites
WHEN TO VIEW THE PLANETS S Callisto
COMETSEARCH
PANSTARRS makes its closest approach Comet PANSTARRS (C/2016 R2)
42 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
The Moon passes Venus
Pollux
LOCATINGASTEROIDS
Castor
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 43
ASKASTR0 Astronomy’s experts from around the globe answer your cosmic questions.
JETS
into a rainbow.
Gravitational
waves, however,
do not disperse,
meaning both
Q: IF NOT EVEN LIGHT CAN ESCAPE high- and
low-frequency
FROM A BLACK HOLE, HOW CAN YOU gravitational
waves travel
EXPLAIN JETS THAT LAUNCH AT NEAR at the same speed
through every
LIGHT SPEED EXTENDING FOR NUMEROUS medium.
LIGHT-YEARS? Robert Byerly, Windsor, California LUCAS V. BARBOSA
A: You are absolutely right that It is from the accretion disk Q: IN THE NOVEMBER 2017 should travel at the same speed
not even light can escape from that the jets are formed and ISSUE’S GRAVITATIONAL as a low-frequency wave.
a black hole, and yet they launched, again well outside WAVES STORY, ROBERT A familiar example of dis-
launch huge, energetic jets that the event horizon. Astronomers NAEYE WROTE, “IF GRAVITA- persion occurs when white light
we can see. The key here is believe these jets arise through TIONAL WAVES DISPERSE, passes through a prism, which
while nothing can escape a interactions between the black SLOWER FREQUENCIES WILL separates the light into its con-
black hole once it has fallen past hole’s magnetic field and elec- ARRIVE AT THE DETECTORS stituent colors. This occurs
a certain point — called the trically charged plasma par- AFTER THE FASTER ONES.” because different wavelengths
event horizon — the jets origi- ticles in the accretion disk. BUT HOW ARE THERE DIF- (frequencies) of light take dif-
nate from outside that region. When the black hole’s mag- FERENT VELOCITIES FOR ferent paths through the prism.
Black holes themselves are netic field accelerates them, DIFFERENT FREQUENCIES? As light passes through the
invisible. But outside the event they gain enough energy to IT SEEMS ILLOGICAL TO ME. prism, it is absorbed and re-
horizon, infalling matter col- glow, allowing us to spot them. Aaron Morris emitted by the atoms of the
lects into an accretion disk, For stellar-mass black holes, Smyrna, Georgia prism differently, depending on
which grows hot due to friction the jets “turn on” and become its frequency. Violet light is
and emits all sorts of radiation, visible at a distance of tens of A: Gravitational waves are dis- slowed down by this absorption
from optical through X-rays. thousands of miles from the turbances in the fabric of space- and re-emission process more
When astronomers observe a black hole. For supermassive time that radiate outward from than red light, and thus the two
black hole, they’re actually black holes, this distance is the rapid movement of massive travel very different paths,
observing the radiation from millions of times greater. objects. And in fact, you are spreading out by the time they
this disk, which ends at the Alison Klesman right: Basic human intuition exit the prism.
event horizon. Associate Editor says that a high-frequency wave According to Einstein’s the-
ory of general relativity, gravi-
tational waves do not
experience dispersion in this
way. In other words, provided
that general relativity is an
accurate description of nature,
high-frequency gravitational
waves should travel at exactly
the same speed (the speed of
light) as low-frequency gravita-
tional waves. There should be
no preferential absorption or
re-emission of gravitational
waves as they travel through
space-time, regardless of their
frequency. Many alternative
theories, however, predict that
gravitational waves could expe-
rience dispersion as they travel
Black holes themselves are invisible, but they can form huge accretion disks and launch energetic jets. The through space-time; these the-
accretion disk (orange-red and blue) and jet (purple) occur outside the black hole’s event horizon (the dark sphere) ories treat gravity and
and are thus visible to astronomers. NASA/JPL-CALTECH
44 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Objects are not to scale
Solar system distances
ne
er
Ne s
tur
ptu
nu
it
to
h
Jup
Sun
rs
Sa
Ura
t
Plu
Ear
Ma
Inner Oort Cloud Oort Cloud
Main
asteroid belt Kuiper Belt
The Oort Cloud is an extended region of icy bodies left over from the formation of the solar system. These objects appear tightly packed in illustrations,
but they are actually spread out with great distances on the order of 31 million miles (50 million km) between neighboring bodies. ASTRONOMY: ROEN KELLY
gravitational waves differently between about 2.1 and 3.3 Q: MY UNDERSTANDING IS detectable when infalling mat-
from Einstein. If the nature of astronomical units (AU; 1 AU THAT THE MATERIALS FOR ter forms a disk that emits
gravity is different from what is the average Sun-Earth dis- OUR SOLAR SYSTEM AND radiation. A lone black hole
Einstein states, then gravita- tance, 93 million miles [150 OTHERS NEARBY WERE with no companion accretes
tional waves might be allowed million kilometers]) from the CREATED BY A SUPERNOVA. slowly, so it has a minimal disk
to disperse. Sun, there are some 1 million to WHERE IS THE BLACK HOLE and remains virtually invisible.
LIGO and Virgo have both 1.5 million asteroids larger than FROM THAT SUPERNOVA? Finally, nothing in our
looked for dispersion in the 0.6 mile (1 km). Each of these John Goodemote Milky Way is static. Every star
gravitational waves detected asteroids is on average 1.8 mil- La Grange, Illinois (and neutron star and black
from merging black holes and lion miles (3 million km) apart, hole) revolves around the cen-
neutron stars, but have so far or about eight times the Earth- A: The heavy elements we see ter of the galaxy, and also
found that all the different fre- Moon distance. These asteroids throughout the galaxy today, moves relative to the objects
quencies are arriving at the are small compared with our including our solar system, around it. This ultimately
detector at the exact same time, Moon and thus would generally were indeed created in and dis- means that astronomers aren’t
just as Einstein predicted. not be observable from each persed by supernovae, as well as able to reliably wind back the
Robert Naeye other. Collisions between aster- by colliding neutron stars such clock to determine what our
Contributor oids still do happen, with a few as those observed in August. Sun’s surroundings looked like
per year that create dust clouds However, not all supernovae before it formed. A black hole
we can detect with telescopes. end in black holes. Current or neutron star left by a nearby
Q: I’VE HEARD THAT THE The Oort Cloud has many models predict that a star must supernova isn’t in the same
OORT CLOUD CONTAINS more objects than the main have a mass at least 20 times place it was billions of years
TRILLIONS OF ICY BODIES. asteroid belt, some trillion that of the Sun before the core ago. We may never find the
WHAT WOULD BE THE AVER- objects larger than a kilometer, collapse at the end of its life exact supernova remnant or
AGE DISTANCE BETWEEN but it also occupies a much will result in a black hole. If remnants that left behind the
THESE BODIES? larger volume of space from any nearby supernovae didn’t material from which our solar
Larry Guldenzopf 5,000 AU to beyond 20,000 to meet this initial criterion — if system formed.
Milwaukie, Oregon 50,000 AU from the Sun. Oort their parent stars were only Alison Klesman
Cloud objects larger than 1 km between eight and 20 solar Associate Editor
A: In movies you usually see have some 31 million miles (50 masses — they would have left
an asteroid belt full of rocks million km) between each behind a neutron star, not a
close to one another. In reality, other. This is about the dis- black hole. Send us your
this would be an unstable situ- tance between Earth and Mars Neutron stars are difficult to questions
ation because objects that are at their closest approach. observe, particularly when they Send your astronomy
close to one another will col- The large distances between are old and lack a binary com- questions via email to
lide often as they orbit the Sun. small objects in our solar system panion. They are typically on askastro@astronomy.com,
Any belt of objects will grind make empty space the norm the order of 12 miles (20 km) or write to Ask Astro,
down the population until col- and mean spacecraft can travel in diameter and cool off over P. O. Box 1612, Waukesha,
lisions are rare, and thus the safely among the planets. time unless they are actively WI 53187. Be sure to tell us
objects generally will not be Scott Sheppard accreting material from a your full name and where
found near each other in a sta- Staff Scientist, Department of nearby companion star. Black you live. Unfortunately, we
ble long-lived belt. Terrestrial Magnetism, Carnegie holes have the same observa- cannot answer all questions
In our main asteroid belt Institution of Washington, tional problem — they only submitted.
between Mars and Jupiter, Washington, D.C. “light up” and become
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 45
WHY DO
GALAXIES
ALII N
N
AL GG ??
The matter in our universe forms
filaments and threads like a grand
cosmic web, tugging galaxies and
clusters into place along the way.
by Michael West
O
The galaxy cluster ne of the most striking features
MACS J0416.1–2403 of the distribution of matter in
is highly elongated.
The orientations of
the universe is its filamentary
its brightest member appearance, with long, luminous
galaxies, which appear strands of galaxies woven togeth-
round and yellow in er into a vast cosmic web.
this image, reflect this
arrangement. ESA/HUBBLE, Nowhere is this more evident than the
NASA, AND HST FRONTIER FIELDS Perseus-Pisces Supercluster. This colossal chain
of galaxies snakes across more than 50° of the
northern sky, fed by a network of smaller fila-
ments that resemble tributaries flowing into a
river. Embedded within these filaments are
densely populated groups and clusters of galaxies.
Between them lie immense voids.
Our own Milky Way Galaxy resides in the
outskirts of a similar structure known as the
Laniakea Supercluster. (Laniakea means “immea-
surable heaven” in Hawaiian.) Home to an esti-
mated 100,000 galaxies, it’s a tangled knot of
46 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
60°
30°
150° 120° 90° 60° 30° 330° 300° 270° 240° 210°
–30°
–60°
48 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
SMEARING
COSMIC
SHEAR
One astronomer’s signal is
sometimes another’s noise.
Charles Messier com-
piled his famous list of
deep-sky objects to spare
fellow comet hunters
from wasting time on
them. Edmund Weiss, a
19th-century Austrian
astronomer, called aster-
oids the “vermin of the sky”
because their trails on long-
exposure photographs
were considered blemishes.
And galaxy alignments turn
out to be a nuisance for
some astronomers, too.
Gravitational lensing,
the deflection of light rays
by gravity, has become a
powerful tool for cosmol-
ogy. As light from faraway
Above: The giant galaxies journeys through
galaxy in the cen- space, the gravitational
ter of the cluster pull of matter — both visi-
Abell 3827 is in the
ble and invisible — alters
process of devour-
ing several smaller its path. This causes galax-
ones. Galaxies like ies near each other in the
this grow by first sky to appear slightly elon-
capturing and then gated and aligned.
later cannibalizing Astronomers call these dis-
their neighbors. tortions cosmic shear.
R. CARRASCO ET AL., GEMINI
Although it’s a minus-
OBSERVATORY/AURA
cule effect, by carefully
Left: Galaxy merg- measuring the shapes and
ers often occur orientations of large num-
along filaments in bers of galaxies, astrono-
the cosmic web, mers can infer the amount
possibly imparting and distribution of dark
the end result with matter, the mysterious
a preferred align- stuff that makes up much
ment. ESA/HUBBLE AND of the universe.
NASA; ACKNOWLEDGEMENT:
JUDY SCHMIDT (GECKZILLA)
But a crucial assumption
in cosmic shear studies is
that galaxy orientations
are inherently random, so
Cosmic cartography that any apparent align-
ments are the result of
On this map of the gravitational lensing.
50° galaxy distribution
Physical alignments, such
in the region of
the Perseus-Pisces as those seen in giant ellip-
45°
Supercluster, each tical galaxies, masquerade
40° point represents as cosmic shear and com-
Declination
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 49
SIMULATING Dark matter distribution
THE UNIVERSE 70° 60° 50° 40° 30° 20° 10° 0° 350° 340°
In 1941, five years before digital
computers were invented, Erik
Holmberg of Lund Observatory in
Sweden performed the first simu- –30°
lation of colliding galaxies. What
Density of matter
he lacked in computational power
he made up for with ingenuity.
Because an object’s gravita-
tional pull and apparent bright-
– 40°
ness both vary inversely with the
square of distance, Holmberg
realized he could use light as a
proxy for gravity. Representing
two galaxies with 37 lightbulbs
each, he measured the brightness
at different locations to deter-
1 billion light-years
mine the strength and direction –50°
of the gravitational force and
adjusted their motions accord- An international team of scientists used the 570-megapixel Dark Energy Camera at Cerro Tololo
ingly. Although crude, Holmberg’s Inter-American Observatory in Chile to record light from 26 million galaxies. Tiny distortions in
analog computation provided their apparent shapes caused by gravitational lensing provide a map of the dark matter in different
insights into the frequency of gal- regions of space. In this image, red regions have more dark matter than average, while blue regions
axy mergers and suggested that have less. Hints of large-scale filamentary features can be seen. The European Space Agency’s
close encounters could generate Euclid mission and NASA’s Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope, both scheduled for launch in 2020, will
spiral arms. measure cosmic shear from space, providing even sharper views of the cosmic dark matter distribution.
CHIHWAY CHANG OF THE KAVLI INSTITUTE FOR COSMOLOGICAL PHYSICS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO AND THE DES COLLABORATION
Astronomers quickly
embraced digital computers as a
tool to simulate events and time- They noticed that clusters in the Perseus-Pisces
scales beyond anything accessi- Supercluster are elongated in the same direc-
ble to mere mortals. In the 1970s,
tion as the filament that bridges them, leading
brothers Alar and Jüri Toomre
pioneered numerical simulations
them to suggest in a 1980 paper published in
of galaxy mergers by represent- Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical
ing each galaxy as a swarm of Society that “the orientation of clusters in
interacting particles whose tra- superclusters is a conspicuous morphological
jectories were calculated by the property of superclusters.”
computer. Although the avail- The alignment of galaxies and clusters over
able computing power at the
tens or hundreds of millions of light-years
time limited the number of par-
ticles that could be followed,
means the innermost regions of some galaxies
these simulations revealed that are aligned with their surroundings on scales
galaxy mergers are common, larger than 1,000 times the size of a single gal-
and that mergers of spiral gal- axy itself. It suggests that the birth and evolu-
axies can produce things that tion of these objects have been strongly
look like elliptical galaxies. influenced by the cosmic web. But how?
As computational power
grew, so did astronomers’ ambi-
tion. Today, thanks to state-of- Going with the flow
the-art computers, it’s possible Galaxies, like people, are products of their
to simulate the evolution of environment. Elliptical galaxies, for example,
enormous volumes of space in usually huddle together in groups and clusters,
unprecedented detail using tril- while spiral galaxies prefer more elbowroom.
lions of particles to represent Environment clearly plays a role in galaxy
both luminous and dark matter.
orientations, too. There are two leading theo-
Beginning from some assumed A computer simulation shows the gossamer-like
set of initial conditions, astrono- structure of the cosmic web. Within this network, ries for how this happens. One suggests that
mers can run the simulation for- matter flows along filaments, piling up where they galaxies are born aligned with their surround-
ward in time to see what the intersect. The simulation shown here, one of the ings, while the other assumes that alignment is
largest ever done, followed the motion of trillions
predicted distribution and
of particles as gravity amplified tiny variations something they acquire later.
properties of galaxies would be in their initial distribution. Black points show the Galaxies might gain their orientation in
today and then compare the locations of dark matter; yellow denotes dense several ways. Big galaxies grow by cannibaliz-
results with observations. Such regions where galaxies and clusters form; and ing smaller ones, a process astronomers euphe-
simulations have become an white indicates voids. The region displayed here is
invaluable tool for understand- 2.5 billion light-years across, only a portion of the mistically call merging. But mergers aren’t
ing how the universe reached entire simulated volume. JOACHIM STADEL, UZH haphazard. Computer simulations show that
its present state. — M.W. they occur most frequently along well-defined
50 A S T R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
A computer simulation of our home galaxy,
the Milky Way. Today’s simulations are
more realistic than ever before, following
the birth and evolution of galaxies from
the Big Bang to the present day. This
simulation required 15 days of number
crunching with one of the world’s fastest
supercomputers. HOPKINS RESEARCH GROUP/CALTECH
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 51
Leo’s exotic
Beyond the brightest galaxies,
the Lion contains many
challenging deep-sky targets.
by Stephen James O’Meara
52 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
deep-sky gems
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 53
M
ost deep-sky hunters excellent seeing to look for that orange
associate Leo with dwarf’s 13th-magnitude red dwarf com-
galaxies … and so panion (C) 2.5" to the east. The greater the
they should. Although magnification, the greater the apparent
the celestial Lion has separation, and the greater your chances
other wonders (espe- are to see faint objects.
cially Regulus and Gamma Leonis, two Yet there’s more! Even small-telescope
regal double stars), we can enjoy them on users can search for a 12th-magnitude line-
our way to more exotic galaxies. of-sight companion (D) 3' due west of
Most of these galaxies can be seen read- Regulus — a sneaky little star often missed
ily through modest-sized apertures, but by the casual viewer. What you can’t see is
some will require much greater apertures. the spectroscopic object, speculated to have
Others still are best appreciated by involv- once been a luminous giant greater than
ing the imagination to see the delicate dra- Regulus but is now an Earth-sized high-
mas unfolding in and around them in density white dwarf star of 0.3 solar mass.
wavelengths that extend beyond the eye’s Take a deep breath before you head to
visual range. After all, astronomy is half our next challenge, Leo III (Leo A). This
science, half imagination. enigmatic dwarf galaxy is one of the most
I hope the latter exotics will inspire
astroimagers to capture these objects and
their demanding details and bring them to Below: Two odd galaxies, NGC 3226 and
light so the rest of us can enjoy them as NGC 3227, float in Leo as they gently lock
in a tidal embrace. NGC 3227 (right) is the
they truly are.
somewhat brighter barred spiral in this
interacting pair. Elliptical galaxy NGC 3226
Hidden dwarfs lies to its left. ROBERT LOCKWOOD
Leo harbors a fine selection of dwarf galax-
ies, many of which can be enjoyed by
observers using telescopes both large and
small. But we’ll start with a visual chal-
lenge: the 10th-magnitude dwarf spheroidal
Leo I.
Astronomy Senior Editor Michael E.
Bakich succinctly summarizes the situa-
tion: “Easy to find, hard to see.” The galaxy
lies only 20' north of Regulus (Alpha [α]
Leonis), but its light spreads across 12' by 9'
of sky. (That’s comparable in size to NGC
205, but two magnitudes fainter and with
no core!) Add in glare from Regulus, and
you’ve got a wonderful visual challenge.
Hints: Use a wide-field eyepiece that
provides moderate magnification (70x),
push Regulus out of the field of view, and
gently tap the tube as you look for a dim
and uniform carpet of ethereal light against
a bleak background of stars. At a distance
of 800,000 light-years, Leo I may be the
farthest satellite system orbiting our galaxy.
Regulus itself is a multiple star system
that can be seen with binoculars and tele-
scopes, and offers a secret challenge. This
glistening 1st-magnitude jewel shines with
a dazzling light. An 8th-magnitude “violet”
(a color-contrast illusion at low power)
companion (B) lies 3' to the northwest; B is
actually an orange dwarf. If you are using a
large aperture (12 inches and greater), don’t
stop there. Use 300x or more on a night of
54 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
telescope. The galaxy was described as tri-
angular shaped, and was held steady with
averted vision.
Galactic cannibals
Let’s dip farther south into the Lion’s mane
to 2nd-magnitude Algieba (Gamma [γ]
Leonis), near which we’ll find an amazing
galaxy gobbler. But first, keep your tele-
scope trained on Gamma Leonis, one of
the night sky’s finest binaries for telescopes
of all sizes. It’s amazingly beautiful, appear-
ing as two golden orbs: a 2nd-magnitude
reddish-orange primary with a lemon-
yellow 3rd-magnitude companion about 5"
away. At times, the secondary will take on a
more illusory aqua hue when seen at high
magnification; indeed, the 19th-century
observer William Henry Smyth saw the
companion as “greenish yellow.” You’ll have
to use your imagination to see the
10-Jupiter-mass exoplanet in its Earth-like
orbit around the primary.
When you’ve finished exploring Algieba,
poodle along just 30' to the east-northeast,
Above: Leo I is a faint, challenging dwarf galaxy where you’ll find the interacting galaxies
that lies in our Local Group at a distance of about
NGC 3226 and NGC 3227. NGC 3227, the
800,000 light-years. It lies a short distance from
Leo’s brightest star, Regulus. BERNHARD HUBL larger and brighter of the two, is a peculiar
barred spiral that shines at 10th magnitude
Left: Regulus itself is a 1st-magnitude beacon and appears as a 7'-long ellipse, making it a
that hides two faint stars circling the bright near twin in size to M108 in Ursa Major.
primary: a “violet” companion 3' away and
a fainter red dwarf 2.5' away. This telescopic NGC 3226 is a 2'-wide, 11.5-magnitude
sketch captures all three stars and was made peculiar elliptical nipping the north-
with a 6-inch f/8 reflector at 240x. JEREMY PEREZ northwestern rim of its larger neighbor. At
their union, a tiny bridge appears to con-
nect the two. (And I wonder what size tele-
scope is required to see that!)
I’ve spied the two easily through a 5-inch
refractor, but the real drama is reserved
isolated of its kind in the Local Group. for users of large-aperture telescopes
Lying about 2.5 million light-years away, it and astroimagers, as the two galaxies are
appears as a featureless sphere of stars awash in the remains of a deceased third
bursting forth with relatively youthful stars galaxy — cannibalized by the gravity of
(around 90 percent of which are less than the visual pair.
8 billion years old), yet it shows no signs of High-resolution optical images with the
Gamma Leonis is tidal interactions having taken place to Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope in
beautiful, appearing trigger new star formation.
Finding this cosmic puzzle will test
Hawaii, combined with data from the
European Space Agency’s Herschel Space
as two golden orbs: your visual mettle. The rub is that Leo III Observatory and NASA’s Hubble and
is three magnitudes fainter than Leo I but Spitzer space telescopes, have revealed the
a reddish-orange much smaller (5' by 3'), so its light is more braided remains of the cannibalized galaxy,
compact. You’ll find it about 1˚ south- whose gas and stars have been torn asunder
primary with southwest of 5th-magnitude 20 Leo by gravitational forces. This extragalactic
a lemon-yellow Minoris in the Lion’s high mane (R.A.
9h59m26.4s; Dec. 30˚44'47"). The one
detritus now describes a vast and ornate
series of loops and swirls around the two
companion. observation I’m aware of was made by a visible members. How much of this detail
South African observer using an 8-inch f/6 can be seen visually (and through what
APM Wirth-Intes Maksutov Newtonian 86 size telescope) is something you can
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 55
Above: An obliquely oriented spiral, NGC 3521
is one of the most overlooked bright galaxies
in the sky. A small scope shows it as a beautiful
cloud of light. KEN CRAWFORD
56 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
extragalactic neighbor M105, with two
close attendants: the 11th-magnitude len-
ticular galaxy NGC 3384 about 7' to the
northeast and 12th-magnitude NGC 3389
(which is most likely a background galaxy)
near equidistant to the southwest. We can
now imagine the location of the Leo Ring,
a giant blossom of cold gas that surrounds
these galaxies; it once was one of the night
sky’s most dramatic and mysterious clouds
of intergalactic gas in the radio spectrum.
First detected by radio telescopes in
1983, the ring was further studied in 2009
by the ultraviolet vision of NASA’s GALEX,
which detected emissions interpreted as
dwarf galaxies forming out of primordial
gas. A year later, astronomers using the
Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope found
optical emissions associated with the ring
— not from dwarf galaxies, but from bursts
of star formation along the ring. Their
models indicate that the gas is not primor-
Above: The 12th-magnitude galaxy NGC 2964 dial, but formed by a billion-year-old colli-
(top right) lies near another strange galaxy,
NGC 2968, which has a twisting dark lane
sion between M96 and NGC 3384.
running across its midsection. JOHN BESWETHERICK/ Let’s slip far to the northwest corner of
ADAM BLOCK/NOAO/AURA/NSF Leo’s boundaries, about 5˚ southeast of
Alpha Lyncis, where we’ll find the “other”
Left: Another trio in Leo consists of M95 (left), Leo Triplet: 12th-magnitude NGC 2964,
M96 (above center), and the elliptical galaxy
M105 (right). Other galaxies lie near M105,
13th-magnitude NGC 2968, and 14th-
including NGC 3384 (above and right of M105) magnitude NGC 2970. Included in
and NGC 3389 (above NGC 3384). DANIEL B. PHILLIPS Astronomy contributing editor Phil
Harrington’s Cosmic Challenge, this triad
appears through modest-sized telescopes as
a series of extragalactic “dust motes.”
Whereas NGC 2964 is oriented east-
west, measures 3' by 1.5' across, and sports
make a 10˚ sweep east with a wide-field a tiny, fuzzy core, NGC 2968 is oriented
eyepiece. You are within striking range of northeast-southwest, measures 2' by 1.5',
another celebrated pack of reasonably and reveals no core. In reality, NGC 2964 is
bright galaxies: M95, M96, and M105. a mixed spiral galaxy, and NGC 2968 is an
M95 and M96 are separated (east-west) irregular galaxy with a peculiar S-shaped
by only 42'; both magnitude 9.5 barred spi- dust lane running lengthwise through its
rals are about 7' wide, with tight arms that body. But there’s more! A tidal tail con-
wind around a bright core, forming both a nects NGC 2968 and NGC 2970, extending
bright inner annulus and a fainter outer to the northeast. NGC 2970 is a true visual
NGC 3628 has a tail ring. Only M95 is seen nearly face-on
(looking like the Death Star from Star
dust mote, measuring only 0.5'.
NGC 2968 is very distorted and sur-
that looks like an Wars), while M96 is inclined 45˚. M96 is rounded by shells. What’s more, a super-
also the more curious of the two, as it is a nova occurred in 1970 on the luminous
ocean liner trailing one-armed spiral that loops around the bridge, confirming a physical association
core from the southwest to perform a tight
smoke. Can it be counterclockwise inner swirl, forming an
between NGC 2968 and NGC 2970.
If you make an astonishing observation
seen visually? And if ill-defined inner annulus before looping
again to form a warped outer loop, the
of any of these exotic features, send an
email to sjomeara31@gmail.com.
so, at what aperture northern rim of which is rife with star
formation. And this is where it gets Stephen James O’Meara is a well-known
and magnification? interesting. observer, author of many books, and a
About 1˚ east-northeast of M96 lies its contributing editor of Astronomy.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 57
Observe
MARS
at its best
It’s been 15 years since the Red Planet was this close and this big. Set up
your scope, and take advantage of this apparition. by Michael E. Bakich
Although a bit PLANETARY OBSERVING HITS A HIGH called oppositions, when Mars lies opposite the Sun from
farther and smaller
than it appeared
point this summer as Mars once again dominates our perspective on Earth. This year’s opposition occurs
in 2003, Mars in the evening sky. Dust off your scope, because this is July 26 or 27, depending on where you live. Let me
2018 will appear the year to observe the Red Planet. It hasn’t been this explain.
much larger than big and bright since 2003, and it won’t be again until
during its worst
opposition, more September 2035. Dates and numbers
than 800 years So, excitement is building. For readers new to Red The moment of opposition occurs at 5h13m Universal
from now. ASTRONOMY: Planet mania, astronomers’ interest peaks during times Time on the 27th. In the United States, that’s 1:13 a.m.
ROEN KELLY
EDT. If you observe from the Mountain or Pacific time
zones, the date of opposition will be the 26th.
Middle ground Then, a scant four days later, Mars reaches its closest
point to Earth. An opposition happens every 780 days
63,070,000 miles (minus 1 hour 26 minutes 24 seconds, to be exact). But
Sun 35,785,000 miles each closest approach to Earth is not really, well, closest
because Earth’s and Mars’ orbits are not circular, so the
34,580,000
miles distance between our two worlds changes from one oppo-
sition to the next.
Earth
During a distant opposition, Mars can lie more than
60 million miles (97 million kilometers) away. Contrast
that with a nearby opposition that places Mars less than
35 million miles (56 million km) from Earth.
August 2003 July 2018 March 2832 For observing purposes, it all comes down to apparent
diameter. Astronomers use angular measurement to
describe how large a celestial object appears. A planet’s
angular size can change a lot. Mars varies in size at oppo-
sition from a minimum of 13.8" to a maximum of 25.1".
And its maximum brightness at each close approach var-
ies from magnitude –1.5 to –3.0.
In 2018, opposition occurs July 27, but Mars lies closest
58 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
This Hubble
Space Telescope
image, taken
June 26, 2001,
remains one of
the best ever of
Mars. At the time,
the Red Planet
was 43 million
miles (68 million
kilometers) from
to Earth (and thus appears a smidge larger) on the 31st. equator) is –25°34'. This means for an observer at 40° Earth. NASA/THE HUBBLE
HERITAGE TEAM (STS CI/AURA)
The Red Planet will lie 35,785,000 miles (57,590,000 km) north latitude, Mars will climb a scant 24° above the
away then. It will span 24.33" and shine at magnitude southern horizon at midnight local time.
–2.8. And — not that you’ll need any stars to locate it It’s important to consider a planet’s altitude because
— its position will lie within the constellation the less air you view (or photograph) through, the better
Capricornus just north of the midpoint of a line joining the image. So, if you have a choice, head south. Even a
the magnitude 4.7 star 62 Sagittarii (HIP 98688) with 10° change in latitude will let you see more surface
magnitude 4.3 Omega (ω) Capricorni. details. Ideally, we all probably want to observe from
latitude 25°34' south. Anyone up for a trip to Brisbane,
Head south Australia? At midnight there, Mars will be overhead on
Observers at northern latitudes find themselves at its opposition date.
a severe disadvantage this summer. At opposition, Here’s a tip: Don’t wait for opposition. Although Mars
Mars’ declination (distance above or below the celestial will be biggest and brightest around opposition, you can
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 59
How bright will Mars be?
24"
–2.8
23" 24"
–2.6
Magnitude 22" 23"
This sequence,
taken June 5, make quality observations long before and after that 4-inch or larger telescope, you’ll see large albedo features
2016, shows Mars’ date. At the start of May — a full three months before — regions distinguished by the amount of light they
rotation over
closest approach — Mars will shine at magnitude –0.4 reflect. Mars’ best include Syrtis Major (an easily seen
slightly more than
2 hours. The left and measure 11" across, nearly 50 percent of its maxi- dark, triangular feature), Chryse, Elysium, the Hellas
image was taken mum size this year. At that size, detail will be visible. Basin, Libya, and Solis Lacus.
at 1h17m36s UT, Because Mars will really put on a show for more than Mars’ day, which astronomers call a sol, is 37.4 min-
the center one
at 1h48m36s UT, a month on either side of opposition, the darkness of utes longer than an Earth day. So, if you observe Mars at
and the right one your site doesn’t matter much. Indeed, some ambient the same time each night, its markings will appear to
at 3h26m36s UT. light actually is welcome when you observe the Red move 9.11° per day to the west. In a little more than five
DAMIAN PEACH
Planet. A white light off to your side (not directly in your weeks, the planet seems to slowly rotate backward one
field of view) lighting up your surroundings will cause full spin. All of Mars’ prominent features will, at some
your daytime vision — which is superior to night vision time during this period, lie on its meridian, the line
in both resolution and color sensitivity — to kick in. splitting the planet’s visible disk from top to bottom, as
Want to observe from a parking lot in Chicago? If it’s seen from Earth. All martian features look their best
clear, you’ll see some detail, even through small tele- when on the planet’s meridian.
scopes. But you shouldn’t observe from a parking lot Even including albedo highlights, the Red Planet’s
because the steadiness of the air above your site — what best surface features are its polar ice caps. At opposition,
astronomers call seeing — makes all the difference. The Mars’ south polar cap will tilt 11° in our direction.
better the seeing, the more detail your scope will reveal. Due to the temperature range at the martian poles,
Unfortunately, any parking lot stores lots of daytime heat astronomers subdivide each ice cap into larger “sea-
in the summer and releases it at night, ruining the view sonal” and smaller “residual” caps. Residual caps last
of even bright objects like Mars. So leave the city behind. through the martian year. The southern residual ice cap
measures about 200 miles (320 km) across. The northern
What can you see? residual ice cap spans about 600 miles (960 km).
Albedo features are the areas most subject to seasonal Winters are more severe in Mars’ northern hemi-
changes such as brightening or darkening. Through a sphere, and the seasonal ice cap there has reached a
60 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
This image,
taken October
23, 2014, shows
Mars (bright
object at bottom
center) passing
by the Lagoon
(M8) and Trifid
(M20) nebulae
in Sagittarius.
DEREK DEMETER
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 61
GUIDE
YOUR The photographer
captured Barnard’s
Loop in Orion over
two nights from
a plateau about
CAMERA
25 miles east of Globe,
Arizona. He used an
AstroTrac tracking
mount on a heavy
tripod as his base.
He mounted his QSI
583wsg camera on an
TO
autofocus mounting
bracket and attached
it to a Pentax 67
medium-format lens.
NICHOLAS CLARKE
SHOTS
A variety of mounts and techniques
film era, when most amateur astronomers considered
color emulsions advanced, not to mention special
spectroscopic and astronomical films and techniques,
like cold cameras and film
hypersensitization.
As I progressed though more
detailed and complicated photo-
similar to the ones I used in the
film days; the advantage is that
you can control with your cam-
era many of the settings I had to
can help you create stunning graphic techniques, acquiring a deal with by using different film
images. Which one is for you? mount that accurately tracked types or in the darkroom. As
the sky was the next step. This with film, prints, and the dark-
by Mike Reynolds took the trails out of my expo- room, digital processing is
sures and gave me nice wide- another story in itself.
field images of the night sky. General interest in wide-field
Today’s digital techniques are camera-lens imaging has
62 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
partially been reignited
through the work of The World
at Night (TWAN). Initiated by
Babak Tafreshi and Mike
Simmons through Astronomers
Without Borders, the 30 or so
regular TWAN photographers
(and many others) have con-
tributed well-composed images
and time-lapse videos of celes-
tial objects with interesting
natural or human-made land-
marks in the foreground. The
phrases “lightscape imaging” These superb full-frame cameras for astroimaging use different tech. The Canon 6D (right) is a standard DSLR
or “light painting” are often that employs a mirror to send the image to the viewfinder. The Sony a7R II is a mirrorless digital camera. COURTESY
OF THE MANUFACTURERS
used to describe such work.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 63
taken, the period between cause problems for exposures
exposures, and the number of when you want stars to appear
exposures. Some intervalom- as points of light, rather than
eters even allow you to set the squiggly lines.
time between mirror lockup Set the white balance
and exposure, since the mirror to auto: White balance lets you
lockup introduces vibration in adjust colors so that the image
the system. looks natural in its setting.
This is great if you are shooting
Camera settings a wedding under some unusual
Proper camera and lens settings lighting, or skiers against
will not only save you a lot of bright white snow, but it’s
frustration, but also noticeably not necessary for nightscapes.
improve the quality of your So, leave the white balance
images. And the beauty of digi- on auto.
The LighTrack II Mount tal media is that you can delete ISO setting range: The
from Fornax is easy to assemble and reshoot — unless your measure of the camera sensor’s
and use. The company also sells subject is a total solar eclipse or sensitivity setting is the ISO, a
the optional FMW-200 wedge
and polar alignment scope. a magnificent fireball. photographic standard adopted
ASTRONOMY: WILLIAM ZUBACK Turn off the lens autofocus: during the film days by the
Many camera lenses — in your International Organization for
smartphone, point-and-shoot Standardization. Most digital
camera, and most DSLR lenses cameras start at a low sensitiv-
— have a feature called autofo- ity of 100 ISO (or even 64 ISO)
cus. For taking general photos and range to 102,400 ISO on
of people and scenery, this is an high-end cameras. Although a
invaluable feature, but not so high ISO setting would seem
for astrophotography. If you ideal for low-light astronomical
leave the camera DSLR lens on imaging, there is an important
autofocus when taking astro- trade-off. As you increase the
nomical images, the lens will ISO, you increase electronic
perceive the sky as blank and noise. I prefer to image at a
continually search for the maximum of 400 ISO. But the
focus. Autofocus also drains noise-suppression software in
your battery. your camera may work won-
Turn off your flash: This ders. Experiment with higher
one might seem obvious, but
I’ve seen instances when a nov-
The constellations Andromeda and Triangulum (with their two large galaxies)
dominate this wide-field shot taken through a Canon 6D with a 47mm lens ice did not know to turn off the
mounted on a Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer tracking mount. JOHN CHUMACK flash, or an experienced imager
forgot to do so. This is one of
the reasons why I still use a
is not as important as it is when that you avoid inducing vibra- checklist when I prepare for a
you’re planning to use a CCD tions that can ruin your expo- night of astrophotography.
or DSLR through the telescope, sures. Canon refers to its Mirror lockup: This lets
yet this does depend on the intervalometer as a Timer/ you lock the mirror before you
length of the exposure. Remote Controller; Nikon calls begin imaging. In normal oper-
Other beneficial accessories it a Multi-Function Remote ation, when the mirror swings
include a reasonable-size mem- Cord; and Sony calls it a out of the way as you start an
ory card that allows you to Remote Commander. Be cer- exposure, the motion intro-
quickly download exposures, a tain you check your camera duces a vibration into the sys-
fully charged battery or an model compatibility if you pur- tem. This is not a problem for
external power supply, and an chase this accessory. normal, handheld, usually
intervalometer. I also carry With an intervalometer, you short exposures, but it can
spare memory cards and can set the length of each expo-
charged batteries with me. sure when you set your camera
The intervalometer is an to “bulb” on some DSLRs or Celestron’s Advanced VX
important accessory. It allows “manual” on others. With most Mount has a maximum weight
capacity of 30 pounds (13.6
you to program and control the intervalometers, you can set the
kilograms). Counterweights
length of your exposures with- time between activation and and a tripod are included.
out touching the camera, so when the first exposure is COURTESY OF CELESTRON
64 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
ISO settings, and see what Dew control: I bring along a
results you get. But be warned: plastic garbage bag to cover my
You’ll look at a high-ISO image equipment in case of sudden
and think, “Look at all of those inclement weather. Depending
stars!” Unfortunately, most of on where you observe, conden-
the points will be noise. sation might also be a problem.
Manual or bulb setting: A variety of accessories — for
Your DSLR features a pre- example, a dew heater — can
determined number of expo- help you combat this poten-
sure lengths, with the longest tially session-ending issue.
usually 30 seconds. With the As you complete your
manual setting, you set the checklist, keep in mind where
exposure length. On the bulb you will be doing your imag-
setting, the shutter stays open ing. You won’t take many good
while you depress the shutter images with a lot of light pollu-
button, and it closes when you tion around. Yet some imaging
release it. Most cameras also from a light-polluted area can
allow you to manually set your make for interesting lightscape
lens aperture from either of photography. I am fortunate to
these settings. live far enough from bright city
File size: This lets you lights that I can easily see the
choose the exposure’s final size. Milky Way without optics. Shooting comets is popular with astroimagers. Here, the photographer
I always recommend capturing However, you might have to attached a Canon XTi to a Zeiss 80mm refractor and mounted them
RAW exposures, the largest file travel some distance to find a on a tracking mount. This image, shot April 8, 2013, between 4:45 A.M.
possible. This will use more dark sky. and 4:55 A.M. MST, combines ten 1-minute exposures at ISO 800. CHRIS SCHUR
space on your memory card,
but it will also give you more Under the stars
data for better results when
processing your images.
Now that you’ve completed
your preparation, you’re ready
FULL VS. CROPPED SENSOR LENS
Noise reduction: Electronic for some imaging. But where EFFECTIVE FOCAL LENGTHS
noise can be an issue with digi- do you begin? If it’s your first
Full Sensor Canon APS-C 1.6X Nikon APS-C 1.5X
tal cameras. With this feature, session, start with a bright
you can reduce the amount of constellation. This will help 16mm 25.6mm 24mm
noise (which usually looks like you see what the sky conditions 24mm 36mm 38.4mm
faint stars), an important con- are. Take some initial test shots 50mm 80mm 75mm
sideration when many of your with different exposures and a 85mm 136mm 127.5mm
backgrounds will be black and couple of different lenses if you 135mm 216mm 202.5mm
your subjects will be faint have them. 105mm 168mm 157.5mm
points of light. The drawback is Say you’re going to take
400mm 640mm 600mm
a decrease in detail. Experiment some exposures, and it’s winter.
with this feature, and see what The constellation Orion is
works best for you. above the horizon, a great place
Lens aperture: This is spe- to start. First, check the focus
cific to the lens, though usually carefully. Do not trust the the lens and its aperture, ISO astronomical imaging a try,
controlled by the DSLR. infinity mark on the lens. Over setting, noise reduction factor, especially if you already have
Adjusting the aperture changes the years, I’ve gotten to know how well your mount is polar the equipment. You’ll find it
the amount of light that reaches where infinity is on my lenses, aligned, and more. I also exper- fun and relaxing to create
the camera’s sensor. The pur- yet I always check at the start of iment. Try a range of exposures images. You’ll also have lots of
pose of an adjustable lens aper- (and several times during) each from short to long, and pick the chances to experiment, some-
ture is to change the depth of imaging session. one that looks best to you. times with the placement of a
field. As the aperture decreases, You can approach exposure Wide-field astronomical pine tree in the foreground,
the f-number increases, bring- length a couple of different photography will let you image and at other times by trying a
ing more objects in the picture ways, depending on whether the Milky Way, meteors and range of lens focal lengths.
into focus. Because we are deal- you plan to process your meteor showers, and aurorae Hopefully, your sessions will
ing with astronomical objects images, a whole new factor in dancing in the starry sky. You lead to high-quality pictures
(with the exception of light- astrophotography. Or do you might even capture a satellite you’ll be proud to share.
scape imaging) this is not an want to keep it simple for now or the International Space
issue. Set the aperture at the and see what immediate results Station passing through one of Mike Reynolds is a contributing
lowest number so your lens will you can get? The maximum your images. editor of Astronomy and a
allow the maximum amount of length you can expose depends I cannot encourage you passionate celestial imager —
light through. on factors like sky conditions, enough to give DSLR-tracked especially of total solar eclipses.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 65
CAPTURE VIDEO
with this low-cost camera
Lots of accessories make the RunCam Night Eagle an easy match
for any telescope or camera lens. by Richard P. Wilds
12mm to 5mm C-mount C-mount to 11 ⁄4" adapter Knight Owl 0.5X Focal Optional 11 ⁄4"
Strain relief Camera C-mount adapter spacers (2) ( 1 ⁄ 2" barrel length) Reducer or equivalent extender ring
A
n inexpensive new video cam- Above and right: The individual parts and the
era has come onto the scene. assembled view for the RunCam Night Eagle 2
Astro Edition are shown in a configuration typical
RunCam Technology Co., for refractors with 2-inch or larger apertures, and
in partnership with the all Newtonian reflectors. RICHARD P. WILDS
International Occultation Timing
Association (IOTA), has adapted one of its
sensitive “quadcopter FPV” video cameras 8 to 250). This gives the user maximum
for use by amateur astronomers. control over video exposures.
The monochrome RunCam Night An added bonus for star party users is
Eagle 2 Astro Edition has a sensitivity of that RunCam includes a digital zoom so
0.00001 lux and supports the 640x480 others can get a close-up view of objects on
NTSC and 720x576 PAL formats. Using the video screen.
CMOS technology, its sensor can detect Of course, your field of view through
faint stellar targets even through small different optical configurations will vary.
portable telescopes. When using the 0.5 Knight Owl Focal
Reducer without the zoom, a 12-inch f/5
IOTA’s input Newtonian reflector produces a field 0.5°
IOTA has assisted RunCam to produce an wide, or equal to the width of the Full
incredible video camera at an affordable Moon. A 4.8-inch f/5 refractor gives a field
price. Enhancements made specifically twice as wide, a full 1°. And wider (even
to aid in the observation of occultations much wider) fields are possible through
include internally controlled integrations camera lenses of various focal lengths.
of two, four, and eight exposures (pro- Because of the camera’s sensitivity,
viding images of stars across the field of bright planets can saturate the sensor when
view well into the double-digit magnitude using the Knight Owl 0.5 Focal Reducer.
range); improved gain controls for faint However, I am confident that those inter-
objects (which now include settings from ested in planetary photography will find
1 to 9); and brightness controls for bright little difficulty in replacing the Knight Owl
objects (which now include settings from Focal Reducer with a quality Barlow lens to
66 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
This computer reduction shows the first scientific results from an original This montage of the Moon combines 11 exposures. The photographer set
RunCam Night Eagle. It plots multiple results of the light curve of the the gain to 1 and the brightness to 8. This test image shows how well the
momentary disappearance of stars behind asteroid 206 Hersilia. DAVID DUNHAM camera can handle saturation issues. TONY GEORGE/IOTA
double or triple the system’s focal length, of occultation recording. You’ll find it at
making the planets much more viewable. PRODUCT INFORMATION www.asteroidoccultation.com/observations.
Most useful to the beginner will probably
Required accessories RunCam Night Eagle 2 be the IOTA Video Capture program,
RunCam produces and sells the Night Astro Edition which allows a Windows computer to cap-
Eagle 2 on its own. The Night Eagle 2 Astro Image sensor: 11⁄8" CMOS
ture the video stream and convert it to an
Edition, which contains the aforementioned Horizontal resolution: 800 TVL
AVI file for later analysis. Further down on
enhancements, is available only through Screen format: 4:3
the webpage, you’ll find the link to a dedi-
IOTA. That organization offers three differ- Signal system: NTSC/PAL switchable
cated YouTube channel that contains
ent kits. For $79 plus shipping, you’ll receive Signal-to-noise ratio: 50 dB
examples of RunCam Night Eagle 2 Astro
just the camera with a wide-angle lens. Electronic shutter speed: Auto
Edition videos and images.
For $149 plus shipping, you get the cam- Maximum gain: 1–9
era, plus all accessories (M12 to C adapter, Minimum illumination: 0.00001 lux
Precision timing
5mm spacer rings, camera C-mount to 1¼" Power: DC 5 to 36 volts
In occultation work, accurate timing of
adapter) except the 0.5x focal reducer. IOTA Work current: 90mA at 12 volts, 200mA
the disappearance and reappearance of a
includes the Knight Owl 0.5 Focal Reducer at 5 volts
star is extremely important. To help you
and everything else for $179 plus shipping. Housing: Aluminum alloy
out, IOTA has developed the IOTA-VTI
In the picture to the left, you can see a Weight: 0.56 ounce (16 grams)
v3 video time inserter, which you’ll find at
black bracket attached to the camera. Price: $79 to $179 plus shipping
http://videotimers.com/home.html.
While the company designed this bracket URL: occultations.org/test-night-eagle-
This small, battery-powered device con-
for mounting the camera in quadcopters ordering-page
tains a GPS antenna and adds a time stamp
(an environment where there would be lit- (accurate to milliseconds) to the bottom of
tle or no stray light), users found that the every frame of your occultation video. It
mounting holes let in light that can also allows you to record the exact location
impinge on the sensor. So, I recommend ly onto a small portable video camera at which you made the observation.
attaching this bracket both to seal out stray (like the Canon ZR or Elura series, which Recording stellar occultations allows
light and to relieve strain on the delicate both use DV tape and little compression), amateur astronomers to make real scien-
power and video cables. a full-size VCR recorder, or a computer tific contributions to the study of the solar
Even with the bracket holes sealed, hard drive. For computer capture, a USB system, double stars, and more. The combi-
though, some light can get in around the 3.0 port and a frame grabber (like the nation of the RunCam Night Eagle 2 Astro
edges of the camera case. For advice for StarTech SVID2USB23) are required. Camera and the IOTA-VTI v3 offers an
dealing with this issue, visit IOTA’s web- IOTA does not recommend using small inexpensive way to get into this exciting
site: http://occultations.org/documents/ portable digital video recorders because branch of citizen science.
AstroMetalTapeLightLeakSolution.pdf. they compress the images to a point where
their scientific value is degraded. Richard P. Wilds is a member of the American
Recording video You can download for free all the soft- Astronomical Society’s Historical Astronomy
You can record the camera’s output direct- ware offered by IOTA members in support Division and IOTA.
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 67
NEW
PRODUCTS Attention, manufacturers: To submit a product
for this page, email mbakich@astronomy.com.
$80 .00
Build Your Own
MARKETPLACE
68 A S T R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
MARKETPLACE
MEADE SCT UPGRADES
INDEX of
The best $299 Improve tracking,
focus, light thru-put,
clutch, mounting
ADVERTISERS
eyepiece you’ll and balancing. ADM Accessories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Armstrong Metalcrafts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
No computer required. Battery- all size binoculars. Astro Haven . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
powered 7” color monitor included. View standing, sitting
or reclining. $124.95 Astro-Physics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Celestron. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
M16 Eagle Nebula
8” Celestron Evolution Dream Telescopes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Metropolitan Skies
Farpoint Astronomical Research . . . . . . . . 9
REVOLUTION IMAGER Iceland 2018 -
RevolutionImager.com Great North, Westfjords & Aurora . . . . 71
iOptron . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
High Point Scientiic
Agena AstroProducts Jewelry Designs for Men. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Oceanside Photo & Telescope
Woodland Hills Telescope JMI Telescopes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Skies Unlimited
NexDome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Orange County Telescope
Northeast Astornomy Forum. . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Oberwerk Corporation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Peterson Engineering. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Precise Parts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Rainbow Symphony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Revolution Imager. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Scope Buggy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
ScopeStuff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 69
OBSERVINGBASICS
BY GLENN CHAPLE
Apparent field of view (AFOV)
Large Small
I know where,
Low
Image magnification
but when?
High
N
oting the time and time on my calendar
that a predicted because Jupiter will be a readily
astronomical event seen telescopic sight for months
will occur can be to come, but other Jupiter-
problematic. If I related events require precise
told you that a comet is pre- times, too. For instance, if the
dicted to impact Jupiter at 9:00 skies are clear on the evening of Last January, I described object is at the bottom of the
P.M. on May 1, you’d rightly ask, the 8th, I may want to take out three simple ways to determine FOV, and I note the altitude
“9:00 P.M. where?” In a world my telescope and try for the the true field of view (TFOV) value. Then I move the tele-
ajumble with some two dozen Great Red Spot (GRS). Will it be of any eyepiece/telescope com- scope so the object is at the top
time zones, we need a standard visible then? bination. Mike Bertin, of of the FOV, and I write down
way to express the time of astro- To find out, I’ll need to know Orange County Astronomers the new altitude value. The
nomical events. the time when the GRS will be in California, offers another difference gives me the true
To this end, astronomers use near the center of the side of method for those of you who field of view in altitude. All of
Universal Time, abbreviated UT. Jupiter’s disk that faces us. I own a go-to scope that displays this takes less than 5 minutes.”
To avoid the confusion between turn to Project Pluto (specifi- altitude and azimuth. The Al Nagler, a pioneer in the
A.M. and P.M. hours, UT utilizes cally, www.projectpluto.com/ beauty of this method is that it production of ultra-wide-field
a 24-hour “military time” clock, jeve_grs.htm), which supplies works during daylight by using eyepieces, notes that the appar-
and it is based on the time at the transit times for the GRS. A a distant terrestrial target, like ent field of view divided by
0° longitude meridian in transit is predicted at 1h17m the top of a light tower. magnification does not give an
Greenwich, England. accurate TFOV because of eye-
For any place on Earth out- piece focal length and distor-
side this zone, you have to make In a world ajumble with some two dozen tion variations and tolerances.
a correction. Here’s how it time zones, we need a standard way to express He notes, “The actual
works for me. I live in the the time of astronomical events. calculated true field of ANY
Eastern time zone. During eyepiece is its field stop diam-
Eastern Daylight Time (EDT), eter divided by the telescope
which runs from the second UT on May 9, which corre- He writes, “I level the scope focal length, times 57.3°.”
Sunday in March through the sponds to 9:17 P.M. EDT on May — eyeballing it is OK, but I usu- Field stop data for all Tele Vue
first Sunday in November, my 8. This is an hour after sunset, ally use a small level that I have eyepieces are published on the
clock is four hours behind so Jupiter should be comfort- mounted on top of the optical company’s website. If you’re
Universal Time. The rest of the ably positioned above the east- tube. Next, I move the telescope not sure of the field stop
year when clocks “fall back” to ern horizon. in azimuth so the object is at diameter for a different brand
Eastern Standard Time (EST), I What about your time zone one edge of the field of view, and eyepiece, the methods I men-
subtract five hours from UT. and the correction you need to I write down the azimuth value. tioned in the January column
Unfortunately, there will be make to convert to UT? Then I move the telescope so the will suffice.
no comet/Jupiter collision, but Astronomy simplifies the pro- object is at the other edge of the Do you have questions,
the big planet arrives at opposi- cess by posting times in Eastern field of view. I write down the comments, or suggestions of
tion this month. According to Standard (or Daylight) Time. new azimuth value, and by tak- your own? Email me at
the 2018 Observer’s Handbook You can also refer to a chart and ing the difference, I have the gchaple@hotmail.com. Next
— an annual publication put article on EarthSky (earthsky. TFOV in azimuth.” month: The missing Messier
out by the Royal Astronomical org/astronomy-essentials/ Bertin then double-checks object. Clear skies!
Society of Canada — the pre- universal-time). The article his result by repeating the pro-
cise time of opposition is May 9 refers to Universal Coordinated cess in altitude. “I once again Glenn Chaple has been an
at 1h00m UT. That translates to Time (UTC), which, for all prac- center on my reference object avid observer since a friend
May 8 at 9:00 P.M. EST. tical purposes, is identical to with the scope still level. I move showed him Saturn through a
small backyard scope in 1963.
I don’t plan to mark that date Universal Time. the telescope so the reference
70 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Journey to Iceland for an unforgettable view
of the aurora borealis!
Everyone should experience the astonishing beauty of the aurora borealis once in
their lives — and one of the best places on Earth to take in the spectacle is under
Iceland’s northern skies.
This unique, new Iceland itinerary features:
• 8 nights of viewing just steps away from your comfortable countryside accommodations.
• The seldom-visited Great North region and the stunning Westfjords peninsula.
• Whale watching, fascinating local museums, a superb local guide, and much more.
P32345
Astronomy.com/magazine/trips-tours/2019-chile-northbound
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 71
READER
GALLERY
1. RAIN OF STONES
This photographer endured a
temperature of –18 degrees Fahrenheit
(–28 degrees Celsius) on December 14,
2017, near Daqing, China, during the
annual Geminid meteor shower. His
final image combines 48 exposures,
each one recording a single Geminid.
• Jeff Dai
2. THREE-IN-ONE SHOT
This wide-angle shot captures the
California Nebula (NGC 1499) in
the constellation Perseus at left,
the Pleiades star cluster (M45) in
Taurus at right, and a fortunate
astrophotographer in the middle.
• Amirreza Kamkar
72 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
3. CLUSTER STRUCK
The constellation Cassiopeia contains
many open clusters, bright and faint.
Stock 6 is the one at the center of this
image. It’s one of 24 open clusters
recorded by German astronomer
Jürgen Stock in the 1950s. NGC 688 is
the brighter open cluster below center,
and Berkeley 63 is the tight open
cluster to its right. • Dan Crowson
3 5. BLUE GHOST
Imagers seldom capture reflection
nebula IC 2169 as a separate object
because it lies in the general region
of the much more photogenic Cone
Nebula (NGC 2264) in the constellation
Monoceros. This intensely blue cloud
scatters light from nearby stars and
reflects it in our direction.
• Bruce Waddington
W W W.ASTR ONOMY.COM 73
BREAK
THROUGH
In the hub
with Hubble
Perched above Earth’s
turbulent atmosphere, the
Hubble Space Telescope
can resolve fine details
in crowded fields. This
view of the Milky Way’s
central bulge could be
Exhibit A. During the past
nine years, scientists have
used Hubble’s unique
capabilities to track
about 10,000 Sun-like
stars in this congested
region. They found that
the younger stars —
those richer in elements
heavier than hydrogen
and helium — orbit the
galaxy’s center faster than
their older cousins. The
researchers suggest that
these youthful interlopers
could be relics of smaller
galaxies that the Milky
Way cannibalized.
NASA/ESA/T. BROWN (STS CI)
74 A ST R O N O M Y • MAY 2018
Capture the red planet in stunning high
resolution during opposition.
Mars will light up the night sky during its epic opposition
this summer. Peaking on July 27, this opposition
promises to be the best and brightest since 2003.
There’s no better time to gear up with a high resolution
Celestron imaging system.
V
E
LA
C HA
PY
MAE
LEON
XI
3 VO
NG372 PA
S
C AU S T R A L E
T R IA NG U LUM
CR _ NG
AN
U C4
X 755
TL
S
IA
N LI
IU
` a
RO RA
97
A
O
51 ` _ 3
C6
O T
SC
NG 39
S
CIRCINUS NG
AU
LE
IUS
C
C
T
MA
CE
RA
A NOR
N
HYD
NG
TA
C5
U
RA
RU
NG231
28 1
US
C
M7
S
PI
S
PU
Saturn
C ORV U S
LU
CO
M83
M8
M6
S E X TA N S
M22
W
S
Antares
C R AT E R
_
M4
M20
M17
SCU
M10
Spic
M16
4
Ju
_
pit
er
(ecliptic) LIBRA
V
n
Path of the Su
IR
S
G
U
H
O
M5 C
IU
Ven
RP
PH
O
SE
u
M6
s
C
M6
6
5
De
NS
SERPE
LE
ne
T
CAPU
`
O
Arc
ola
tur
us
M6
4 _
C NG
P
B OM
ER A
EN
IC
ES C O RO NA
MAGNITUDES BOÖTE
S BOREALIS
Sirius Open cluster M13
0.0 Globular cluster CA
1.0 VE NES ES
Diffuse nebula NA CUL
2.0 TI
C HER
3.0 I M51
Planetary nebula
4.0
5.0 Galaxy
N
HOW TO USE THIS MAP: This map portrays
the sky as seen near 30° south latitude.
Located inside the border are the four
JULY 2018
directions: north, south, east, and
west. To find stars, hold the map Calendar of events
overhead and orient it so a
direction label matches the 1 The Moon passes 5° north of 16 The Moon passes 1.6° north of
S
U direction you’re facing. Mars, 2h UT Venus, 4h UT
The stars above the
R
G
map’s horizon now 4 The Moon passes 3° south of 19 First Quarter Moon occurs at
match what’s Neptune, 0h UT 19h52m UT
in the sky.
6 Last Quarter Moon occurs at 20 Asteroid Thisbe is at opposition,
7h51m UT 9h UT
U
D
UM
IN
27 Mars is at opposition, 5h UT
NU
Mars
IC
ITT
8h25m UT Neptune, 6h UT
S
PH
8h UT
ir
_
Alta
A
P
DEL
CA
A
TT
GI
SA
STAR COLORS:
LA
depend on surface
LP
temperature. Hot
U
V
MyScie n ce S h o p.co m
P29014