Indholdsfortegnelse for July 2022 i BBC Sky at Night

Visit www.skyatnightmagazine.com/bonus-content/TUYY8NE/ to access this month’s selection of exclusive Bonus Content JULY HIGHLIGHTS Interview: Searching for intelligent life The SETI Institute’s Franck Marchis talks astrobiology, exoplanets and what he really thinks about UFOs. Watch The Sky at Night Destination Moon The team look back at the Apollo missions and discover how space agencies are preparing to return to the Moon. DIY Astronomy: Build a webcamscope Download plans and images to help you complete this month’s DIY Astronomy project (see p74 for more info). The Virtual Planetarium Pete Lawrence and Paul Abel guide us through the best sights to see in the night sky this month.…

On 10 May I took out my Dobsonian reflector telescope and pointed it at the first quarter Moon. I don’t use my telescope as much as I would like to but I was really interested in what I saw that night – what appeared to be the number ‘99’ within a crater on the Moon. I attached my mobile phone adaptor and took these photographs, then I remembered that Sky at Night Magazine had recently published a reprint of Sir Patrick Moore’s excellent Moon Map (issue 200, January 2022). I looked it out and compared my photos to it, and was able to distinguish that it was crater Clavius in the lunar southern region that I was looking at. This has fired my interest to take my telescope out more…

Live Home Planet National Space Centre, Leicester Hands-on displays, a giant globe, interactive floors and a spectacular marble run are all part of the newly opened Home Planet gallery at the National Space Centre, designed to inspire visitors to consider the human impact on Earth and our place in the Universe. Booking essential. Adults £16.95, children £13.95. www.spacecentre.co.uk Live Herschel to Hawkwind Observatory Science Centre, Herstmonceux, 2 July, 7:30pm Rock guitarist and astronomer Peter Williamson gives an entertaining talk that explores the connection between music and the heavens, including live music and a singalong. Tickets £18; £24.50 with food. bit.ly/3MZhJUi Live Saturday Stars Mills Observatory, Dundee, 2 July, 1pm and 2:30pm Come along for family-friendly astronomy-themed craft activities followed by some safe solar viewing through the observatory’s telescopes, all in…

“The SETI Institute is a non-profit organisation of astronomers, biologists, philosophers: anyone searching for intelligent life in our Universe. We search for technosignatures that could be coming from an advanced civilisation. Imagine one that knows we are here and beams lasers to send us messages. It may take a hundred years for us to receive it, but that’s the kind of signal we want to detect. “Maybe intelligence, technological intelligence, is not supposed to live for a long time. But if we find an intelligent civilisation, we’ll know that we – a biological and technological species – have a future. We would have someone to talk to, to exchange information with. “I love the Roswell story. It’s the start of modern UFO lore. Today, anyone can record a video in…

PICK OF THE MONTH Mars Best time to see: 31 July, 03:30 UT Altitude: 37° Location: Aries Direction: East-southeast Features: Phase, surface markings, atmospheric phenomena, polar caps Recommended equipment: 75mm, or larger We’re less than six months away from the next opposition of Mars on 8 December 2022, and it’s around this time that the planet starts to improve noticeably week on week. On 1 July, Mars shines at mag. +0.5 and presents a 7 arcsecond disc when viewed through a telescope’s eyepiece. At this time, instruments 200mm or larger will start to reveal surface features, present as dark markings on the planet’s globe. In addition, the southern polar cap should be visible as a bright ‘spot’ on the southern edge of the planet. Mars will appear 85%-lit on 1…

Asteroid 9 Metis reaches opposition on 20 July, having tracked from southern Capricornus at the month’s start into Sagittarius. This area of sky can be challenging to navigate due to the fact that it never gets very high from the UK. The start of the track is also less easy to navigate to, thanks to a lack of notable stars in the southeast corner of Capricornus. The situation does improve throughout July though, thanks in part to darkening skies, but also by virtue of a small kite-shaped pattern – the Little Kite – formed by 58 Omega, 59, 60 and 62 Sagittarii. These stars range in brightness from mag. +4.5 to mag. +4.7 and thanks to the area being devoid of much else, do tend to stand out. The asteroid…

Dwarf planet Pluto reaches opposition on 20 July in Sagittarius, close to the border of Capricornus. The mag. +8.6 globular cluster M75 sits even closer to the border and is a nearby navigational guide (see chart, above). In July, Pluto moves westwards, starting 1.5° west-southwest of M75. Our challenge is to locate and capture this distant world, which appears like a 14th magnitude star in a telescope. The best way to ‘see’ Pluto is to use the asteroid-tracking method of recording the suspected star field over the course of several nights, looking for the faint dot that appears to be moving. During July, Pluto’s magnitude remains a steady +14.3. Wed normally recommend at least a 300mm scope for this, but additional aperture can only help as Pluto is quite low…

Parker Solar Probe Closest pass to the Sun: 6.2 million km Launch date: 12 August 2018 Mass: 685kg In situ instruments: 3 Remote instruments: 1 Science goals: Investigate the Sun’s corona and solar wind Temperature: Heat shield can withstand direct heat of 2,500°C Orbit: Highly eccentric orbit which takes it out to the orbit of Venus between perihelions Solar Orbiter Closest pass to the Sun: 42 million km Launch date: 10 February 2020 Mass: 1,800kg In situ instruments: 4 Remote instruments: 6 Science goals: Investigate solar polar regions and sunspot cycle Temperature: 500°C Orbit: With gravitational assists from Venus, the probe will rise up 33° above plane of the Solar System…

2017 observing campaign telescopes: 1. Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA), Chile. 2. Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX), Chile. 3. IRAM 30-m Telescope, Pico Veleta, Sierra Nevada, Spain. 4. James Clark Maxwell Telescope (JCMT), Hawaii, USA 5. Submillimeter Array (SMA), Hawaii, USA. 6. Large Millimeter Telescope (LMT), Alfonso Serrano, Mexico. 7. South Pole Telescope (SPT). 8. Submillimeter Telescope (SMT), Mount Graham, Arizona, USA. Additional telescopes since 2017: 9. IRAM NOEMA Telescope, French Alps. 10. Greenland Telescope (GLT) 11. University of Arizona 12-meter Telescope, Kitt Peak, Arizona, USA.…

Practical astronomy projects for every level of expertise A webcamscope provides a simple and cheap introduction to astrophotography. As its name suggests, it’s built around the sort of webcam you might buy for Zoom meetings, rather than a DSLR camera. The components you need to make a webcamscope are widely available and, whether you choose brand-new or second-hand parts, they won’t cost much. You may even have some of them in a spare drawer. I paid £11 for the webcam and £16 for the 200mm M42 lens on eBay, while the eyepiece adaptor, which replaces the webcam’s lens, was £10. Second-hand M42 lenses are commonly available and, as they use a screw thread rather than a bayonet fitting, you can make a mount for one from an old rear lens…

Aurora streamers over the White Mountains John Chumack, Chena River Recreation Area, Alaska, 31 March 2022 John says: “I love the dark skies here. I could easily see several deep-sky objects with the unaided eye, including the Andromeda Galaxy, M31, which you can spot just below the green ‘piano keys’ in this shot. It’s usually almost –30°C here, but this year it was actually –8°C. This was much better for my camera batteries, which didn’t drain as fast.” Equipment: Canon 6D DSLR, Tokina 16-28mm lens, Bogen tripod Exposure: ISO 3200 f/2.8, 6” Software: Adobe Camera Raw John’s top tips: “To shoot aurorae, it’s vital to find a low, dark location with no cities directly to your north. Be sure to mount your camera stably on a tripod, especially on uneven…

VíCTOR M BLANCO 4-METRE TELESCOPE, 3 MAY 2022 Locked in a tango across an ink-black dancefloor and against a twinkling background of thousands of other objects, are two galaxies in the southern constellation of Horologium, the Clock. The vast galaxy on the left, a magnificent barred spiral, is NGC 1512. At 70,000 lightyears across it almost rivals our own Galaxy for size. At its heart is a stunning 2,400-lightyear-wide ring strewn with infant star clusters, called a circumnuclear starburst ring. Snaking far, far out into space are its huge arms, gleaming with countless hot, blue stars. Falling into their grasp is the dwarf lenticular galaxy NGC 1510. This tiny neighbour also glows with new star formation, triggered by its endless gravitational tussles with its bigger partner. Eventually, in several million…

OSIRIS-Rex to Apophis NASA has approved a second space rock stop-off for its asteroid investigating OSIRIS-Rex after dropping off its sample of Bennu at Earth on 24 September 2023. Its next target is Apophis – a near-Earth asteroid that will passjust 32,000km away from Earth on 13 April 2029 – and it will spend at least 18 months in orbit, though it will be unable to collect a surface sample. Mars’s solar-powered dust storms The Sun could be to blame for Mars’s annual dust storms, which cover huge swathes of the planet, according to a new report. The study found the planet was taking in more energy from the Sun than it was radiating out as heat, and this energy excess could be fuelling the storms. Black widow binary Astronomers…

On the 10 July 1974 episode of The Sky at Night, Patrick Moore took an image of the red supergiant star Antares. Also known as Alpha Scorpii, Antares is the brightest star in the constellation of Scorpius, and is often referred to as The Heart of the Scorpion. In the northern hemisphere, it is visible as a sparkling red gem in the summer evening sky alongside its much dimmer companion, Antares B. While Antares has a visual magnitude which varies between mag. +0.6 and +1.6, Antares B is a mere +5.5, meaning it is just visible to the naked eye, but its light is swamped by the nearby supergiant. The star’s red colour is due to the fact it is in the latter stages of its life span, and has…

Bluedot returns for four days of music, art and space science, all in the shadow of the iconic Lovell Telescope. Among the treats are talks by physicist Jim Al-Khalili, astronaut Tim Peake, space scientist Monica Grady and BBC Sky at Night’s Chris Lintott, alongside a bill of stand-up comedy, art and music by the likes of Björk and Groove Armada. There’s tons of fun for kids, with science shows, a cinema, hands-on activities and family favourite Brainiac Live. Then, as night falls, visit the pop-up stargazing station for an expert night-sky tour. Day tickets from £35; weekend tickets from £179, including camping. www.discoverthebluedot.com…

The Teapot is a familiar asterism of the southern sky. From the UK, it never climbs to a significant altitude when it’s at its highest point due south, so make sure you have a clear horizon in order to see it. It’s formed from a group of stars within Sagittarius, and the star Delta (δ) Sagittarii marks the point where the lid, body and spout are joined. It had the traditional name Kaus Meridionalis, which refers more to the mythological interpretation of Sagittarius as a centaur archer than a teapot! There are three stars in Sagittarius named Kaus; Kaus Borealis (Lambda (λ) Sagittarii), Kaus Meridionalis and Kaus Australis (Epsilon (ε) Sagittarii). The name Kaus means ‘bow’, the ‘borealis’, ‘meridionalis’ and ‘australis’ means northern, middle and southern. In mythology the three…

1 NGC 6790 Aquila, the Eagle, is marked by mag. +3.3 Delta (δ) Aquilae, which is a good place to start our tour. The planetary nebula NGC 6790 is located 1.6° south and 0.6° west of mag. +3.3 Delta (δ) Aquilae. It’s tiny, with an apparent size of 4 x 3 arcseconds, which is similar to the apparent size of Uranus. At this size, the 19,000 lightyear-distant planetary won’t show much detail, even through large scopes, but smaller planetaries tend to have a higher surface brightness. NGC 6790 is listed with an integratedmagnitudeof+10.5. Although in most amateur scopes it appears as little more than a blue/green fuzzy star, a visual OllI (Oxygen) filter will cause the surrounding field stars to dim while the planetary remains bright, an important planetary-hunting technique.…

Hinode, Japan An Earth-orbiting satellite built in collaboration with the UK and USA, Hinode launched in 2006. Its goal is to understand the link between magnetic fields near the solar surface and the structure of the outer solar atmosphere, as well as understanding the 11-year solar cycle. Daniel K Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST), USA With a 4m mirror, DKIST in Hawai’i is the largest solar telescope in the world. Its primary goal is to understand the solar dynamo, and it does so by taking high resolution images – capable of resolving magnetic features 35km in size – multiple times a second. Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), ESA SOHO launched in 1995, with the aim of observing the Sun’s outer layers including the chromosphere and corona. It helps give global context…

The technique of very long baseline interferometry combines data from pairs of EHT telescopes to reveal both the small-and large-scale structure of the target. The varying distances between the telescopes – known as the baseline – means they receive the signal from the black hole at slightly different times, which can be measured using very accurate clocks. As the planet turns, each telescope’s view of the Galactic centre changes, as do the dishes’ apparent separations as seen from the black hole. Such changes help ‘fill in’ the virtual antenna. To compile the image, a variety of baselines are needed, and the more the merrier. The enormous volume of raw recorded data (3.5 petabytes, equivalent to 750,000 DVDs) from each EHT site is stored on high-performance helium-filled hard drives and transported…

Melissa Brobby interviews Dr Iain McDonald What is microlensing and how many planetary candidates have been found in data from the Kepler space telescope using the method? We found five planetary candidates via microlensing, which works by waiting until the planets pass in front of a background star. Einstein’s theory of relativity states that light from the background star should be bent around the planet, which acts as a lens, making the background star brighter for a short time. This length of time depends on the mass of the lens and how fast it is moving, and for planets this is only a few hours. Sadly, microlensing events are one-time-only, meaning we might struggle to take more data of these planetary candidates. At this stage, can the composition and masses…

Hubble refines the Universe’s expansion rate The new measurement could help solve one of the biggest problems in cosmology Using over 30 years of observations, the Hubble Space Telescope has helped to create the most precise measure of the expansion of the Universe, known as the Hubble constant. The new value of 73km/sec/Mpc (kilometres per second per megaparsec) is now accurate to within one per cent, and means it would take the Universe 10 billion years to double in size. “The Hubble constant is a very special number. It can be used to thread a needle from the past to the present for an end-to-end test of our understanding of the Universe, ” says Licia Verde, from the University of Barcelona, who took part in the study. Astronomers have long…

Jupiter’s asteroid swarms The planet has hundreds of thousands of rocky bodies in front and behind The Lagrangian points around an orbiting body are special points in space, where the gravitation of the Sun pulling in and the centrifugal force of our motion flinging out act to balance each other out. These regions around the Earth are very useful for spacecraft. For example, the SOHO solar observatory has been parked in the L1 Lagrangian point between the Sun and Earth, and the WMAP probe that mapped the remnant heat from the Big Bang is at L2 beyond the Earth. There are also Lagrangian regions situated 60° leading and trailing any massive object in its orbit. In Jupiter’s case, its L4 and L5 regions are each populated by a swarm of…

The Sky at Day We all know what it’s like to plan a night of stargazing, only to find it’s forecast to be cloudy...again. So this month the team explore what you can see in the sky during the day. From the Parker Solar Probe to solar observing, Chris and Maggie take a look at what our Sun has to offer, while Pete Lawrence reveals other kinds of celestial phenomena before sunset. BBC Four, 11 July, 10pm (first repeat BBC Four, 14 July, time tbc) Check www.bbc.co.uk/skyatnight for more up-to-date information…

Astronomer to the stars Astronomy writer Jonathan Powell discovers a royal influence on stargazing The lofty position of astronomer in a royal court has afforded whoever held the position rare privileges, quite apart from the prestige and chance to mingle in higher circles. And for some astronomers, it was also the gateway to pursuing certain personal scientific projects that without royal funding, may never have been realised. In the very earliest ruling courts, the science of astronomy was still merged with astrology, before the two took their separate paths. Predictions made by these astrologers could weigh somewhat heavily upon them. After failing to predict an eclipse in 2300 BC, two Chinese astrologers attached to the emperor’s court soon found they were detached from their heads. But with the passing of…

Between 1953 and 2009 the UK’s Ministry of Defence researched and investigated UFO reports to assess defence implications. Investigations involved interviewing witnesses, checking radar tapes, analysing photos and videos and cross-checking against military activity, weather balloon launches, satellite paths, meteor showers and more besides. Most sightings turned out to be misidentifications of ordinary phenomena, but around 5 per cent remained unexplained, including sightings from pilots and cases where UFOs were tracked on radar, performing seemingly impossible speeds, manoeuvres and accelerations. In recent years the MoD has declassified and released nearly 60,000 pages of UFO documents. The most bizarre case in these real–life X–Files was the Rendlesham Forest incident of December 1980, near two military bases in Suffolk. An object briefly landed in the nearby forest, leaving indentations in the frozen…

DON’T MISS Thin Moons and planets BEST TIME TO SEE: 15/16, 17/18, 19, 21, 26 and 27 July at times specified The Moon circumnavigates the night sky once every 27.321 days, never straying far from the ecliptic. The main planets in the Solar System also tend to remain close to the ecliptic and consequently, the Moon makes a pass of each one every month. This month’s encounters are in the morning sky with Saturn up first. Approaching opposition on 14 August, Saturn is currently in eastern Capricornus. It encounters a 92%-lit waning gibbous Moon on 15/16 July, the Moon passing 5° south of the planet. On the night of 17/18 July it’s Neptune’s turn, although this dim mag. +7.9 planet will be tricky to see against the light from a…

Kepler is one of the great ray craters visible on the Earth-facing side of the Moon. Although it’s smaller than those other superb examples, 93km Copernicus and 86km Tycho, Kepler gets a visual boost due to its location within the dark lava of Oceanus Procellarum, a 700km x 500km basin occupying a good portion of the western half of the Moon’s face we see from Earth. Surrounded as it is by dark lava, the bright ejecta from Kepler stands out extremely well, radiating from the crater’s sharply defined rim. Kepler’s rim is impressive and rises to a peak height of 3,050m on the western side, the average crater depth being around 2,700m. Its sides appear to slope sharply down to a series of impressive, wide terraces. The overall appearance is…

1. The Summer Beehive The Summer Beehive (IC 4665), looks like a slightly smaller version of Praesepe (the Beehive Cluster) and, with its curved chain of white stars that form part of the letter ‘H’ in the inverted word ‘HI’, welcomes you to the summer skies. This relatively young cluster is a delight in binoculars of any size and you should easily be able to resolve 10 or more stars with a pair of 10x50s. □ SEEN IT 2. Poniatowski’s Bull We’ll continue with another easy object, one that looks better in wide-field binoculars than any other. Poniatowski’s Bull (Melotte 186) is a 4° diameter open cluster that includes the V shape formed by 66, 67, 68, 70 and 73 Ophiuchi. These 4th and 5th magnitude stars make it similar…

Although the star at the heart of our Solar System outshines everything else, its very brightness defies attempts to better understand it. Its light blinds any who look at it, while its heat scorches craft that venture too close. Despite this, specialised observatories have allowed solar astronomers to look on from afar over the years. But now there are two telescopes giving an up-close view of the Sun. On 26 March, the European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter probe sailed past the Sun on its closest approach yet, coming within a third of the Earth-Sun distance to our star. And last year, its observing cousin, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe, passed so near to the Sun that it flew through the outer layers of its atmosphere, sniffing out the pristine particles near…

The fundamentals of astronomy for beginners We would be amazed if we could look up at the night sky and see all the rocks flying through space around us. Our Solar System contains billions of them, all orbiting the Sun – like miniature worlds. Occasionally, Earth crosses paths with one of these meteoroids and it burns up in our atmosphere as a meteor or shooting star. But some survive their fiery passage and land on the ground as a charred rock. Most of these are never found, but a few are seen to fall and then are recovered to be studied by scientists. All these meteorites are fascinating, but some are more valued by scientists and collectors. One might even say they are ‘celebrity meteorites’. Here, we look at five…

Expert processing tips to enhance your astrophotos With the exception of targets like open clusters, stars are generally not the main feature of astro images. In fact, their presence can hinder us from teasing out nebulae and similar objects of interest. While some programs, like Photoshop, offer techniques to partly get around this, a new plug-in makes it much easier. In this article, I will look at the benefits of using StarXTerminator. The plug-in StarXTerminator, by Russell Croman, has been trained to recognise and eliminate stars from an image, by using ‘machine learning’ (artificial intelligence). Once these have been removed, the image can be processed with full attention paid to the target. When the processing is complete, the stars can be put back in, or left out (see images, above).…