Category Archives: NASA Space Place

Constant Companions: Circumpolar Constellations, Part I

By Kat Troche
NASA JPL

Winter in the northern hemisphere offers crisp, clear (and cold!) nights to stargazers, along with better views of several circumpolar constellations. What does circumpolar mean when referring to constellations? This word refers to constellations that surround the north and south celestial poles without ever falling below the horizon. Depending on your latitude, you will be able to see up to nine circumpolar constellations in the northern hemisphere. Today, we’ll focus on three that have gems within: Auriga, Cassiopeia, and Ursa Minor. These objects can all be spotted with a pair of binoculars or a small to medium-sized telescope.

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Connecting the ‘Dots’ with Asterisms

By Kat Troche
NASA JPL

In our December Night Sky Notes, we mentioned that the Orion constellation has a distinct hourglass shape that makes it easy to spot in the night sky. But what if we told you that this is not the complete constellation, but rather, an asterism?

An asterism is a pattern of stars in the night sky, forming shapes that make picking out constellations easy. Cultures throughout history have created these patterns as part of storytelling, honoring ancestors, and timekeeping. Orion’s hourglass is just one of many examples of this, but did you know Orion’s brightest knee is part of another asterism that spans six constellations, weaving together the Winter night sky? Many asterisms feature bright stars that are easily visible to the naked eye. Identify these key stars, and then connect the dots to reveal the shape.

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Spy the Seventh Planet, Uranus

By Liz Kruesi
NASA JPL

You might be familiar with Saturn as the solar system’s ringed planet, with its enormous amount of dust and ice bits circling the giant planet. But Uranus, the next planet out from the Sun, hosts an impressive ring system as well. The seventh planet was the first discovered telescopically instead of with unaided eyes, and it was astronomer extraordinaire William Herschel who discovered Uranus March 13, 1781. Nearly two centuries passed before an infrared telescope aboard a military cargo aircraft revealed the planet had rings in 1977.[1]

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Looking Beyond the Stars

Brian Kruse
NASA JPL

Looking up in awe at the night sky, the stars and planets pop out as bright points against a dark background. All of the stars that we see are nearby, within our own Milky Way Galaxy. And while the amount of stars visible from a dark sky location seems immense, the actual number is measurable only in the thousands. But what lies between the stars and why can’t we see it? Both the Hubble telescope and the James Webb Space Telescope (Webb) have revealed that what appears as a dark background, even in our backyard telescopes, is populated with as many galaxies as there are stars in the Milky Way.

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Super Blue Sturgeon Moon

Vivian White
NASA JPL

On August 1st, catch a full Moon rising in the east just 30 minutes after sunset. We are seeing the entire sunlit side of the Moon as it is nearly (but not quite) in line with the Sun and Earth. The Farmers’ Almanac calls this month’s Moon the “Sturgeon Moon”, for the time of year when this giant fish was once abundant in the Great Lakes. Cultures around the world give full Moons special names, often related to growing seasons or celebrations.

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Find A Ball of Stars

Linda Shore, Ed.D
NASA JPL

French astronomer Charles Messier cataloged over 100 fuzzy spots in the night sky in the 18th century while searching for comets – smudges that didn’t move past the background stars so couldn’t be comets. Too faint to be clearly seen using telescopes of the era, these objects were later identified as nebulas, distant galaxies, and star clusters as optics improved. Messier traveled the world to make his observations, assembling the descriptions and locations of all the objects he found in his Catalog of Nebulae and Star Clusters. Messier’s work was critical to astronomers who came after him who relied on his catalog to study these little mysteries in the night sky, and not mistake them for comets.

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Look Up in the Sky – It’s a Bird

Theresa Summer
NASA JPL

Bird constellations abound in the night sky, including Cygnus, the majestic swan. Easy to find with its dazzling stars, it is one of the few constellations that look like its namesake and it is full of treasures. Visible in the Northern Hemisphere all summer long, there’s so much to see and even some things that can’t be seen. To locate Cygnus, start with the brightest star, Deneb, also the northeastern most and dimmest star of the Summer Triangle. The Summer Triangle is made up of three bright stars from three different constellations – read more about it in the September 2022 issue of Night Sky Notes. “Deneb” is an Arabic word meaning the tail. Then travel into the triangle until you see the star Albireo, sometimes called the “beak star” in the center of the summer triangle. Stretching out perpendicular from this line are two stars that mark the crossbar, or the wings, and there are also faint stars that extend the swan’s wings.

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Solar Eclipses Are Coming!

David Prosper
NASA JPL

Have you ever witnessed a total solar eclipse? What about an annular solar eclipse? If not, then you are in luck if you live in North America: the next twelve months will see two solar eclipses darken the skies for observers in the continental United States, Mexico, and Canada!

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