This article is originally published on The Conversation with the title of “Why astronomers now doubt there is an undiscovered 9th planet in our solar system”. Samantha Lawler, University of Regina Planet Nine is a theoretical, undiscovered giant planet in the mysterious far reaches of our solar system. The presence of Planet Nine has been […]
Category Archives: Astronomy
The closest black hole that you can see it even with “naked eye” has been discovered
Well, of course, you cannot see a black hole – but the newly discovered one has two stars orbiting it, and you can see these companion stars even with the naked eye from Earth. The triple system is named HR 6819. Named QV Tel Ab, the inner component of the system is the closest black […]
A new Earth-sized planet (Kepler-1649c) in the habitable zone has been detected
A new Earth-sized planet named Kepler-1649c orbiting its star in the habitable zone has been detected by a team of scientists, using reanalyzed data from NASA’s Kepler space telescope, NASA has announced.
The moon looks like Saturn – amazing photo
Amateur astrophotographer Francisco Sojuel took an amazing photo of our satellite: because of the clouds, the Moon looks like Saturn – as if it is attempting to impersonate the ringed planet.
Freeman Dyson who imagined alien megastructures dies at 96
Sad news… Freeman Dyson, the English-born American theoretical physicist, and mathematician who imagined hypothetical alien megastructure called “Dyson Sphere” died on February 28, 2020. Freeman was 96 years old.
Why the night sky is dark?
Roger Barlow, University of Huddersfield Why the night sky is dark? It sounds obvious. That’s what night is. The sun has set and when you look up at the sky, it’s black. Except where there’s a star, of course. The stars are bright and shiny.
This is why light pollution in cities is a very bad thing
Do you remember when did you see a sky full of stars last? It’s been many years for me, I even can’t remember when I saw last. A lot of young people didn’t see even once, because of the light pollution in cities, since they were born in cities and probably never went to the […]
Five Moon myths – and how to disprove them yourself
Daniel Brown, Nottingham Trent University This year’s first supermoon will potentially grace the sky on February 9. A supermoon is usually defined as the largest full moon possible. This is a very loose definition and roughly means this happens when the full moon occurs within 10% of its closest to Earth. But in reality, supermoons […]
This is why we have Leap Years
Once (almost) every four years, we have a “leap year” which has 366 days instead of 365. Why it is like that? Why we have leap years? JAXA (Former NASA Goddard) Planetary scientist Dr. James O’Donoghue (@physicsJ) explains why we have leap years in his latest video.
Fastest human-made object: Parker Solar Probe
On January 29, 2020, during its fourth close approach of the Sun, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe reached a top speed of 244,225 mph (393,042 km/h) or 62.28 miles per second (mi/s) (109.18 kilometers per second) and once again became the fastest human-made object ever built. Despite it seems blazingly fast (and actually it is), it […]
