SUNSET: 
Sky & Telescope March 2012
Sky & Telescope's March 2012 issue is now available to digital subscribers.
Farewell to Rossi's Explorer
Last week, NASA engineers reluctantly shut down the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer, a largely unheralded orbiting outpost that relayed a steady stream of observations for 16 years.
A Rare Flyby of Asteroid Eros
The grandaddy of near-Earth asteroids brightens to magnitude 8.6 as it flies by Earth in late January and early February.
Alien Mars Announced
Aided by an amateur astronomer, Kepler scientists have detected an exoplanet system containing three sub-Earth-sized planets, the smallest of which is about the size of Mars.
Black Hole Shoots Bullets
Observations of a black hole that spat out twin blobs of superhot material may help astronomers understand how the mysterious beasts create powerful jets that shoot out from their poles. The blobs appeared just as the system went quiet in X-rays.
New Maps of Dark Matter
An intensive study of dark matter’s distribution in the universe has verified predictions of where the invisible stuff that makes up the majority of cosmic matter resides.
New Supernova in Leo
Along with the usual galaxies, dark matter, and exoplanets, the American Astronomical Society's January meeting is abuzz with the discovery of a supernova by a team of amateurs. Astronomers are rushing to observe the explosion before it fades.
Wanted: Meteorites from Mercury
Dynamical oddsmakers insist that several samples of the innermost planet, blasted into space from fresh craters such as Mena, should be lying somewhere on Earth. So where are they?
Heartbeat Suggests Smallest Black Hole
Strange, regular pulses from a black hole-star binary system suggest that the smallest black hole yet discovered lies behind the signals. Similarities between it and another known mystery object may mean the black holes are hiccuping as they eat.
Eclipses in 2013
This year features two "central" eclipses of the Sun: an annular in May (visible from Australia and the South Pacific) and a "hybrid" (annular/total) in November that you'll have to travel to Africa to see.
GRAIL's Twins Safely Reach the Moon
Braking rockets fired on cue yesterday and today, placing twin spacecraft in lunar orbit. In the coming months, they will exploit the Moon's own gravity to revolutionize what we know about the lunar interior.
Tour January's Sky! | December 30th, 2011
With every New Year, millions of us resolve to do something, anything, different or better in the coming year. So let's resolve to get outside and enjoy the night sky more. Venus, Jupiter, and a host of winter stars await you.
Pseudo-moons Orbit Earth
Temporary satellites are frequently caught from Earth's neighborhood and may make regular passes at being moonlets. But the objects only stick around long enough to orbit a few times before the Moon kicks them back out into the cold.
A Fine Year for the Icy Quads
One of the best — but briefest — annual meteor showers should be active in the hours before dawn on the morning of Wednesday, January 4th.
A Breathtaking View of Titan
Here's a "holiday treat" featuring Saturn's largest moon and some dramatic lighting geometry, courtesy of NASA's Cassini orbiter and its imaging team.
Meteor Showers in 2012
Sky & Telescope predicts that 2012's best meteor shower should be the Quadrantids in January, but this will also be a good year for the Perseids in August and the Geminids in December.
Kepler Finds Two "Deep-Fried" Planets
The incredibly successful Kepler spacecraft is discovering alien solar systems at a dizzying pace. Now it's found a system in which two planets have apparently survived a journey inside their host star, during its swollen red-giant phase.
Comet Lovejoy Keeps on Giving
Its place in astronomical folklore already secure, having skirted very near the Sun and survived last week. But resilient Comet Lovejoy (C/2011 W3) is still strutting its stuff — with twin tails nearly 20° long — in predawn skies for observers in the Southern Hemisphere. It's even drawing a crowd aboard the International Space Station!
NASA Taps a Rocket Scientist
With probes on the way to the Moon, Mars, and Pluto — and a multibillion-dollar space telescope gobbling up shrinking funds — astronomer and former astronaut John Grunsfeld agrees to take the helm of the space agency's science division.
Kepler Team Confirms Two Hot Earths
Of the Kepler mission's 207 Earth-size candidate planets, two have just been officially confirmed as real.
