SUNSET: 
Wrong-way Planets Confound Theorists
Planet-formation theory has been turned on its head by the discovery of planets that travel around their stars in retrograde orbits.
Saturated With Springtime Star Parties?
April 2010 is Global Astronomy Month. This is also International Dark-Sky Week, to be followed later this month by Astronomy Day. Lots of events come and go — but who's participating in them?
One Supernova, Many Camera Angles
"Light echoes" off dust clouds far from an old supernova are still providing replays of the explosion — as seen from different directions. They show that the explosion was asymmetric.
Spotlight on Messier 66
The Hubble Heritage Project has released a stunning new portrait of an oddly-shaped spiral galaxy that's currently riding high in the evening sky.
Come to NEAF April 17-18
Make plans to attend the largest annual astronomy trade show in America: the Northeast Astronomy Forum & Telescope Show.
Project Ozma: The First SETI
It's been 50 years since a young radio astronomer named Frank Drake audaciously attempted, for the first time, to eavesdrop on radio transmissions from alien civilizations.
Mystery Eclipse Caught in the Act
After struggling for decades to understand why Epsilon Aurigae's partial eclipses last so long, astronomers are finally watching the event as it happens.
Gum 19: A Two-Faced Nebula
A provocative new telescopic view reveals stars forming in a little-known southern-sky nebula.
Asteroid To Hide Naked-Eye Star
For anyone in a 25-mile-wide path right across Los Angeles, a bright star in Ophiuchus will wink off for several seconds in the predawn hours of April 6, 2010.
Uranus and Neptune in 2010
Uranus and Neptune are easy to find with the aid of the charts in this article.
Hayabusa Hits the Homestretch
Against all odds, a crippled Japanese spacecraft has managed to limp back home after its asteroid encounter 4½ years ago. It's now less than three months from a triumphal return to Earth.
A Blast from the Past
An exquisite new image from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter shows the crater gouged out when a Saturn IV-B rocket slammed into Oceanus Procellarum 40 years ago..
New Comet Machholz
California's comet-hunting veteran Don Machholz bagged his 11th discovery on March 23 and 26, 2010. It's a faint diffuse comet, low in the morning sky.
Mercury Takes the Spotlight
The normally elusive innermost planet has its best apparition of the year — with dazzling Venus to point the way!!
Hubble Confirms Dark Energy's Clout
Thanks to a huge photographic survey undertaken by the Hubble Space Telescope, cosmologists have used the distorted shapes of primordial galaxies to "weigh" the distribution of unseen matter in the early universe and confirm the existence of the mysterious "dark energy."
Catch a Star's Unprecedented Eruption
At first observers thought they'd discovered a nova — a "new star" erupting from obscurity. But astronomers quickly realized that it was a well-known, formerly well-behaved variable star suddenly gone bonkers.
An Amateur's Mercury Odyssey
In 1998 a trio of amateur astronomers slapped a video camera on Mount Wilson's 60-inch reflector and aimed it at Mercury. A decade later, NASA's Messenger spacecraft rediscovered many of the surface features they found.
The Sun is Back!
After a couple of relatively dormant years, the Sun is showing signs of major activity again.
Future Shock From Gliese 710
Is our solar system's Oort Cloud in danger of being stirred up by a passing star? A fresh analysis of Hipparcos observations argue that the answer is most likely "yes" — but not for another 1.4 million years.
Phenomenal Phobos
On March 7th, the European orbiter Mars Express had a close encounter with a little moon about which scientists have big questions.
