Space is always changing. New things are discovered frequently, and the latest discovery was made inside our own solar system. Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system, now has a staggering 79 moons in its orbit. Compare this to Earth’s lonely, singular moon and this shows you just how monstrous the gas giant planet is in size.
This article has been inspired by the many questions we get asked here at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium. We love being asked questions but we thought it would be funny to have a look at the questions you really should never ask an Astronomer. We hope this gives you a bit of a laugh!
This July will be a very astronomically eventful month – full of eclipses, bright planets, meteor showers and bright satellite passes. If the weather permits, we will have the opportunity to witness a lot of interesting events in the night sky.
Where do meteorites come from? This question has been occupying the scientific community ever since it was realised that these “rocks from the sky” are, in fact, pieces of other worlds arriving on our planet from deep space. New research done by scientists at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium in Read more…
This summer experience our world and beyond as you sit back and relax in the Planetarium’s 360-degree dome theatre. With six different shows running Monday-Saturday throughout July and August there is so much to choose from, including a brand new film.
Approximately every other star in the Milky Way galaxy is in a ‘binary’ system. These binaries are made up of two stars orbiting around a common centre of gravity. The time taken for the stars in the binary to make one revolution is called the ‘orbital period’. Binaries have a wide range of orbital period. The closest stellar system to the Sun is alpha Centauri which has two stars not unlike our Sun orbiting around one another every 80 years. A third member of the system, Proxima Centauri, which is much smaller red dwarf star, orbits around these two stars once every 10,000 years.
Article by Michael Burton, Director of the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover recently discovered organic molecules in 3 billion year old Martian rocks. This material may have been delivered by meteorites and comets to the young planet. Deep space is full of organic matter. Organic matter contains Read more…
Article by Jorick Vink , Astronomer at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium When you are fortunate enough to have a clear view of the night sky, and you start wondering about the properties of all these sources of light, you might be amazed to find out all these stars have Read more…
Article by: Tom Watts In collaboration with universities in England, Australia and Thailand, the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium is part of a team operating and commissioning the new Gravitational wave Optical Transient Observatory (GOTO) at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on the island of La Palma. GOTO, once operational, Read more…
Article by: Holly Preece, PhD student at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium NASA’s Hubble space telescope was launched on 24th April 1990. It was the first optical space telescope to be launched into orbit and has been one of the most productive scientific instruments ever built. It orbits the Earth Read more…
Article by: Yanina Metodieva, PhD student at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium March has certainly been an eventful month, and now we’re in to April. The Spring has definitely sprung and we’re enjoying the stretch in the evenings, even if it makes stargazing a little trickier. Sure we have to Read more…
The Observatory and Planetarium has welcomed school students to visit for work experience. A previous Astronote described our work with the Faulkes Telescope Project. Below is an account written by three of our work experience students in 2018 March, based on the work done at Armagh Observatory and Planetarium by them and three other students.
Article by Aaron Golden, Visiting Astronomer at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium Stephen Bourke works at the Department of Space, Earth and Environment, Onsala Space Observatory in Sweden, and Aaron Golden at the School of Maths in NUI Galway, and is a visiting astronomer at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium. Read more…
No one undertakes research in physics with the intention of winning a prize. It is the joy of discovering something no one knew before. – Professor Stephen Hawking Today, 14th March 2018, marks a very sad day in the world of physics and the world in general. One of Read more…
Article written by: Conor Byrne As an astrophysicist with a keen interest in space from a young age, the opportunity to witness a rare astronomical phenomenon is naturally quite high on the ‘bucket list’. So when I was attending a research workshop in the United States in August 2017, just Read more…
Article written by: Professor Michael Burton, Director of Armagh Observatory and Planetarium The city of Armagh lays claim to a remarkable history that belies its small size. A history stretching from the neolithic era, and the mythology of Emain Macha (the ancient capital of Ulster), through the City’s Christian foundation Read more…
Article written by: Phil Hall Two weeks ago, a space-suited mannequin was strapped inside a cherry red car, the car was strapped inside a rocket, and the whole lot was launched into space. Although the shiny convertible might be the first of its kind in space, the mannequin, dubbed ‘Spaceman’, Read more…
Article Written by Gavin Ramsay Comets have been known for millennia with Halley’s Comet famously being shown in the Bayeux Tapestry illustrating events which took place in 1066. They were also thought to foretell catastrophic events. Today we know them as having a small nucleus made up of ice and Read more…
Article written by: Heather Alexander Have you ever had a fun night out with friends, or a lazy day in with loved ones, or even just strolled down the street, and asked the question “Who discovered…?” I am the type of person who asks this question, frequently. Thanks goodness I Read more…
Recent observations of the helium star HD144941 have been obtained from space. Armagh astronomers Professor Simon Jeffery and Dr Gavin Ramsay have discovered that they show a light curve best explained by darker and lighter patches on the star’s surface coming into view as the star rotates with a period Read more…
Well, thankfully the drudgery of January is behind us and we can look forward to a month full of dark nights, stars and even a hint of romance. And let me tell you this my dear reader, if there’s one thing we’re experts on up in the Planetarium, it’s romance**. Read more…
Since the beginning of the space age, humanity has been sending robotic emissaries to all corners of the solar system. These represent some of the most complex technological undertakings ever conceived. Travelling for years and even decades to their destinations, they have helped form a modern picture of the solar Read more…
Some good news folks! If you fancy a few free ‘sparklers’ to get you celebrating, you could fill a bag with the number of fabulous looking stars that will appear their prettiest again this month against the darkest seasonal drape of the year as it stretches in all directions above Read more…
Star Wars, the very name brings up images of childhoods spent in front of a TV or cinema screen, absorbing up stories of a galaxy far, far away. For many, it was the thing to ignite their passion for storytelling, and for others it was the thing that ignited their Read more…
Hello again Planetarichums! It’s Stephen here, ready to do my very best to explain some of the upcoming wonders in our night sky as we head into winter and the Christmas holidays. So, first things first, we’ll talk a little about our celestial neighbour, the Moon. On December 3rd our Read more…
Comets are small icy and rocky objects flying around our Solar System on elliptical orbits, as opposed to near-circular ones the planets are enjoying. They are strange and fantastic enough as it is: bright comets with their tails spanning across the sky have been marvelled at, recorded, and often feared Read more…
In a paper entitled ‘GALEX J184559.8−413827: a new extreme helium star identified using SALT’, Armagh astronomer Simon Jeffery reports the first new extreme helium star to be discovered in nearly 40 years. Extreme helium stars represent a small group of low-mass supergiant stars. They have spectral types equivalent to A Read more…
After telling us about the Sun, in part two of this posting Armagh astronomer Gerry Doyle takes us through the telescopes and satellites being used to study the Sun. The Solar Physics community needs continued access to state-of-the-art observational facilities (both space- and ground-based) that cover a broad range of wavelengths and Read more…
October is over, and November is now upon us. The days are definitely getting colder, the night are definitely longer, which means the time for gazing into the night sky is now! One of the best things about November is the fact that there is not one, but two meteor Read more…
Armagh Observatory and Planetarium’s Robinson Lecture this year will be about the Sun. To lead into this here is the first of two articles about why astronomers study our Sun, and the range of telescopes and satellites co-opted to the the task. Solar physics is the branch of astrophysics that Read more…
The 2018 Robinson Lecture will be given by Professor Louise Harra of University College London. Her topic is about the Solar Orbiter, a new spacecraft to be launched to study the Sun. It will be held in the Archbishop’s Palace in Armagh on Wednesday 22 November, 2017, starting at 7pm. Read more…
On October 31, 2017, the world will celebrate the international hunt for dark matter. Armagh Observatory and Planetarium will be having a special showing of the “Phantom of the Universe” at 2pm, a Full Dome show which discusses our understanding (or lack thereof) Dark Matter, and the search to find Read more…
On Aug 14th 2017 LIGO and the Virgo Gravitational Wave detectors based in the USA and Italy detected the fourth merging Black Hole event. This was a triumph for both groups, but especially the Virgo group which had only started taking regular data earlier that month. It did leave many Read more…
Hello and welcome to my first attempt at an Astronotes blog! My name is Stephen and I’m finding out about our sky as I go during my time here in the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium. So, I hope you’ll join me on our journey through the October night sky. Read more…
The Sun is a constant presence in everyday life from rising in the morning signifying the beginning of the day, to setting at night representing the time to rest. With the human race ever more dependent on technology it is important to monitor solar activity and the potential harm it Read more…
Gaia is a satellite launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) on 19 December 2013. It is essentially a census gathering information on over one billion stars, totalling an amazing 1% of the galaxy’s total population, measuring their positions, motion, brightness and colour. Gaia’s primary objective is to create the Read more…
It is common knowledge that the Earth is running out of resources, we’re constantly plagued with images and statistics supporting renewable energy and changing our way of thinking but what if we gathered resources from Space and gave the Earth a break from human pillaging? This is an idea from Read more…
A team of scientists in Australia are scanning the Universe for signals from extraterrestrial life. Professor Matthew Bailes, based at Swinburne University in Melbourne, is the lead scientist in this project funded by Russian billionaire Yuri Milner. Milner has donated $100 million and has the support of Professor Stephen Hawking. Read more…
As the summer draws to a close September is a perfect time for stargazing before the cold nights of winter finally creep in. With sunset around 9pm and a forecasted heatwave, fingers crossed for some clear skies with some lovely mild temperatures. A key feature of the summer night sky Read more…
During our school days, children in the developing and developed world could not even dream about getting a chance to look through a professional telescope; forget about playing with it for real observations! Those days, only the best professional astronomers/astrophysicists had access to such telescopic sites and networks. However one Read more…
Welcome stargazers to that haven where in the midst of our busy lives, between all our comings and goings, we can look up and find solace, and be inspired by the quiet glittering beauties overhead. So let’s start with the summer triangle, discussed in July’s article, and use it as Read more…
Michael Burton, Director, AOP On 27th July 2017, the RoI Minister John Halligan switched on I-LOFAR telescope, the largest radio telescope in the world, at Birr Castle in Co. Offaly. The Armagh Observatory and Planetarium is a member of the 8 institutions across the island of Ireland that came together to build I-LOFAR. Read more…
Named after a famed 17th Century Italian-French astronomer the Cassini spacecraft took 10 years to reach a distant location in the Solar System, that of Saturn and its surrounding neighbourhood. Since its arrival in 2004 it has made a number of remarkable discoveries during its exploratory mission. The Cassini Read more…
Get your sunglasses on, and break out the sun tan lotion! July is here and we’re glad to see it. Summer is fully upon us and many of us will be on our summer holidays this month. The month of July was named after Julius Caesar by the Roman senate, Read more…
Would you like to live on Mars? This is a question that we here at the Armagh Observatory and Planetarium ask on a daily basis. There never is a solid yes or no answer from any of the groups we ask, whether they be young or old. We usually Read more…
It’s hard to believe that the summer has come around and we are half way through 2017. Time may be flying by but the good weather means a chance of clear skies at night and with lots to see this month let’s hope the rain stays at bay. Read more…
Name a famous scientist. Who was the first person that came into your head? Steven Hawking, Albert Einstein or Isaac Newton? Maybe for those of you out there that watch The Big Bang Theory you might be familiar with some of the more obscure people and said Erwin Schrodinger, Galileo Read more…
The spring night sky has well and truly sprung, and although these months are sign of brighter evenings and therefore later bedtimes if you want star gaze, there are still lots of interesting patterns and objects that we can see. So let’s delve in and find them. The spring night Read more…
Michael Burton, Director of Armagh Observatory and Planetarium Have you been enthralled by the BBC’s Stargazing Live Australia, hosted by Brian Cox and Dara O Briain and shown over three nights at the end March this year? A spectacular show, hosted from Siding Spring Observatory in the Warrumbungles National Park Read more…
Given that astronomy dates back to early written records from the Babylonians around 1600 BC if not earlier, black holes are a relatively new addition to human knowledge of the cosmos. Black holes cannot be seen therefore it took a long time for the first one to be found. Composed Read more…
Goodbye February, the shortest month of the year, and hello March! The desperate chill of winter is starting to lift and at the end of this month we will have the March Equinox. On the 20th March the Sun will shine directly on the equator and there will be nearly Read more…
The discovery of the TRAPPIST-1 exo-planetary system is a truly remarkable event in science. It is an exemplar of how an armada of telescopes – some located on the ground and some in space, and collectively owned by a league of nations – can work together to chart new frontiers Read more…
Are we alone in the Universe? This is an age old question that has been the driving force for our ventures into space exploration. And with the record breaking discovery of 7 exoplanets in the TRAPPIST-1 system, it definitely feels like we could be on the cusp of an Read more…
The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is a powerful instrument which can be used to observe the Sun at high spatial, temporal, and spectral resolution. ALMA consists of a giant array of 12-m antennas, with baselines up to 16 km, and an additional compact array of 7-m and 12-m antennas. Read more…
Over the past few weeks I have been hearing the term “The Big Bounce Theory,” quite a lot. At first I thought it was a sequel to the brilliant “The Big Bang Theory” TV show. When listening to the “Star Talk,” podcast by Neil De Grasse Tyson however Read more…
It’s that time of the year again for the third annual Northern Ireland Science Festival and this year is bigger and better! The Armagh planetarium has been holding events under NISF from the beginning so we could not miss the opportunity to be part of this inspiring event. We Read more…
On Monday 14 November 2016 the skies over the UK and Ireland will be graced by a beautiful bright full moon. Also on this this day there will be a “supermoon”. This is a term I have a love-hate relationship with. It excites and intrigues people and encourages them to Read more…
At Armagh Planetarium we hosted our very first video game based workshop. This summer we immersed ourselves into the blocky world of Minecraft. Using MinecraftEdu, the children that took part in these workshops got to explore possibly one of the coolest places ever, the International Space Station! As Read more…
As we welcome back the colder weather we are also welcoming back the beginning of the best months of stargazing thanks to the onset of longer dark evenings. Mix this with the spooky objects visible in the crisp autumn month of October and we have a recipe for fun and Read more…
One of the European Space Agency’s flagship missions reached its grand finale on Friday 30 September 2016. After 20 years in development, a 10-year trip around the Solar System and two years on station at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the Rosetta mission drew to a close at 12:19 BST when the spacecraft Read more…
1 September 2016 saw the first full meeting of all of the staff of Armagh Observatory and Planetarium. We are looking forward to carrying Armagh’s impressive heritage of astronomical research and public education forward into an exciting future together! You can follow AOP’s work through our websites and Read more…
Astronomers have made the exciting discovery of an Earth-mass exoplanet in the habitable zone of our nearest neighbouring star, Proxima Centauri, a red dwarf star 4.25 light years (1.3 parsec) from the Sun. The new-found world, designated Proxima b, is a little more massive than the Earth, implying that it Read more…
It’s August and suddenly the nights are getting a bit longer so what is there to see in our night sky this month? Everyone should watch out for August’s amazing Perseid Meteor Shower. You probably know already that there are a number of regular meteor showers over the Read more…
We are delighted to welcome Michael G. Burton as Director of Armagh Observatory and Planetarium. Professor Burton is an internationally renowned researcher who specialises in using infrared and millimetre-wave astronomy to study how stars form in the interstellar medium (the tenuous matter between the stars in our galaxy, the Read more…
Pokémon Go has taken the world by storm; it seems that everyone is playing it. If you see someone walking in circles with their head down and looking at their phone, you know they’re on the game…and maybe part of you wants to rush over and see what they’ve found. Read more…
At the end of Part Two our Galactic explorers had produced the first true maps of our Galaxy, showing its shape and extent, by using radio telescopes to map the distribution of atomic hydrogen, so revealing the spiral arm structure. In the concluding portion of this article we turn to Read more…
Let us go outside somewhere in Northern Ireland about midnight on 15 June 2016 and see what there is to see in the sky. Hercules. Muscular hero and demi-god! Killer of the Hydra! Victor over the Nemean Lion! Slayer of giants! Crusher of Cancer the Crab! And he didn’t Read more…
In March 2016, Armagh Planetarium debuted a new workshop for schools ‘Robotics in Space’. This interactive workshop highlighted the roles of robots and robotics in space missions, discussed what robots are currently in space as well as how can they be programmed and controlled. This new workshop was made possible Read more…
As a species we human beings are rather obsessed with the end of our world and how that is going to happen. From zombie apocalypses to giant asteroids hitting the Earth, we’ve pretty much thought of everything. However there is a new idea in town, and it makes giant asteroids Read more…
It’s the middle of May! Let’s go out tonight and look at the stars! At this time of year in the UK and Ireland, our nights are getting later and shorter, partly due to our planet’s axial tilt and partly due to daylight savings time, with the Sun setting soon Read more…
At the end of part one of this article we left our galactic explorers uncovering the first hints of the existence of spiral structure within our Milky Way. In part two we see how the new field of radio astronomy opened up the Galaxy for viewing to our explorers. Read more…
Picking books for children can be difficult, not only are we adults battling with TV, game consoles, tablets and toys, it’s hard to fit the old-fashioned entertainment of a book into a child’s life. There’s no doubt children have a great imagination and at a young age nothing is impossible Read more…
Armstrong and Aldrin were the first two people on the Moon when Apollo 11 landed there in July 1969. This astonishing achievement (which it should not be forgotten was followed by five more successful landings) continues to fascinate our readers who are still eager to learn more about the details. Read more…
Spring has truly sprung. Welcome to the month of April, and doesn’t time fly when you’re having fun. We can hardly believe that it is April already, and we’ve had so much fun stargazing at the Planetarium so far this year. April is certainly not the cruellest month for us! Read more…
Dim and isolated, the dwarf irregular galaxy Wolf–Lundmark–Melotte (WLM) could be described as an astronomical “living fossil” as it seems to have developed without ever interacting with any other galaxy since it formed billions of years ago. First observed in 1909, the WLM galaxy is part of the Read more…
We live in a galaxy – a star city with several hundred billion residents. Moreover, we know our Milky Way is a spiral galaxy, with prominent arms of bright young stars that spiral outwards from a central bar that is dominated by old stars. These arms are so prominent as Read more…
For those of you that are still bearing the psychological scars from Pluto’s demotion from planet to dwarf planet a decade ago, here is news that may add salt to the wounds. Published recently in the Astronomical Journal, Konstantin Batygin and Mike Brown claim they have found evidence of a Read more…
See you later February, you’ve been a wonderful month, but now it is time to welcome March. Something we delight in here at Armagh Planetarium is how the months got their names. March is a particularly nerdy one. March got its name after the Roman god of war, Mars. Not Read more…
Goodbye January blues, hello February fun! We’re already into the second month of our new year and it’s been absolutely amazing for stargazing already. Before we get in to what you can hope to gaze at this month, I want to point out to you all that this February is Read more…
Happy New Year! Welcome to January 2016, and if you haven’t made a New Year’s resolution yet (or you have made one but want to sneakily change it,) why not challenge yourself to star gaze this year. Star gazing is a brilliant past time and is a wonderful activity that Read more…
In 2015 Armagh Planetarium’s website (including Astronotes) received well over 2.6 million page views (and over 75 million web hits*) from all over the world. It seems we’re doing something right! But what were all these people coming to see? Here are the 20 most viewed Astronotes articles of 2015 Read more…
For anyone who is not feeling the Christmas spirit yet this Christmas, Armagh Planetarium is definitely the place you will find it! We held our 5th annual Christmas Card Competition this year at Armagh Planetarium and we were astounded by the response from the schools across Northern Ireland and beyond! Read more…
Tim Peake is clearly a man who likes a challenge and has a keen sense of adventure, for in his spare time the father of two enjoys skiing, cross-country running, climbing and caving. However the UK-born former pilot from Chichester is due to embark on his greatest adventure before the Read more…
What’s that we hear? Sleigh bells? It’s the month that hosts the Christmas holidays, it’s December. We’re getting into the heart of winter and the night sky is likely to be crisp and clear and we get into the colder nights. When you’re out stargazing this month, Jack Frost may Read more…
A spectacular multi-coloured fireball was witnessed in Ireland and Scotland by dozens of people on the evening of 29 November 2015. This was the fiery descent of a meteor through the Earth’s atmosphere. The meteoroid itself was a tiny stony or metallic piece of natural space debris, essentially Read more…
Is this a new dawn for suborbital travel? The Blue Origin company’s New Shepard rocket test vehicle made a successful flight into space on its second mission from its West Texas launch pad on 23 November 2015. Blue Origin aims to develop a series of reusable passenger carrying space vehicles Read more…
With Christmas only around the corner, finding the perfect gift for loved ones may be on the to-do list. So find below a list of gifts available to purchase from the Planetarium’s gift shop right here in Armagh. Why not go a little out of this world to find the Read more…
Newly discovered small Solar System body V774104 may seem just another tiny, cold and remote world beyond Neptune but this is an important finding as its mere existence suggests that the wastes of the outer Solar System are considerably more populous than we thought a couple of decades ago. Read more…
While suspicion, fear, and fantasy, at times were closely associated with the Cold War period in terms of how the USA and the USSR viewed one another’s respective actions, it became clear that space projects were not exempt from this mutual scrutiny either. One such project which did little to Read more…
The nights are getting very dark and there is a definite chill in the air. Hello November, and hello to some brilliant stargazing opportunities. The Earth’s tilt means that now the southern hemisphere is in its summer, and sadly we here in the northern hemisphere are tilted away from the Read more…
New Horizon’s arrival at Pluto this year, after a nine year-long traverse through the Solar System has revealed many new things about this little icy planet. Pluto used to be the ninth planet but was demoted in 2006 to the status of dwarf planet. Until the New Horizons mission started Read more…
When I heard about this book I immediately wanted to read it, being a space enthusiast and very interested in the journey to Mars, I had to know how one man stranded on the Red Planet could try to survive. Mark Watney an astronaut on the Ares 3 mission Read more…
Welcome to October! The nights are now longer and the stars come out earlier. Yes it may be getting close to winter, but who doesn’t like autumn? October is full of exciting events, and one event that we are looking forward to here in the Planetarium is World Space Week. Read more…
It is widely accepted that our Solar System was created about 4.6 billion years ago based on dating of meteorites. Scientists believe the Solar System formed when a cloud of dust was disrupted by the shockwave from the explosive death of a nearby star initiating its collapse into a stellar Read more…
It’s September and the schools are back in session. The summer holidays have come to an unfortunate end and now we all have to get back to our daily routines. July and August have been great months for stargazing, but with the coming of September comes longer nights, which is Read more…
Various claims about the end of the world and “Judgement Day” can be found threaded into the long history of humanity and has become a common re-occurrence that, most likely, will always be something that raises its needless anxiety-inducing head. For my short 27 years on this grand old planet Read more…
After entering the Twittersphere in 2010 Armagh Planetarium’s online presence has grown over the past few years encompassing the Astronotes blog and Facebook accounts. We at Armagh Planetarium have also recently launched a Pinterest account for you to follow or seek inspiration from. If you are not a Read more…
Have you ever stopped and really thought about the possibility of finding life in the universe or maybe that extra-terrestrial life finding us! And then, when they find us, what if they aren’t exactly friendly and they want our planet for some super evil plan so they decide to have Read more…
In July 2015 Belfast Met opened its doors to budding astronauts, pilots and app geniuses with a new series of STEM summer camps. The free activity camps took place at Titanic Quarter Campus for over 16’s interested in fun experiments involving cosmology, aerospace science and ICT technologies. Space Camp Read more…
August, it’s one of our favourite months of the year. Whether you’ve been on your summer holidays or not, August is a month to relax, and have fun with family and friends. The month August was named after the infamous Roman Emperor, Augustus Caesar. He was the grandnephew of the Read more…