LATEST NEWS
New Pluto Panorama Shows Jumbled Peaks
A striking, just-released image from NASA’s New Horizons mission shows a crescent Pluto panorama. Dramatic backlighting accentuates the dwarf planet’s surprisingly rugged mountains.
Does the Nearest Quasar Host a Black Hole Binary?
Astronomers are investigating a new technique for finding close pairs of supermassive black holes — they might have found one in the nearest quasar.
New Evidence for Black Hole Binary
And in other black hole binary news, astronomers have found definitive evidence that the quasar PG 1302-102 hosts a supermassive black hole pair, its members less than a tenth of a light-year apart.
View Last Sunday’s Eclipse — From Space
Some of the best views of Sunday’s partial solar eclipse didn’t come from Earth.
A New Way to Heat the Sun’s Corona
Astronomers have detected waves working together in the solar atmosphere, potentially heating the gas through turbulence.
OBSERVING HIGHLIGHTS
This Week’s Sky at a Glance, September 18 – 26
Dawn features Mars gleaming near Regulus, and you might just glimpse Jupiter further down. And fall officially arrives on September 23rd.
Get Ready for the Upcoming Lunar Eclipse
On the night of September 27–28, the full Moon will plunge completely through Earth’s shadow for the last time until January 2018.
Watch Andromeda Blossom in Bincoulars
How much can you see of the Andromeda Galaxy system with just a pair of binoculars? Turns out a lot!
Tour September’s Sky: A Lunar Eclipse!
This month’s stargazing features pretty planetary treats in the eastern sky before dawn — and the last total lunar eclipse visible until 2018.
COMMUNITY
Astronomy Day + International Observe the Moon Night = Weekend of Fun
This year Fall Astronomy Day and International Observe the Moon Night share a square on the calendar. Find out how you can take part!
Call for Solar Observers (Sept. 19–27)!
Does your version of stargazing involve pointing your telescope at the Sun? With the right equipment, you can aid a project that aims to catch a solar flare in the act of erupting between September 19 and 27.
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