When the first astronauts came back from the Moon more than half a century ago, they brought back a scientific treasure trove of soil and rock samples. These were – and still are – intensely scrutinised in laboratories all over the world, allowing scientists to gradually piece together the history Read more…
Mars is the only other planet in the solar system apart from the Earth that combines a clear – albeit thin – atmosphere and a solid surface. Therefore, an astronaut standing on the surface may observe and record phenomena on the martian sky, both astronomical and atmospheric. One of these Read more…
By Apostolos Christou, Researh Astronomer Every 26 months, the positions of Mars and the Earth align in such a way to allow probes launched from Earth to reach Mars (see how to calculate launch windows here). The next such launch window has just opened, with three separate missions under starter’s Read more…
A myth deeply engrained into popular culture is that the Moon is made of green cheese. The Apollo missions showed beyond reasonable doubt that the moon is made of rock and not, sadly, of one of our favourite dairy products. That being said, data brought back from Apollo and the Read more…
When Thomas Romney Robinson, director of the Armagh Observatory, invented the cup anemometer in 1846, little did he know that one day his invention would be recording the alien breeze on the surface of another world. Fast forward 130 years: On 20 October 1975, a small capsule detached from the Read more…
By Gavin Ramsay, AOP Research Astronomer In previous AstroNotes we have highlighted the Gravitational-wave Optical Transient Observer (GOTO) project of which AOP is a partner. Although its main aim is to detect the optical counterparts of cosmic explosions, it has been used to observe some Comets. Last week GOTO observed Read more…
By Simon Jeffery, AOP Research Astronomer In 1930, Dorrit Hoffleit reported that star number #4749 in the Harvard List of variables had faded four times between 1897 and 1929, and identified it as an R Coronae Borealis (RCB) variable. RCB stars are luminous low-mass stars (red giants) with surfaces around Read more…
Research Astronomer Dr Apostolos Christou reports on a new model to explain the two “oddball’’ moons of Neptune: Triton, a >2000 km diameter satellite that circles Neptune in the opposite direction that the planet rotates; and 300-km Nereid, the planetary moon with the most elongated orbit in the solar system. Read more…
The transition region in the Sun is the atmospheric layer that separates the cooler chromosphere from the hotter corona. Studying the structure and dynamics of the transition region requires greater attention as these provide critical information on the supply of mass and energy from the lower atmosphere to the corona and Read more…
By Galin Borisov (not the interstellar comet discoverer) During this tough period of COVID-19 pandemic, most of the astronomical observatories around the world are closed and no observations are carried out. But my Bulgarian colleague, Yanko Nikolov, decided to self-isolate in the mountain and fulfil the observations with the 2m Read more…