June 2008

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The world's best-selling astronomy magazine offers you the most exciting, visually stunning, and timely coverage of the heavens above. Each monthly issue includes expert science reporting, vivid color photography, complete sky coverage, spot-on observing tips, informative telescope reviews, and much more! All this in an easy-to-understand, user-friendly style that's perfect for astronomers at any level.

Features

Our galaxy's collision with Andromeda

By Abraham Loeb, T. J. Cox

The Milky Way is on a collision course with its neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy. What will the night sky look like after the crash?

pg. 30

Web extra: The birth of Milkomeda

Watch for the equivalent of 5 billion years as the merger of the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy results in the birth of a single elliptical galaxy: Milkomeda.

Do cosmic flashes reveal secrets of the infant universe?

By Steve Nadis

Gamma-ray bursts can outshine 100 million galaxies. Astronomers now think these energetic events offer a window into the distant past.

pg. 34

Web extra: What's behind a gamma-ray burst?

Astronomers call gamma-ray bursts the biggest bangs since the Big Bang. NASA animator Dana Berry shows you how one works.

How we've junked up outer space

By Richard Talcott

Derelict spacecraft, stray nuts and bolts, and millions of even tinier fragments litter the space around Earth.

pg. 40

Web extra: A growing problem

By Richard Talcott