Local Group - Astronomy Magazine - Interactive Star Charts, Planets, Meteors, Comets, Telescopes

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STARMUS VI: The out-of-this-world science and arts festival will see speakers including Chris Hadfield and Kip Thorne celebrate 50 years of exploration on Mars

Posted 2 years ago by Jake Parks

The Starmus Festival, founded by astrophysicist Dr. Garik Israelian and Dr. Brian May, astrophysicist and the legendary guitarist of Queen, will be held in Armenia and dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the first soft landing on Mars by "Mars 3" and the first orbiter "Mariner 9". LONDON, June 23, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- STARMUS VI Science and Art Festival, from 31 August to 9 September, entitled "STARMUS VI. 50 Years on Mars," will be held in Armenia and dedicated to the 50th anniversary o...

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Queen guitarist Brian May and David Eicher launch new astronomy book

Posted 4 years ago by Jake Parks

In an unprecedented event Wednesday, September 23, Brian May and David Eicher will hold an online book launch for their latest work, Cosmic Clouds 3-D, along with master astroimager J-P Metsävainio. Tomorrow’s live virtual event begins at 8 p.m. GMT (2 p.m. CDT). And you can tune in live below. Cosmic Clouds 3-D is the first book ever to present 3-D stereoscopic images of nebulae, the clouds of gas that inhabit our galaxy. These sites are the birthplaces of stars, but some als...

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Enter the Space & Beyond Box Photo Contest!

Posted 4 years ago by Jake Parks

By David J. Eicher The Space & Beyond Box Night Sky Photo Contest has just begun! We’re encouraging you to enter any photo you’ve made of the heavens, and the prize will be an Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas and Guide Set, a $179.99 value, and a wonderful guide to observing deep-space objects. The Contest is open now through April 23, 2020. Imaging the sky ranges from the very simple to the highly complex. The digital chips in cell phones and DSLRs are now so good that you can...

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Last chance to join our 2020 Costa Rica Star Party!

Posted 4 years ago by Jake Parks

By David J. Eicher I invite you to join me on one of the greatest adventures you’ll have as an astronomy enthusiast — viewing the treasures of the Southern Hemisphere sky from the pristine beauty of Costa Rica. This year we are honored to be bringing along an Explore Scientific 16-inch Dobsonian telescope that will provide jaw-dropping views of the Carina Nebula, Omega Centauri, star clusters in Crux and Centaurus, distant nebulae and galaxies, and dozens of other wonders. Y...

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Join Us in Tucson for Our Annual Public Star Party!

Posted 4 years ago by Jake Parks

By David J. Eicher On Saturday, February 15, 2020, Astronomy magazine will sponsor the eighth annual all-day skywatching party at the East Campus Observatory of Pima Community College (PCC), in Tucson, Arizona. The address there is 8181 East Irvington Road. Activities begin at 2 p.m. and continue all the way through 9 p.m. The event is hosted by the Tucson Amateur Astronomy Association (TAAA), one of the most active astronomy clubs in the United States. Throughout the day, club mem...

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Learn about the Moon in a great new book

Posted 5 years ago by Michael Bakich

It's always nice to hear about a great new book. I just received this review from Matthew Russell of the British Interplanetary Society. He was able to read a pre-publication copy of the text, and here's what he had to say about it. The Moon has been Earth’s continual celestial partner, and all humankind has gazed in wonder at her since the dawn of our species. Some of our greatest hopes, dreams, and darkest thoughts have revolved around this silver sphere that dominates our night sky. In...

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New book chronicles the space program

Posted 5 years ago by Michael Bakich

Longtime contributor Ben Cooper of LaunchPhotography.com just sent me a note that his first book, Launch Photography, will be published by Amherst Media on September 15. The book features some 150 photographs that Cooper took in his first 20 years of photographing the space program, primarily at Cape Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. In addition to providing text about manned and unmanned crafts, he shares wide-angle captures, night photographs, images shot from seldom-seen ang...

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Astro stuff galore at the Swap and Sell

Posted 5 years ago by Michael Bakich

Do you have a telescope, eyepiece, camera, or other astronomical accessory you want to part with? No? Then how about buying one (or more!) of the same? On Saturday, March 23, 2019, the Sheboygan Astronomical Society is hosting its 12th annual Swap-n-Sell. This year’s event, like the previous ones, will take place at the Aviation Heritage Center of the Sheboygan Airport in Wisconsin from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. For those of you who own a GPS or like to use Google Maps or MapQuest, the address i...

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The Tucson Star Party will be a day of Sun and stars

Posted 5 years ago by Michael Bakich

On Saturday, February 9, 2019, Astronomy magazine will sponsor the seventh annual all-day skywatching party at the East Campus Observatory of Pima Community College (PCC). The address there is 8181 East Irvington Road. Activities begin at 10 a.m. and continue all the way through 9 p.m. The event is hosted by the Tucson Amateur Astronomy Association (TAAA), one of the most active astronomy clubs in the United States. Throughout the day, club members will operate several solar telescopes that wil...

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Tour the observatories of Arizona

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

When somebody who lives in the United States thinks about astronomy, Arizona often comes to mind. There’s no mystery why: beneath that state’s vast, clear skies you’ll find some of the most exciting astronomical destinations in the world. Join me in May 2019 as Astronomy magazine partners with TravelQuest International on a nine-day journey from Tucson to Flagstaff that we’ve called Arizona Skies. You’ll experience all the beauty of the southwestern desert, from it...

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First look at the 2024 total solar eclipse

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

2,024 days to go. I’m posting this blog September 23, 2018, and, yes, there are 2,024 days until the next great American total eclipse, which will occur April 8, 2024. Citizens of and visitors to the United States are still abuzz about the August 21, 2017 total solar eclipse. Videos, photos, and social media reports still abound. I hope you saw it. But maybe you missed it — at least the total part. Why doesn’t matter. Whether you were serving on a submarine at the bottom of th...

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ScopeOut Cincinnati will be lots of fun

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

The Cincinnati Observatory is once again hosting ScopeOut, its annual two-night telescope festival. The dates are Friday, September 14, and Saturday the 15th. And this year, I’m the featured speaker. My talk will be “Star Death,” which deals with the lives of stars, starting before their births to long after their deaths. And what deaths! The objects stars turn into once they die are some of the weirdest in the cosmos. All that and dinner, too! To learn more about this event...

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Downsizing the Astro library

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

In the past several weeks Astronomy’s Editor, Dave Eicher, and I have gone through the roughly 7,500 books in the magazine’s library. As you might imagine in a field as rapidly changing as astronomy, many of those books, which we began to acquire in the 1980s, are seriously out of date. So, we are downsizing. This idea actually grew out of a process, during the past year, where the staff of the many magazines here at Kalmbach Media consolidated into one-half of our building. The ide...

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Tippy D'Auria passes away

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

Astronomy Contributing Editor Mike Reynolds just sent me this sad note: The founder of the Winter Star Party, Tippy D’Auria, has passed away just shy of 83.D’Auria and his wife Patty had the idea of a southern Florida winter observing event, somewhat like other star parties of the era. They went to the board of the Southern Cross Astronomical Society in Miami, and received permission to do the event. The Winter Star Party was established in 1984, with the first few held in the Everg...

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Make astronomy part of your summer travel

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

Mars opposition is coming — you’ve likely heard that several times this month (and week) already. What this means is that now (and the next few months) is a great time to get out there and view our neighboring world at its biggest and brightest. It won’t be this big and bright again until 2035. If you’re bummed about the planet-wide dust storm raging across the Red Planet, which will unfortunately obscure many of its more detailed features, consider that Mars is still ...

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A roundup of Comic-Con

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

The world’s greatest pop-culture convention is over for this year. San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC) 2018 — the 49th incarnation of this great event — started Thursday, July 19, and ran through Sunday the 22nd. Actually, a preview night occurred Wednesday, July 18, for professionals, exhibitors, and press. And, once again, that was me. Press. I was there for the whole shebang, met some wonderful people, and experienced lots of great events. Comic-Con started in 1970 as a three-day ga...

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An interview with Andy Weir

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

If you’ve read my blog about the 2018 version of San Diego Comic-Con, you know that science was well represented. While I was there, I had the chance to chat with Andy Weir, author of The Martian and Artemis, his latest book. You’ll find my interview with Andy here. // &lt;div&gt;Please enable Javascript to watch this video&lt;/div&gt;...

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See the new COSMOS season 2 trailer

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

On July 21, FOX and National Geographic released a first look at the highly anticipated return of the Emmy Award-winning worldwide phenomenon COSMOS. Executive producer/writer/director Ann Druyan (who won an Emmy Award for writing the 2014 series and a Peabody Award for producing it) and executive producers Seth MacFarlane (Family Guy, The Orville, COSMOS: A SpaceTime Odyssey), Brannon Braga (The Orville, COSMOS: A SpaceTime Odyssey, Terra Nova) and Jason Clark (The Orville, COSMOS: A Space...

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Guest Blog: Blazars - A multi-wavelength look at the objects behind the first neutrino traced back to a deep-space source

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

By Angela Osterman Meyer Perhaps the most amazing aspect of studying astronomy is that in solving one mystery of the cosmos you find far more questions than answers; the adventure never ends. The distant and ultra-luminous objects known as blazars perfectly embody this. At right is a blazar (looking bright white) surrounded by nearby stars in an image from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. Which brings us to the first mystery of blazars: What made astronomers think...

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Guest Blog: Writers of Sweek.com hail Asteroid Day with literature!

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

By Chinthaka Nanayakkara For Russian dwellers to the northwest of Lake Baikal, that unforgettable morning in 1908 must have dawned just like any other ordinary morning, calm and tranquil. But after 7 A.M., it was anything but ordinary, calm or tranquil. Only few natives spotted the blinding blue streak of light that zipped across their skies, but the deafening explosion that echoed from the faraway depths of the forest was clearly heard by almost everyone in the vicinity. Then c...

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Learn to process images like the pros

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

Wanna learn how to process your carefully taken astroimages? Longtime Astronomy magazine image contributors Warren Keller and Ron Brecher are teaming up to present a pair of 3-day workshops. The first will be in Mesa, Arizona, September 21-23. Learn more about it, including the full agenda — 18 hours of PixInsight training — here. The second workshop will be held September 28-30 in Lake Forest, California. Click here for all the details. You might want to make up your mind quickly....

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Get ready for Galactic Tick Day!

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

When you think about the solar system, chances are you picture the planets orbiting the Sun. But that’s only part of the story — our solar system, including the Sun, is also orbiting the center of the Milky Way, the galaxy in which we reside. While a single orbit of Earth around the Sun takes a mere 365 days, a single orbit of the Sun (and the rest of our solar system, along with it) around the Milky Way takes nearly 230 million years. It is that journey — the trip our plane...

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A new book by Stephen James O'Meara

Posted 6 years ago by Michael Bakich

Diamonds in the Sky: Discover the Stars Over Botswana, is the latest book from famed observer and Astronomy columnist Stephen James O’Meara. And despite “Botswana” being part of the title, this Kindle e-book is a great introduction to what’s up at night. Steve wrote this book as a “first step” guide, meaning that it’s filled with basic information to help you learn your way around the night sky in a casual manner. He designed it to be used any time of y...

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Spotlight on the state of women in STEM: The 2018 Women in Technology Summit

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

I’m back with more excellent news for women in STEM. Why do I keep posting about this topic? Well, it’s an important one — there’s still a huge gender gap that studies show is going to take a long time to fix. That gap is due to many reasons, of course, but among them are the state of the support women in these fields receive, and the fulfillment they get from pursing careers in these industries. This weekend, Women in Technology International (WITI) began its 24th ann...

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The 232nd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society: Day 3

Posted 6 years ago by Jake Parks

Hello! I’m back again, checking in on the third and final full day of activities at the 232rd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society. It’s been an amazing week so far, with plenty to do and plenty to see, and today was certainly no exception. I’ve been shotgunned by astronomical science this week, so we’ll be diving into plenty of intriguing research and news in the days and weeks that follow. But for now, let’s explore some of the highlights from today, whi...

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The 232nd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society: Day 2

Posted 6 years ago by Jake Parks

Welcome back! Today was the second full day of pure astronomical bliss here at the American Astronomical Society’s summer meeting. Yet again, the day was bursting with exciting presentations, exhibits, and conferences, so let’s dive right in with some highlights. Creating the cosmos in a lab To kick off the day, I sipped my morning coffee while attending the Laboratory Astrophysics Division’s Plenary Lecture: Small Interstellar Molecules and What They Tell Us. The lecture, ...

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The 232nd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society: Day 1

Posted 6 years ago by Jake Parks

Hello from Denver, Colorado, home to the 232nd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society! Though many attendees arrived Sunday evening for this year’s AAS winter meeting, the festivities did not swing into full gear until bright and early Monday morning. But once they did, oh, what a whirlwind day it was. After first grabbing a quick cup of coffee and browsing a number of research projects during the early morning poster session, I took my seat in preparation for the welcome address ...

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Take your astrophotography to the next level with this 90-minute tutorial

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

Astrophotography has become more and more accessible over the years. As technology improves and both equipment and programs are increasingly available for lower prices, many amateur astronomers have been drawn to the excitement, challenge, and sense of accomplishment that comes from capturing a beautiful image of the night sky for yourself. But while basic astrophotography has certainly become easier to perform, the image processing that can help you achieve breathtaking images like the ones ...

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The Adler Planetarium's latest Kavli Fulldome lecture explores our planetary experiment

Posted 6 years ago by Alison Klesman

We are all living in a giant science experiment — an experiment with no control group, which has never been performed before, and will never be performed again in exactly the same way. Our “planetary experiment” is taking place right here, every day, on Earth, and we have the ability to affect its outcome. In fact, part of that outcome has already been determined by those who have come before us, and we hold in our hands the power to impact the future of generations of humans...

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Mark your calendars: June 23 is the 9th Annual Astronomy Festival on the National Mall

Posted 6 years ago by Amber Jorgenson

[UPDATE: The event's location has been changed to northwest of the Washington Monument; 17th St. NW and Constitution Ave. 15th St. has been changed to 17th St. due to renovation.] Can you think of a better way to celebrate the summer solstice than by hanging out with astronomers and taking a guided tour of our magnificent solar system? Didn't think so.The longest day of the year will be commemorated with the 9th Annual Astronomy Festival on the National Mall (AFNM) on Saturday, June 23, 20...

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