News | Page 18 of 711 | Astronomy.com

MESSENGER spacecraft at Mercury

Robotic Spaceflight, Solar System

How the MESSENGER mission transformed our understanding of Mercury

August 14, 2024, 5 AM, looking east

Observing, Planets, Upcoming Events

How to see tomorrow’s conjunction of Mars and Jupiter

Saturn’s moon Mimas, floating above the planet’s rings, might conceal a liquid ocean beneath its surface.

Saturn’s moon Mimas may hide a surprisingly young ocean

The constellation Orion the Hunter hosts two of the 10 brightest stars in the sky, Betelgeuse and Rigel. At magnitude 0.5 and 0.2, respectively, Betelgeuse (orange star at upper left) and Rigel (blue-white star at lower right) stand in stark contrast to many of the surrounding stars.

Why do astronomers measure stars in magnitudes?

Adolf Schaller

Legendary space artist Adolf Schaller dies at 68

NGC 2623 is a great example of what a pair of interacting galaxies looks like, 260 million light-years distant. Galaxies need mergers or other cosmic events to perturb different regions and trigger star formation and galaxy evolution.

Survivors from the Milky Way’s birth

Perseid meteors

Observing, Upcoming Events

How to watch the Perseids, 2024’s best meteor shower

The Andromeda Galaxy (M31) is the nearest major galaxy, and spans a width equivalent to more than six Full Moons.

Deep-Sky Objects

How to grasp the scale of the cosmos from your backyard

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s secondary mirror is now in place

Map of Io's hot spots

Science, Solar System

First-of-its-kind map of Io’s volcanoes hints at subsurface magma ocean

How legendary dark-sky advocate David Crawford sparked the fight against light pollution

Telescopes and Equipment

Find cool products this hot month