SUNSET: 
Astro Image in the News:
Rosetta Buzzes Earth
Many sky photographers caught the little Rosetta probe as it whizzed by Earth on its way to landing on a comet in 2014.
Watch a Spacecraft Buzzing Earth
European observers can catch the interplanetary Rosetta craft zipping by at 8th or 9th magnitude on March 4th.
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.
Delta Scorpii Still Showing Off
For the fourth summer in a row, the head of the bright constellation Scorpius looks a little unusual.
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.
A Daytime Occultation of Jupiter
Here's a blue-sky project if ever there was one. The thin waning crescent Moon will occult the second-brightest planet as seen from much of North America on Tuesday, November 9th.
The Closest Whiz-by of Toutatis
An asteroid several kilometers wide will brighten to 9th magnitude and be visible in small telescopes when it passes Earth in late September.
Wild, Weird Titan Reveals More Secrets
The most Earthlike world in the solar system is also the strangest ever encountered.
Spot Vesta (and Uranus)
Two solar-system bodies just below naked-eye brightness can be found with binoculars in eastern Aquarius on October and November evenings: the minor planet 4 Vesta and Uranus.
Astro Image in the News:
Something Warm in a Very Dark Place
The Spitzer Space Telescope finds an infrared glow hidden in a dark cloud where nothing ought to be.
Astro Image in the News:
Hubble Snaps a Shadow-Spotted Jupiter
Hubble made an infrared movie of Jupiter last March while three of the planet's moons were casting their shadows on its face.
October's Ideal Lunar Eclipse
The total lunar eclipse on October 27th is beautifully timed and placed for skywatchers in the Americas. Don't miss it: it's the last one until 2007.
Earth's Twisty Spacewarp
Einstein wins again. Evidence from superstable satellites indicates that Earth's rotation twists the space around us — ever so slightly.
The Dim Core of a Stripped Star
A dim, Jupiter-size object orbiting a white dwarf seems to be the last remaining bit of an eroded star's core.Art by Jon Lomberg / Gemini Observatory. Deep in Eridanus is a 17th-magnitude white dwarf that occasionally brightens to magnitude 14.5, as tracked by amateurs in the American Association of Variable…
Catch the End of the Perseids
It's not too late to catch the tapering-down of the Perseid meteor shower during the nights after its peak.
Sedna's Origin Solved?
An artist's conception of the large object, informally named Sedna, discovered last year at more than twice Pluto's distance from the Sun.Courtesy NASA / JPL / Caltech / R. Hurt. Last year astronomers discovered what’s probably the biggest body found in the solar system since Pluto in 1930, and they…
Delta Scorpii Brighter Than Ever
A naked-eye star in the dawn continues its unexpected — and very obvious — flareup.
A Close Visitor Tumbles By
The little asteroid 1998 WT24, about 1 kilometer wide, was radar-imaged by NASA's Goldstone antenna last week when it flew within five Moon-distances of Earth. Click on image for animated movie of the asteroid's rotation.Courtesy Steve Ostro, Lance Benner, Jon Giorgini (JPL), Jean-Luc Margot (Caltech), and Mike Nolan (Arecibo Observatory).…
First Planet of a Giant Star
An artist's concept of a Jupiter-like planet eclipsing the giant star Iota Draconis, which is 13 times larger than the Sun.Courtesy JPL/NASA. About 80 planets are known to orbit main-sequence stars that are more or less like the Sun — ranging from spectral type F (a little hotter and larger…
Mars's Active Snow and Ice
These eroded pits in Mars's south polar cap widened noticeably from October 1999 (left) to August 2001 (right). Their walls, several meters high, retreated by about 3 meters during one Martian year. Such rapid change indicates that the material here is frozen carbon dioxide — dry ice — rather than…
