Every story filed under this topic.
The bright landmark of Virgo is two hot stars completing an orbit in about four days. Their mutual gravity changes their shapes, and a small reflected-light signal offers another way to study the pair.
5 min readYour first observing session can begin with a few bright points and a familiar shape. Learn a simple route, protect your night vision and set realistic expectations for what you will see.
4 min readThe pale band across a dark sky is part of the galaxy we live in. Its dark patches are often clouds hiding background starlight, and those same clouds can become bright subjects for infrared telescopes.
5 min readThe brilliant star below Orion is easy to notice. Separating its faint companion is much harder, and that contrast tells two very different stellar stories.
4 min readA spiral galaxy and its elongated neighbour share a view near the Great Bear. Their connection reaches beyond appearance: gravity, newborn stars and powerful gas flows.
5 min readA bright point at Orion’s foot is an enormous hot star. Its light also reveals interstellar dust nearby, while small changes measured over time offer clues about the star’s interior and escaping gas.
5 min readThe small ring in Lyra is a view into a three-dimensional cloud. Images, infrared observations and spectra reveal gas through its apparently open centre and structures whose origins are still being investigated.
5 min readThe bright point beneath Leo's curved head is not a neat stellar sphere. Measurements reveal a swollen equator, unequal surface temperatures and a faint companion connected with its history.
5 min readThe old star cluster in Serpens contains rapidly rotating neutron-star remnants. Optical images and patient radio measurements reveal different parts of a much longer stellar story.
5 min readA nearby winter landmark contains a bright subgiant and a faint white dwarf. The smaller star used to be the more massive one, making the pair a useful test of how stars change.
5 min readA smaller magnitude means a brighter appearance, but one number cannot tell the whole story. Learn the scale, the role of distance and the difference between a sharp point and a faint extended glow.
4 min readThe Beehive’s broad patch resolves into individual stars through binoculars. Precise measurements add another layer: planets revealed by the motion of their host stars.
5 min readGemini’s two bright heads look paired, but Pollux and Castor have different distances and histories. Pollux is an evolved giant whose changing light also carries evidence of an unseen planet.
4 min readThe apparently steady northern landmark changes in brightness and size. Its companions and surface features turn a familiar navigation star into a test of how stars evolve.
4 min readA brighter sky can reveal fewer stars. Follow scattered light from a streetlamp to the background sky, then learn why maps and observations tell different parts of the story.
4 min readM35 is a young group of stars in Gemini. Its compact-looking neighbour, NGC 2158, adds a second story to the same view: greater distance and a much older population.
5 min readThe faintest corner of the Summer Triangle is an enormous star. Deneb connects a simple naked-eye landmark with a difficult question about how massive stars change late in their lives.
4 min readThe whiter head of Gemini is a hierarchy of three stellar pairs. Some members move around companions in days, while the bright visual pair follows an orbit lasting centuries.
4 min readThe hazy cluster in Canes Venatici contains a large population of stars that change brightness. Measurements across their cycles make those variations useful for studying stellar behaviour and the cluster’s distance.
5 min readTwo giant stars dominate the familiar bright point in Auriga. Their orbit and different stages of evolution turn a naked-eye landmark into a useful test of how stars change.
5 min readA small telescope reveals a two-lobed cloud in Vulpecula. Close-up and infrared observations show a more complicated story: a star’s lost material is being reshaped, illuminated and gradually returned to the space between stars.
5 min readThe orange-red shoulder of Orion changes for more than one reason. Its dramatic fading exposed dust forming near the star, while newer observations suggest a faint companion disturbs its extended atmosphere.
5 min readPlanetary distances, old starlight and tiny changes in position become easier to understand once the units and the measurement are separated.
5 min readThe dense cluster in Pegasus contains a rare planetary nebula. Its gas, central remnant and old stellar environment offer complementary clues to one star’s evolution.
5 min readA bright point with a warm colour belongs to a star that has expanded beyond the Sun’s present stage. Its apparent simplicity hides a much larger atmosphere.
5 min readA hazy patch becomes a crowded ball of stars under closer observation. Measurements of individual giants reveal that this ancient stellar group contains more chemical variety than its smooth outline suggests.
5 min readThe bright red heart of the Scorpion hides an extended, moving atmosphere. Maps of its light reveal gas motions and long-lived surface structures that help explain how massive stars lose material.
4 min readA cloudless forecast does not describe the whole observing sky. Compare darkness, clarity and stability, then choose a session suited to the conditions you actually find.
4 min readThe broad V in Taurus is the bright part of a physical stellar group. Former members extend much farther through the galaxy, leaving clues to the cluster’s history and the gravitational forces around it.
5 min readOne familiar point in the Summer Triangle hides a flattened stellar surface. Combining light from separated telescopes lets astronomers measure a shape your eyes cannot resolve.
4 min readThe bright eye of Taurus seems to belong to the surrounding V-shaped cluster. Its nearer position reveals the depth hidden in that sky drawing, while measured stellar changes pose another problem of interpretation.
4 min readThe seven stars everyone knows are only the tail and hindquarters of a much bigger animal. Meet the whole bear.
6 min readOur nearest star is a moving, magnetic ball of plasma. Its familiar light comes from a world whose surface, atmosphere and activity keep changing.
5 min readUse the Big Dipper's pointer stars to find Polaris in northern skies. The route works when those stars are above your horizon and clear of obstacles.
5 min readA hunter drawn in stars of wildly different ages and distances, anchored by a Belt so straight it doubles as a signpost to the rest of the winter sky.
6 min readThe 88 official constellations divide the whole sky into regions. Their familiar outlines connect stars that can lie at very different distances.
4 min read