The differences in what Webb’s infrared instruments reveal and conceal within the PMR 1 “Exposed Cranium” nebula is apparent in this side-by-side view. More stars and background galaxies shine through NIRCam’s view, while cosmic dust glows more prominently in MIRI’s mid-infrared.
The Vera C. Rubin Observatory spent the night staring at the dark cosmos, alerting astronomers of ongoing changes in the skies in real-time.
The observatory fired off its first wave of notifications from its new alert system on February 24, sending 800,000 alerts to astronomers’ computers around the world.
Lasers aren’t only produced by humans here on Earth, but occur naturally in space as masers and, more powerfully, as megamasers.
While mapping out the neutral hydrogen in the Universe, the MeerKAT array serendipitously discovered the most distant megamaser ever in 2022, located 6.6 billion light-years away.
Now, that record has been broken again here in 2026, with a new gravitationally lensed megamaser shattering all prior records, yielding a discovery a whopping 11 billion light-years distant.
In the vast tapestry of the universe, most galaxies shine brightly across cosmic time and space. Yet a rare class of galaxies remains nearly invisible — low-surface-brightness galaxies dominated by dark matter and containing only a sparse scattering of faint stars.
Planetary systems such as our solar system take hundreds of millions of years to evolve. Since humanity has only existed for a sliver of that time, astronomers have only observed planetary systems at birth or, more often, long after they have settled into adulthood. There is an information gap about what happens in the middle.
But soon, this understanding will change. For the first time, astronomers are able to characterize the teenage planetary system TOI-2076 in detail since its discovery in 2020. The system, spotted mid-transition, offers a novel lens into the once-mysterious evolutionary stage.
Some of the universe’s most extreme explosions leave behind almost no trace. The original explosion is unseen, but our observations can capture the long-lived echo it leaves behind as the shock front plows into its surrounding environment.
After weeks of clouds and rain we finally had a clear night. Multiple telescopes were set up in the parking lot including Miles Starkenburg’s 14” (equipped with binocular eyepieces) in addition to our Takahashi 6” refractor, an 8” Dobsonian, and two Seestar (an S30 and an S50) telescopes. Additionally, the CDK on the roof was used in visual mode for the first time at a star party.
The first Astrophotography Special Interest Group meeting was held on January 24th. An excellent turnout of 14 attendees filled the observatory’s library.
If you’re interested in joining this group of ~20 astrophotography enthusiasts, please contact Chuck (cawraith@bpastro.org) with your name and best contact information to get you in the loop.
2026 has delivered us a perfect February, with the first and last days of the month falling on the first and last days of the week, respectively. These perfect months are rare, never occurring more than once every six years, and provide a wonderful insight into the quirks of the Gregorian calendar.
The Aurora have been in the news recently. What are they? What causes them? Why are they Northern lights? Where do the colors come from? Why do they shimmer?
Come to Cosmic Conversations and share your questions and knowledge with your neighbors.