Tabla de contenidos para January 2025 en Astronomy

ARTEMIS WILL UTILIZE FOUR DIFFERENT SPACECRAFT TO RETURN TO THE MOON. The cone-shaped Orion spacecraft, resembling an enlarged Apollo Command Module, will be launched by the SLS and carry four astronauts into lunar orbit to rendezvous with a lunar lander. Orion will be buttressed by the European-built Service Module, which will provide power, propulsion, and life support for the Orion. Starship HLS will be based on the current Starship undergoing Earthorbit testing. But as it will never reenter Earth’s atmosphere, it will be devoid of external heat shielding and aerodynamic control flaps. It will also feature five solar panels that extend from midship, while the ship’s white coating will prevent the Sun from heating the cryogenic propellants. Heavy braking during the lunar approach with be done with the HLS’s six…

All the major planets are on view this month. Venus has a fine evening conjunction with Saturn and Jupiter is high in Taurus. Uranus and Neptune are binocular targets, while Mars reaches opposition. Early morning reveals Mercury. Additionally, on the 9th the Moon crosses the Pleiades (M45), and on the 13th it hides Mars in a rare event. Venus dazzles in the south-western sky after sunset all month. Starting at magnitude –4.4 and brightening quickly, it’s easily visible as twilight descends. On the 1st, Venus shows a 55-percent-lit disk spanning 22". On Jan. 2 and 3, the waxing crescent Moon joins in, standing 10° southwest and 4° east of the planet, respectively. Notice on the 4th that the Moon is 4° northeast of Saturn, which is about 13° from Venus.…

HOW TO USE THIS MAP This map portrays the sky as seen near 35° north latitude. Located inside the border are the cardinal directions and their intermediate points. To find stars, hold the map overhead and orient it so one of the labels matches the direction you’re facing. The stars above the map’s horizon now match what’s in the sky. The all-sky map shows how the sky looks at: 9 P.M. January 1 8 P.M. January 15 7 P.M. January 31 Planets are shown at midmonth MAP SYMBOLS Open cluster Globular cluster Diffuse nebula Planetary nebula Galaxy STAR COLORS A star’s color depends on its surface temperature. ■ The hottest stars shine blue ■ Slightly cooler stars appear white ■ Intermediate stars (like the Sun) glow yellow ■ Lower-temperature stars…

IF WE LET THEM, asteroids may lead us along secluded paths that bring us across fascinating fields. From the suburbs, 15 Eunomia is our guiding light, reflecting our Sol to outshine most of the background stars of the outer Milky Way, much of which is obscured by vast, dusty domains. Only three stars are brighter in the vicinity. Under a dark sky, a realm of stardust and tunnels appears in a wide-field eyepiece. Take your time to identify Eunomia by making a sketch of three or four of the brightest stars and coming back on another night to note its displacement. But the treasure here is found by simply sweeping the scope back and forth across and along the path. Just as easy as many Barnard dark clouds, here lie…

YOU AND I ARE LIVING through a revolution in amateur astronomy. Not long ago, I would have advised beginners to stay away from astroimaging, because getting good results is both expensive and time consuming. Not anymore. Today, I tell them that state-of-the-art smart telescopes are available at comparatively reasonable prices that let tech-savvy neophytes get incredible results the first night out. One of the leading contenders in this hot market is the Seestar S50 from Zhen Wang Optical (ZWO). Introduced in April 2023 at New York’s North East Astronomy Forum, the ZWO Seestar S50 appears almost too good to be true. It promises that anyone, even with minimal astroimaging knowledge, can capture high-quality images of star clusters, nebulae, galaxies, the Moon, and the Sun. It smooths the steep learning curve traditionally…

HOW TO USE THIS MAP This map portrays the sky as seen near 30° south latitude. Located inside the border are the cardinal directions and their intermediate points. To find stars, hold the map overhead and orient it so one of the labels matches the direction you’re facing. The stars above the map’s horizon now match what’s in the sky. The all-sky map shows how the sky looks at: 10 P.M. March 1 9 P.M. March 15 8 P.M. March 31 Planets are shown at midmonth MAP SYMBOLS Open cluster Globular cluster Diffuse nebula Planetary nebula Galaxy STAR COLORS A star’s color depends on its surface temperature. ■ The hottest stars shine blue ■ Slightly cooler stars appear white ■ Intermediate stars (like the Sun) glow yellow ■ Lower-temperature stars appear orange ■ Fainter…

Like a dragon breathing a long spout of fire, a black hole in the distant universe is spewing plumes of energy into the cosmos, forming jets that span 23 million light-years. That’s 140 times the width of the Milky Way, enough to influence the evolution of the universe at scales previously unheard of. The find, announced Sept. 18 in Nature, is named Porphyrion, after a mythological Greek giant who warred with the gods for control of the cosmos. It is twice as large as the previous record-holder, which was also found by the new study’s lead author, Martijn Oei of Caltech and Leiden University in the Netherlands, and colleagues in 2022. PEERING INTO THE PAST Porphyrion was discovered within survey data from Europe’s LOFAR (LOw Frequency ARray) radio telescope. Radio…

DEFLECTING KILLER ASTEROIDS with nuclear weapons has long been the stuff of science fiction. But thanks to a new experiment, that scenario has taken a step closer to reality. Yes, just as in the movie Armageddon, scientists believe that nuclear weapons could be tools to protect our planet. However, detonating a nuclear weapon directly on an encroaching asteroid could risk fracturing the asteroid instead of redirecting it, raining many smaller but still deadly meteoroids onto Earth. A leading proposal is to instead set off a nuclear bomb at some distance from the asteroid to increase the odds of steering the asteroid off a collision course. To test this method, researchers at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico, used a powerful X-ray beam to blast tiny chips of quartz and silica.…

SIXTY-FIVE YEARS AGO, the USSR shocked the world by sending the first robotic emissary from Earth to the Moon. The September 1959 impact of Luna 2 on northeastern Mare Imbrium was a stunning achievement, reaching the Moon less than two years after the launch of Sputnik 1 ushered in the Space Age. The event helped ignite the technological firestorm now known as the Space Race between the U.S. and the USSR. The U.S. responded to the lunar challenge with a flurry of robotic and human explorers. Less than 10 years after Luna 2 reached the Moon, Neil Armstrong took his “one small step for mankind” on the Sea of Tranquility. But just as Apollo reached its stride and the scientific exploration of the Moon began in earnest, politics ended the…

THE ARTEMIS PROGRAM WILL RELY ON a fleet of rockets and crewed vehicles. These include NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS), the SpaceX Starship/Super Heavy system, and the Blue Origin New Glenn. NASA’s 322-foot-tall (98 m) SLS will send the crewed Orion spacecraft into lunar orbit to join the awaiting lunar landing craft. The SLS consists of a core booster utilizing four repurposed RS-25 engines from NASA’s retired space shuttle, and two nonrecoverable uprated solid rocket boosters (SRB), also adapted from the shuttle. The first four SLS flights will expend the 16 remaining space shuttle RS-25 main engines, and the first eight SLS missions will expend the remaining shuttle SRBs. Subsequent missions will utilize newer uprated engines now under development. The initial configuration of SLS makes use of an upper stage…

A NEW YEAR brings a new crescent. When the earthshine is prominent on the 2nd, pick out “Full Moon” features such as Tycho’s rays, brilliant Aristarchus, the aprons of Copernicus and Kepler, and of course the lunar seas. The jumble of bright and dark arcs of the foreshortened craters on the lit crescent can be a challenge to identify. By the 3rd, the oval Sea of Crises north of the equator is fully illuminated. Cleomedes, named after a 1st-century Greek astronomer, is the large, 80-mile-wide crater adorning the north edge of Mare Crisium. An off-center hint of a central peak pokes out of the lava-covered floor, which is pocked by a couple of decent craters about 7 miles across. Kick up the magnification to seek out the long but thin…

THE PLANETS IN THEIR ORBITS Arrows show the inner planets’ monthly motions and dots depict the outer planets’ positions at midmonth from high above their orbits. THE PLANETS IN THE SKY These illustrations show the size, phase, and orientation of each planet and the two brightest dwarf planets at 0h UT for the dates in the data table at bottom. South is at the top to match the view through a telescope. JUPITER’S MOONS Dots display positions of Galilean satellites at 11 P.M. EST on the date shown. South is at the top to match the view through a telescope.…

IN OUR LOCAL GROUP of galaxies, the star cluster R136 stands out. Located at the heart of the Tarantula Nebula (NGC 2070) in the Milky Way’s largest satellite galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud, R136 possesses several dozen of the most massive stars known. Astronomers have yet to find another cluster in the universe that holds as many of these stellar behemoths. Although the Milky Way has nothing to rival R136, it does harbor its own super star cluster. Westerlund 1 contains an impressive array of a few dozen highly evolved massive stars. If the name doesn’t ring a bell, it’s because the cluster was unknown to scientists until 1961. That’s when Swedish astronomer Bengt Westerlund discovered it on a photographic plate taken through a 20-inch Schmidt telescope. These massive stars shine…

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing have reported evidence that the Moon was volcanically active just 123 million years ago, a geologic blink of an eye — a finding that has the potential to rewrite lunar history. The results come from an analysis of lunar samples returned in 2020 by the Chang’e 5 mission, and published Sept. 6 in Science. The craft plucked 3.82 pounds (1,731 grams) of lunar soil from Oceanus Procellarum (Ocean of Storms), delivering the first haul of Moon samples since the Russian Luna 24 mission in 1976. From the samples, the team meticulously separated about 3,000 glass beads ranging between 0.0008 to 0.016 inch (20 to 400 micrometers) in size. Laboratory analysis revealed that the majority of the beads were generated by the…

ONE OF THE MANY DRIVING FACTORS determining when Artemis will alight on the Moon is the spacesuits to be used by the astronauts. Apollo astronauts worked for up to three days on the Moon using spacesuits developed in the late 1960s. Long-term comfort and wear from the extremely abrasive lunar dust quickly became issues. Artemis will initially spend six days on the Moon, eventually extending to 30-day excursions, and the factors that surfaced during Apollo must be addressed for future explorations. NASA’s new lunar suits are being developed by startup company Axiom Space, headed by seasoned ex-NASA managers. Fashion giant Prada is lending expertise with stitching skills and working with exotic materials. The design of the new suit, known as the Axiom Extravehicular Mobility Unit, or AxEMU for short, is particularly…

GROWING UP, I was taught that there were nine planets in the solar system. That all changed in 2006, when the International Astronomical Union voted to demote Pluto’s status to that of dwarf planet. But now, there is a chance that within the next year or two, the solar system could once again be graced with nine official, full-fledged planets. The newcomer replacing Pluto presently goes by “Planet Nine.” If and when it finally shows up, it will get the honor of a real name, but so far, the evidence for this hypothetical planet is all indirect. Just as many of the thousands of known planets orbiting other stars have been found by observing their gravitational effects, rather than by actually seeing them, Planet Nine has been identified thanks to…

The Quadrantids are named for a defunct constellation that lies in northern Boötes. WITH A WAXING CRESCENT Moon in the early-evening sky, the conditions are set for the annual Quadrantid meteor shower. It peaks Jan. 3 and is best viewed in the hours before dawn. The Quadrantids are active between Dec. 28 and Jan. 12, with a narrow peak. The radiant rises soon after 9 P.M. local time, and by 4 A.M. it’s about 45° high. Expect about 25 to 30 meteors per hour if the peak occurs during the dark window of your observing site, corresponding to a maximum zenithal hourly rate of nearly 100, making it one of the best showers of the year. The Quadrantids’ parent object, 2003 EH1, was discovered in 2003 by Brian Skiff at…

YOU KNOW THOSE nice comets that burst onto the scene with so little notice they beat the publication deadline? We’d appreciate three of those! This year, no currently known interplanetary snowballs are expected to glow brighter than 10th magnitude or be well placed. Eager comet hunters with 8-inch scopes can test their skills to reach 333P/LINEAR at magnitude 10.5, but it requires a good star chart and ephemeris to nail it in the starry void. With respect to the North America Nebula (NGC 7000), the faint comet is west of Hawaii. But luck could be ours a short 3° star-hop south of Regulus. Comet 29P/Schwassmann–Wachmann has, semiregularly, outburst from magnitude 15 to 10.5, then taken two weeks to fade back down. You’ll want at least 150x for the 1'- to…

CASSIOPEIA (pronounced kass ee oh pee’ uh) the Queen is one of the first constellations amateur astronomers come to recognize. That’s because its five brightest stars form an asterism that looks like a large letter W. Cassiopeia is observable in the autumn and winter throughout the Northern Hemisphere. It lies opposite the Sun in early October. And if your location on Earth is at 46° north latitude or higher, this constellation is circumpolar, meaning that it will never set. Among the 88 official constellations, Cassiopeia ranks as the 25th largest and 30th brightest. It contains four stars (Alpha [α], Beta [β], Gamma [γ], and Delta [δ] Cassiopeiae) that are among the top 200 brightest in the sky. From the west to the east The first target on our list is…