SUNSET: 
The Brightest Blast
This illustration, which is based on the latest scientific thinking, represents how a magnetar might appear if we could view it up close with X-ray vision. But this is not something anyone would want to do. Magnetars are neutron stars with magnetic fields so powerful that they could kill a…
Astro News Briefs: January 10–16
Spacecraft Sets Out to Strike a Comet January 12, 2005 | NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 1:47 p.m. Eastern time today and began its six-month journey to strike a comet. If all goes as planned, Deep Impact will reach 9P/Tempel 1 in July and release…
Orion Telescopes Sold to Imaginova
The headquarters of Orion Telescopes & Binoculars in Watsonville, California.Sky & Telescope photograph by J. Kelly Beatty. In a move that caught the astronomical community by surprise, today Imaginova Corp. announced its purchase of Orion Telescopes & Binoculars. Based in Watsonville, California, Orion is a major manufacturer and distributor of…
Asteroid 2004 MN4: A Really Near Miss!
Radar results are in: this once-scary asteroid will become a naked-eye object when it skims by Earth in 2029.
Fly Me to the Moons
NASA's Cassini orbiter continues to take stunning images of Saturn's moons.
A Flurry of Exoplanet Discoveries
This artist's concept depicts a disk of gas and dust around a young brown dwarf. Low-mass disks like this should be capable of forming planetary systems with perhaps one gas giant and several Earth-size bodies.Courtesy NASA / JPL / Caltech. Discoveries of extrasolar planets are coming so fast and furious…
Hubble Takes a Hit
The rumors that circulated in late January were true: The Bush Administration's proposed budget for fiscal year 2006 includes no money to service the Hubble Space Telescope.
Astro Image in the News:
The Real Rhea
Courtesy NASA / JPL / Space Science Institute. Cassini's narrow-angle camera acquired this image of Saturn's moon Rhea on January 16th. With a diameter of 1,528 kilometers (949 miles), Rhea edges out Iapetus for being Saturn's second largest satellite, though it is less than half the size of Earth's Moon.…
SOHO Comet Catcher
The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory satellite is on the verge of spotting comet number 1,000.
Perseids Peak as Predicted
Preliminary analysis of the 2004 Perseid meteor shower confirms the forecast of an unusually brief and intense peak of meteor activity over Europe and Asia.
2004: An Excellent Year for the Perseids
The Perseid meteor shower, due to peak on the morning of August 12th, should put on a nice show — and may display a surprising new component.
The 2003 Perseids in Moonlight
This year the light from the full Moon will wash out the faint meteors belonging to this favorite shower.
A Great Year for the Perseids
The most dependable of all meteor showers reaches the peak of its display in a moonless sky.
AAVSO Names New Director
The American Association of Variable Star Observers announced that Arne A. Henden will be the new director.
A Late-Night Jupiter Occultation
The waning Moon covers bright Jupiter before dawn on December 7th for observers in the eastern two-thirds of the US and Canada.
Celestial Highlights for 2004
Eclipses, occultations, comets, and a transit of Venus — it’s going to be an exciting year for observers.
Newfound Star Sparks Brown-Dwarf Debate
Can one binary star cast doubt on myriad brown dwarfs?
Catch Comet Machholz at Its Best
For observers in the northern hemisphere, all the circumstances are at their best in the first half of January for viewing this fine little comet.
Wild, Weird Titan Reveals More Secrets
The most Earthlike world in the solar system is also the strangest ever encountered.
Senator Vows to Fight for Hubble
Amid new rumors that NASA plans to abandon the Hubble Space Telescope), Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland) has vowed to continue fighting to keep the observatory operating.
