BBC Sky at Night - November2016True

THE MISSIONS TO SEARCH FOR LIFE ON EUROPA
Sky at Night
THE UK’S BIGGEST SELLING
ASTRONOMY MAGAZINE
NOVEMBER 2016
#138
Mapping
the
Milky Way
Discover how we
pinpoint the billions
of stars in our Galaxy
MARS
The rovers’ return
Meet the Red Planet’s
new robotic explorers NEW LOOK
The stars of SKY GUIDE
Scotland
10 of the nation’s
QHVW YLHZV RI
the night sky
17 PAGES OF
STARGAZING
THE SKY AT NIGHT INTERACTIVE EXOMARS LANDING

EXTRA Watch Chris
& Maggie on
PLANETARIUM Project scientist
reveals how the
ONLINE the story of
Proxima b
probe will seek
the signs of life
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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR NOVEMBER 03
Welcome
This month’s
contributors
include...
Maggie Aderin-Pocock
Sky at Night presenter
Maggie We’re edging closer to understanding the galaxy we live in
muses on
the marvel
Back in September, the
that was team behind ESA’s Gaia How to contact us
Rosetta, satellite released the most
which was intentionally detailed map to date of Subscriptions,
0844 844 0254
binders and back issues
crashed into comet 67P our Galaxy. It’s a beautiful Mon to Fri 8am to 8pm; Sat 9am to 1pm for orders
in September. Page 19 Editorial enquiries
image that pinpoints the 0117 314 7411
Lewis Dartnell exact locations of over a 9.30am to 5.30pm, Mon to Fri
Astrobiologist billion stars. This got Advertising enquiries
Lewis 0117 314 8365
us thinking: how do astronomers sitting
reports on
how nearby
inside the Milky Way determine what it
would look like from the outside? Elizabeth
Subscription email enquiries
[email protected]
exoplanet Editorial enquiries
Promixa b Pearson finds out on page 70. [email protected]
We travel beyond the Milky Way this issue App enquiries
may have a magnetic
http://apps.immediate.co.uk/support
field that protects it much too, taking a star hopping tour of the [email protected]
like Earth’s. Page 16 Andromeda Galaxy. Often associated only
Amanda Doyle with its bright central core, the full extent of Editorial enquiries
BBC Sky at Night Magazine, Immediate Media Co
Astronomy writer M31 is much larger and offers those with Bristol Ltd, Tower House, Fairfax Street, Bristol, BS1 3BN
Could life larger apertures a great target to set their
thrive below imaging equipment to work on. Discover the monthly target for families with younger
the bursting extragalactic jewels that Pete Lawrence has members to enjoy observing together – not
plumes
seen on icy
identified in the galaxy on page 75. forgetting a new monthly challenge. We’ve
Jovian moon Europa? Observing Andromeda from dark skies brings also refreshed the look of the magazine to
Amanda considers the the richest rewards, and on page 39 Jamie give you what we hope is a cleaner, more
possibilities. Page 44 Carter reveals the best of these that Scotland accessible read that better reflects the cutting
has to offer. From Dark Skies Communities to edge technology of our fascinating passion.
Pete Lawrence
Astronomy expert
uninhabited getaways in the Outer Hebrides, Enjoy the issue!
Pete he shows us that some of the world’s best
delivers a night-sky views are closer than we imagine.
tour with Talking of the best views of the night sky,
a difference from this month we’re bringing you a new
– this one is
and expanded Sky Guide. As well as all the
extragalactic. We show
you how you can star hop regular pages, there are now new dedicated
Chris Bramley Editor
through M31. Page 75 sections on comets, meteors and asteroids;
variable and multiple stars; and a simple PS Next issue goes on sale 17 November
Sky at Night Lots of ways to enjoy the night sky...
TELEVISION ONLINE FACEBOOK PODCAST iPAD TWITTER

Find out what The Sky Visit our website for All the details of our The BBC Sky at Night Get each month’s Follow @skyatnightmag
at Night team will be reviews, competitions, latest issue, plus news Magazine team discuss issue on your iPad, to keep up with the
exploring in this month’s astrophotos, observing from the magazine and the latest astro news in now with bonus video latest space stories and
episode on page 19 guides and our forum updates to our website our monthly podcast and extra images tell us what you think
skyatnightmagazine.com 2016
04
CONTENTS
C = on the cover
NEW TO ASTRONOMY?
Get started with The Guide on
page 80 and our online glossary at
www.skyatnightmagazine.com/dictionary
Regulars
06 EYE ON THE SKY
Features 32 11 BULLETIN
The latest space and astronomy news
32 RISE OF THE ROVERS 19 WHAT’S ON

C How NASA and ESA's next rover missions
to the Red Planet hope to surpass Curiosity.
21 A PASSION FOR SPACE
With The Sky at Night co-presenter
39 '$5. 6.< 6&27/$1' Maggie Aderin-Pocock.
C Scotland abounds in recognised dark
skies – here's all you need to know to get
planning that winter getaway. 23 JON CULSHAW
44 IS THERE LIFE
75 Jon’s off-world travelogue continues.
24 INTERACTIVE
ON EUROPA?
C Fresh images of great plumes of water from
the icy Jovian moon have renewed hope that 26 SUBSCRIBE
we may not be alone in the Solar System.
NE
28 HOTSHOTS LOOW
69 THE MILKY WAY: K
FROM THE INSIDE OUT 49 THE SKY GUIDE C
C How do you create a map of something
you are trapped inside? That's the challenge
we face when it comes to the Milky Way.
94 50 November Highlights
52 The Big Three
The top three sights for November.
54 The Northern Hemisphere
75 DISCOVERING All-Sky Chart
56 The Planets
ANDROMEDA 58 Moonwatch
Learn how to star hop around nearby galaxy 59 Comets and Asteroids NEW
M31 in a special extragalactic tour. 59 Star of the Month NEW
60 Stephen Tonkin’s Binocular Tour
61 The Sky Guide Challenge NEW
69 Double stars in popular targets.

62 Deep-Sky Tour
64 Astrophotography
Shooting a photographic montage
of asteroid Vesta approaching M44.
80 SKILLS
80 The Guide
Tidal locking and the lunar cycle.
82 How To...
Turn a coffee container into a dew shield.
84 Image Processing
Sharpening with a high pass filter.
87 Scope Doctor
89 REVIEWS
FIRST LIGHT
90 Meade ETX 90 Observer telescope.
94 Altair Astro 100mm giant binoculars.
98 ([SORUH 6FLHQWL F PP p H\HSLHFH
102 Books
104 Gear
106 WHAT I REALLY

WANT TO KNOW IS…
What is the secret of AR Scorpii?
CONTENTS NOVEMBER 05
NOVEMBER'S BONUS CONTENT

ACCESS THIS CONTENT ONLINE AT
www.skyatnightmagazine.com/bonuscontent
ACCESS CODE: HML27KN
Highlights and much more…

Z Hotshots gallery
Z Eye on the sky
The Sky at Night Z ([WUD (402' OHV
In August, astronomers announced
the discovery of a planet orbiting the Z Binocular tour
Sun’s nearest star. This exoplanet,
Z Equipment guide
Proxima Centauri b, may be able to
support life and could be a target Z Desktop wallpaper
for future missions to other star Z Observing forms
systems. In September’s The Sky at
Night, the team explore how this Z Deep-sky tour chart
amazing discovery was made, and
look at the technology that could
make interstellar travel a possibility.
EVERY MONTH
Interview: the How Viking imaged Spotting a planet
Virtual
science of ExoMars the Red Planet around a distant sun Planetarium
Project scientist Håkan NASA mission scientists Find out more about the With Paul Abel and Pete Lawrence
Svedhem reveals how the look back 40 years since discovery of Proxima Take a tour of November's night-
probe will study Mars and Viking images of Mars were Centauri b in this short sky highlights with Paul and Pete.
what we might discover. beamed back to Earth. video from ESO.
Ad Services Manager Paul Thornton UK Publishing Coordinator Eva Abramik

Ad Co-ordinator Emily Thorne [email protected]
Ad Designers Cee Pike, Andrew Hobson www.bbcworldwide.com/uk--anz/ukpublishing.aspx
BBC Sky at Night Magazine is published by Immediate Media Reprographics Tony Hunt, Chris Sutch
Company Bristol Limited under licence from BBC Worldwide, who EDITORIAL REVIEW BOARD Andrew Cohen, Head,
help fund new BBC programmes. BBC Science Unit; Deborah Cohen, Editor, BBC Science
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EDITORIAL Director of Licensing and Syndication Tim Hudson
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COVER MAIN IMAGE: MARK GARLICK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, THIS PAGE: NASA/
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Art Editor Steve Marsh SUBSCRIPTION RATES
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£75; rest of world airmail £85. To order, call 0844 844 0260
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Head of Press and PR Carolyn Wray (0117 314 8812)

CONTRIBUTORS Audit Bureau of Circulations
Paul Abel, Maggie Aderin-Pocock, Sean Blair, Jamie PUBLISHING
Carter, Adam Crute, Jon Culshaw, Lewis Dartnell, Publisher Jemima Ransome
24,576 (combined; Jan-Dec 2015)
ISTOCK, ESA X 2, NASA, ESO/M.KORNMESSER
Glenn Dawes, Amanda Doyle, Ian Evenden, Managing Director Andy Marshall
Mark Garlick, Will Gater, Ben Kent, Pete Lawrence, © Immediate Media Company Bristol Limited 2016
Chris Lintott, Steve Richards, Steve Sayers, Giles Sparrow, MANAGEMENT ISSN 1745-9869
All rights reserved. No part of BBC Sky at Night Magazine may be
Paul Sutherland, Stephen Tonkin Chairman Stephen Alexander reproduced in any form or by means either wholly or in part, without prior
Deputy Chairman Peter Phippen written permission of the publisher. Not to be re-sold, lent or hired out or
ADVERTISING SALES CEO Tom Bureau otherwise disposed of by way of trade at more than the recommended retail
price (subject to VAT in the Republic of Ireland) or in mutilated condition.
Advertising Managers Immediate Media Company Bristol Limited is working to ensure that all of its
Neil Lloyd (0117 300 8276), Tony Robinson (0117 314 8811) BBC WORLDWIDE, UK PUBLISHING paper is sourced from well-managed forests. This magazine is printed on Forest
Director of Editorial Governance Nicholas Brett Stewardship Council (FSC) certified paper. This magazine can be recycled,
Inserts Laurence Robertson (00 353 87 690 2208)
for use in newspapers and packaging. Please remove any gifts, samples or
Director of Consumer Products and Publishing wrapping and dispose of it at your local collection point.
PRODUCTION Andrew Moultrie
The publisher, editor and authors accept no responsibility in respect of any products, goods or services
Production Director Sarah Powell Head of UK Publishing Chris Kerwin that may be advertised or referred to in this issue for any errors, omissions, mis-statements or mistakes in
Production Coordinator Emily Mounter Publisher Mandy Thwaites any such advertisements or references.
06
EYE ON THE SKY NOVEMBER 07
stars
A birthplace of
Hot young stars cause clouds of dust and

hydrogen gas to glow brightly in this stellar
nursery within the Large Magellanic Cloud
HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE, 5 SEPTEMBER 2016
Stretching over 150 lightyears across, N159 astronomers to refer to cosmic clouds like
is what’s known as a stellar nursery because N159 as ‘HII’ regions. Such regions can give
it contains all the right ingredients, such as birth to thousands of stars over millions of
cosmic gas and dust, needed for stars to years and are incredibly active during this
form. The young stars glow with intense period. However, as the stars grow and age,
heat and emit ultraviolet light that illuminates many will eventually explode as supernovae
the surrounding gas and makes it glow. or grow so massive that their strong stellar
These stars also emit streams of charged winds disperse the surrounding gas cloud,
particles called stellar winds from their causing it to expand into space.
ESA/HUBBLE & NASA

upper atmospheres, sculpting and shaping
the surrounding gas and carving dark patches YOUR BONUS A gallery of these
and filaments into it. Radiation from these and more stunning
stars ionises the hydrogen gas, leading
CONTENT space images
08
Rosetta’s swansong X 22.9km from

surface (11:49 UT,
ROSETTA SPACECRAFT, 29-30 SEPTEMBER 2016 29 September)
On 29 September at 20:50 UT, the Rosetta spacecraft was set on a
collision course with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, impacting at
11:19 UT the following morning. Analysing data over the coming years,
scientists hope to find out whether comets delivered water to Earth and
what role they may have played in the formation of the Solar System.
T Globular galactic relic

HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE, 7 SEPTEMBER 2016
Terzan 5 is a globular cluster that has been known to astronomers for
about four decades. A recent study using the Hubble Space Telescope has
revealed something unique: it could be a relic from the formation of the
Milky Way. The cluster contains stars that differ in age by about seven
billion years, suggesting stellar formation occurred in two distinct bursts.
Our Galaxy’s tightly packed central bulge is thought to have formed
from the interaction between clumps of gas and stars, and Terzan 5
could be one such clump, formed some 12 billion years ago.
ESA/ROSETTA/MPS FOR OSIRIS TEAM MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA, NASA/ESA, X-RAY: NASA/CXC/
UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM/N.REA ET AL; OPTICAL: DSS, SOLAR DYNAMICS OBSERVATORY/NASA
EYE ON THE SKY NOVEMBER 09
5.8km from surface,

(08:18 UT, 30 September)
16km from surface

(01:20 UT, 30 September)
W Slow stellar spin

CHANDRA X-RAY OBSERVATORY,
8 SEPTEMBER 2016
Supernova remnant RCW 103 glows in multiple
colours while its heart, neutron star 1E 1613,
appears as a central point of blue and white.
Neutron stars form when massive stars
explode and leave behind a dense, tightly
packed core. Further studies revealed it to
be a magnetar, a type of neutron star that
possesses the strongest magnetic fields in the
Universe. This one is the slowest spinning
neutron star ever detected, rotating once on
its axis every 6.67 hours. The previous
slowest neutron star turned much faster,
completing a revolution every 10 seconds.
Dynamic duo X
NASA SOLAR DYNAMICS OBSERVATORY,
1 SEPTEMBER 2016
NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO)
has been observing the Sun from its orbit
35,000km above Earth since 2010. This double
eclipse was captured by SDO at 07:33 UT and
shows Earth (left) and the Moon (right) partially
blocking the Sun. The image was taken just
after Earth had totally blocked the Sun from
SDO’s view. Note how Earth’s atmosphere
creates a fuzzy edge whereas the Moon,
lacking an atmosphere, has a crisp silhouette.
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BULLETIN NOVEMBER 11
PLUS
Bulletin The latest astronomy and space

news written by Elizabeth Pearson
CUTTING
14 CHRIS LINTOTT
16 LEWIS DARTNELL
Our experts examine the hottest
new astronomy research papers
EDGE
Shrinking Mercury is
STILL ACTIVE
The planet’s crust is shifting despite having no volcanism
COMMENT
by Chris Lintott
Confronted with a new
result, it’s hard not to
sound like a six-year-old
with an endless stream of
‘why’ questions.
Messenger tells us
Mercury is active, that
its crust is shrinking and
it likely suffers from
Mercuryquakes. But why
is this the case?
Because it has a core
that must still, at least in
2km part, be molten. That fits
with another puzzling
observation; Mercury
< Left: Mercury’s topography with higher regions somehow maintains a
NASA/JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY/CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON X 2,
in brown and lower ones in blue; right: small troughs magnetic field when
(marked by the arrows) indicate recent tectonic activity larger bodies do not. But
why is the core molten?
Mercury may not be dead after all. The planet is indicating that at least part of its core is still Maybe because
NASA/JHUAPL/CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON/USGS/ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY
still contracting, causing its crust to crack and warm and molten. Mercury is made
remain active, suggests recent analysis of images Larger scarps over 1km high were seen on differently. It seems to
have a larger share
taken by NASA’s Messenger probe. Mercury after the first flyby of the planet by
of heavy metals, which
Images taken by the Messenger probe have Mariner 10 in 1973. This confirmed that the planet means that it has a larger
revealed small fault scarps – stepped, cliff-like had contracted as it cooled in the past, causing core. A larger core can
formations – on Mercury’s surface. Their the crust to break apart and thrust upward creating stay warm and thus
diminutive size means that they would quickly the giant cliffs. It was only when Messenger’s molten for longer.
be eroded by meteor bombardment, and so must altitude was lowered during the mission’s final So why does Mercury
have been created relatively recently. stages that the probe’s resolution was high have such a large core?
“The young age of the small scarps means enough to pick up these smaller scarps, showing It could be the result of
that Mercury joins Earth as a tectonically the process was still happening. a primordial collision,
but really it’s here that the
active planet, with new faults likely forming “For years, scientists believed that Mercury’s
answers stop, leaving
today as Mercury’s interior continues to cool tectonic activity was in the distant past,” says
only questions. More
and the planet contracts,” says Tom Watters, NASA’s planetary science director Jim Green. study of this strange little
from the National Air and Space Museum in It’s exciting to consider that this small planet world is definitely needed.
Washington, DC. – not much larger than Earth’s Moon – is
The find corroborates previous findings active even today. CHRIS LINTOTT co-presents
that Mercury has a weak magnetic field, > See Comment, right The Sky at Night
12
NEWS IN
BRIEF
ECHOES OF
BLACK HOLES
Scientists have found a
new way to measure the
energy emitted when a
black hole destroys a
star. The feeding black
hole releases a flash of
high-energy ultraviolet
and X-ray light, known as
a flare, which obliterates The plume is the most
surrounding dust. How recent tantalising sign that
far this dust destruction we may not have to drill
extends depends on the to sample Europa’s ocean
power of the flare; past
Water jets seen over

a certain threshold, dust
is warmed instead of
destroyed, causing it to
emit infrared radiation.
By observing the flares
EUROPA
in infrared, it’s possible
to detect this infrared echo
and calculate the energy
of the initial event.
The fountains could help in the hunt for life

Plumes of water vapour may have been off Jupiter, indicating there may be plumes rising
spotted spurting high above the surface of the from the moon.
ASTROGEOLOGY SCIENCE CENTER, ESA/ATG MEDIALAB, ESA/ROSETTA/MPS FOR OSIRIS TEAM MPS/UPD/LAM/
SECRETS OF Jovian moon Europa in images taken by the The first sign of jets from Europa were seen in
THE GIANT
IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA, NASA/JHUAPL/SWRI, NASA/ESA AND G. BACON (STSCI), SAADEH ET AL
Hubble Space Telescope. It’s thought the water 2012, also using Hubble, when another team led by
NASA/JPL-CALTECH, J.GEACH/D.NARAYANAN/R.CRAIN, NASA/ESA/W. SPARKS (STSCI) AND THE USGS
SPACE BLOB originates from a subsurface ocean beneath Lorenz Roth witnessed them reaching 160km,
The latest observations the moon’s icy crust. looking remarkably similar to those seen now.
of a giant cloud of gas “Europa’s ocean is considered to be one of the “When we calculate in a completely different way
several hundred most promising places that could potentially the amount of material that would be needed to
thousand lightyears
harbour life in the Solar System,” says Geoff Yonder, create these absorption features, it’s pretty similar
wide have revealed that
acting associate administrator for NASA’s Science to what Roth and his team found,” says William
it is a galaxy cluster in
the act of forming. The
Mission Directorate. “These plumes, if they do Sparks of the Space Telescope Science Institute.
cloud is an exceptionally indeed exist, may provide another way to sample “The estimates for the mass are similar, the
bright object known as Europa’s subsurface.” estimates for the height of the plumes are similar.
a Lyman-alpha blob, the As the jets are thought to reach 200km above the The latitude of two of the plume candidates we see
light of which has taken moon’s surface, it would be relatively simple for a corresponds to their earlier work.”
11.5 billion years to probe to fly through one and take a sample. This The James Webb Space Telescope, due to launch
reach us. Observations would allow the ocean water to be analysed without in 2018, should be able to confirm if this venting
with ALMA, the VLT and having to drill through several kilometres of ice. truly exists. NASA is already planning a mission to
other telescopes have
The jets were found serendipitously during a Europa that will study the moon in several flybys,
shown that this rare
object contains two
campaign searching for signs of a thin atmosphere but it will not be able to take samples. NASA’s
large galaxies along around Europa, which observed the moon as it current mission to Jupiter, Juno, will not be
with many smaller passed in front of Jupiter on 10 occasions over venturing near the moon.
galaxies, which are 15 months. On three of these transits the team saw www.nasa.gov/goddard
likely to form a cluster. signs that water was absorbing the light reflecting > Learn more about Europa on page 44
NEWS IN
Rosetta: mission complete
The spacecraft now rests on the comet it has watched for two years BRIEF
After two years and eight billion km, Rosetta’s
mission has come to an end. The ESA spacecraft
was crash landed on comet 67P/Churyumov-
Gerasimenko on 30 September, reaching its
final resting place in the Ma’at region of the
comet’s small lobe at 11:19 UT.
Rosetta was still recording and returning data BENDING LIGHT
during this final plunge, imaging a series of pits FINDS WORLD
A planet orbiting two
noted for their intriguing features. Researchers
stars that was first
will now begin the task of looking through the
detected because of the
wealth of data Rosetta has provided. way light warped around
“Inevitably, we now have new mysteries Rosetta’s final image, taken it has been confirmed
to solve. The comet hasn’t given up all of its when the spacecraft was by the Hubble Space
secrets yet, and there are sure to be many just 20m above the surface Telescope, the first time
surprises hidden in this incredible such a planet has been
archive. So don’t go anywhere yet says project scientist Matt Taylor. found in this way.
– we’re only just beginning,” http://rosetta.esa.int The planet was detected
by gravitational lensing
– the bending of light by
a massive object – in
2007 by the Optical
Gravitational Lensing
Experiment. This
technique allows
observers to find planets
in much wider orbits
than traditional
radial velocity or
transit methods.
Rosetta was intentionally

crashed into the comet in
a controlled impact
UNIFORM
UNIVERSE
Pluto stained its moon Charon red Cosmologists have
proved that the Universe
The layer of red material seen on forming a thin coating of methane-ice expands uniformly, no
matter where you are.
Pluto’s largest moon during the that lasts until sunlight comes back
The assumption is
2015 New Horizons flyby could in the spring,” says Will Grundy, a
fundamental to our
have come from the dwarf New Horizons co-investigator understanding of the
planet itself. New simulations at the Lowell Observatory. Universe, but has only
by NASA suggest that the As the moon’s poles just been validated
reddish substance seen experience century- using results from the
covering both of Charon’s long periods of darkness, Planck satellite.
poles was once methane the surface temperature “[This] is the best
that had escaped from of the region can drop evidence yet that the
Universe is the same in
Pluto’s atmosphere to –257º C. It’s thought that
all directions,” says
and was then caught by although the methane-ice
Daniela Saadeh from
Charon’s own gravity. would sublimate when the University College London.
“The methane molecules Sun returns in moon’s spring, “Universes that spin
bounce around on Charon’s the hydrocarbons left behind and stretch are entirely
surface until they either escape may be irradiated into red organic possible, so it’s important
back into space or land on the Þ Both of Charon’s poles materials, called tholins. that we’ve shown ours is
cold pole, where they freeze solid, have a crismon cast http://pluto.jhuapl.edu fair to all its directions.”
14 BULLETIN NOVEMBER
CUTTING stars is equivalent to just 2.5 billion Suns,

Our experts examine the
hottest new research EDGE maybe a hundred times less than the Milky
Way’s few hundred billion-Sun mass. The black
hole detected last year in this galaxy weighs only
50,000 solar masses, and other small galaxies
have similarly small black holes.
Black hole beginnings Is that as small as things get? Perhaps not: the
hunt is very much still on. One thing that comes
The dark objects at the heart of most galaxies across clearly from the wealth of data the authors
have assembled is how complementary searches in
may not have started their lives as stars different wavelengths are, with X-ray observatories,
optical and infrared telescopes, and radio facilities
such as the newly upgraded Very Large Array all
pressed into service. In the future, it’s hoped that
survey telescopes like the Large Synoptic Survey
Telescope (now under construction in Chile)
will catch small black holes in the act of feeding,
waiting for them to betray their presence by
messily consuming a star.
Just by counting the black holes we already
know about we may be able to learn a lot. It
“It already seems

that black holes are
much more common
– even in the smallest
galaxies – than had
been thought possible”
already seems that black holes are much more
common – even in the smallest galaxies – than
here do black holes come from? We know that black had been thought possible.
W The common ones we see around

us in the Milky Way form as a result
of the deaths of massive stars. Their
larger, supermassive cousins found at the centres of
galaxies including our own present more of a problem.
holes exist thanks to
measurements of quasars
That’s surprising because if you want your
supermassive black hole to start off as a normal
sized one, produced in a star, it will initially weigh
very little. A small black hole, weighing maybe
10 solar masses, in a small galaxy is likely to be
A new review paper by Amy Reines of the US expelled from the system just through random
National Optical Astronomy Observatory and gravitational interactions.
Italy’s Andrea Comastri sets out the problem. Finding lots of black holes in small galaxies
We know that large black holes exist in the early therefore suggests that they can never have been
Universe because we detect light from quasars small. Instead of forming via stars, the idea is that
powered by material falling on to them within in the very early Universe material at the centres
the first billion years of its existence. of galaxies might be dense enough to collapse
Yet searching for primordial black holes – the directly to form a medium-sized black hole.
small seeds which grow to be today’s behemoths It’s a process that won’t have happened
– is always likely to be difficult. Instead, Reines anywhere in the last 13 billion years and yet,
and Comastri find hope in looking for seeds if more observations keep finding black holes
around us in the local Universe. By finding the in small galaxies, the evidence for it may be all
black holes in today’s dwarf galaxies, many CHRIS LINTOTT is an around us today.
of them undisturbed relics from the time that astrophysicist and
larger systems began forming, the idea is to co-presenter of The Sky
at Night on BBC TV. CHRIS LINTOTT was reading… Observational signatures
get a close-up look at primordial black holes. of high-redshift quasars and local relics of black hole
He is also the director
A good place to start might be the puny
ISTOCK
of the Zooniverse project. seeds by Amy Reines and Andrea Comastri.

galaxy known as RGG 118. The mass of all its Read it online at http://arxiv.org/abs/1609.03562
SpaceX outlines Mars plans NEWS IN

Musk hopes reusable rocket will make repeat trips to the Red Planet BRIEF
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has announced
ambitious new plans at a conference on
27 September: a mission to take over 100 people
to Mars in a single trip, with a reusable vehicle.
The plans hinge on a new spacecraft, the
Interplanetary Transport System, which at 122m
high would be 11m taller than the Saturn V rocket.
It would utilise reusable boosters and fuelling pods CHINESE SPACE
to allow a crewed module to be refulled while in LAB LAUNCHES
orbit and on Mars to reduce costs. The system The Chinese National
relies on SpaceX’s newly developed methane Space Administration
fuelled Raptor engine, which had its first test fire launched its second space
the day before the announcement. lab on 15 September.
“What I really want to do here is to make Mars Tiangong-2 is a
miniature space station
seem possible, to make it seem as though it’s
only 10.4m by 3.35m,
something that we could do in our lifetimes,”
which can house two
Concept art of the Interplanetary Transport System, says Musk. astronauts for up to 30
the reusable vehicle SpaceX hopes will take us to Mars www.spacex.com
days when combined
with a Shenzhou crew
module. The first crew
Moon-forming impact was a scorcher members are expected
to arrive in October.
The latest studies of isotopes in lunar rock samples The lab will be
show that the violent collision which created the capable of supporting
longer-duration missions
Moon was hot enough to melt the Earth’s mantle.
than its predecessor,
It’s thought the Moon was formed from the debris Tiangong-1, which was
left behind after a Mars sized planetoid struck the operational for nearly six
Earth. This collision produced a lot of energy, as years, but now appears
indicated by new measurements which show an to be out of control. That
overabundance of the isotope potassium-41 means the lab can’t be
compared to Earth. This enrichment only happens disposed of in a controlled
at high temperatures and suggests that the impact re-entry as planned, but
was hot enough to vaporise the impactor and it is expected to enter our
atmosphere and burn up
most of the proto-Earth. This created a cloud
in late 2017 all the same.
500 times larger than today’s Earth, which
condensed to create the Moon. The Moon was born out of a collision between the
https://wustl.edu proto-Earth and a Mars-sized body we call Theia
LOOKING BACK THE SKY AT NIGHT

November 1980 26,5,6 5(;
SPACE X, ISTOCK, NASA/JPL, CHINATOPIX—AP, UNITED LAUNCH ALLIANCE
IS ON ITS WAY
OSIRIS-REX launched on
On 20 November 1980, the is surrounded by a thick
atmosphere. Like Earth, this 8 September, bound for
Sky at Night team looked at
atmosphere was mostly nitrogen, the asteroid 101955
the latest images of Saturn,
taken by Voyager 1 as it flew but at a pressure 1.6 times Bennu. It has reached its
by the planet on 12 November, higher than our own. cruising speed of
nine months after Voyager 2 The images showed three new 19,800km/h putting it
first passed it. moons. Two of them, Prometheus on target to reach the
Voyager 1 found that Saturn’s and Pandora, were found to be 250m asteroid in 2018.
upper atmosphere was responsible for shepherding the “[OSIRIS-REX] will soon
predominantly comprised of narrow F-ring. The third, Atlas, is do something that no
hydrogen, but contained seven the closest moon to the edge of the other NASA spacecraft
per cent helium – slightly less broad inner rings. Voyager 1 also has done – bring back
than Jupiter’s 11 per cent. The discovered the faint G ring, around Titan’s hazy atmosphere is a sample from an
probe also revealed that Titan 170,000km from the planet. revealed in this Voyager 1 image asteroid,” says project
manager Mike Donnelly.
16 BULLETIN NOVEMBER
CUTTING Proxima b: how strong a planetary magnetic

Our experts examine the
hottest new research EDGE field it might generate, and how long such a field
might last. They constructed computer models
of Proxima b, based on it having an iron core, a
rocky mantle and a surface layer of water ice, as
predicted from formation theories of such planets.
Proxima b may have Since we don’t know precise details of the
planet’s properties, Zuluaga and Bustamante
a magnetic shield simulated over 1,000 variations of the planet,

across a range of masses, compositions and rotation
rates. And for each of these they modelled the
Three-quarters of simulations suggest the closest evolution of the planet’s interior: the internal heat
exoplanet to us has a radiation-blocking barrier flow, formation of an inner core, and for how long
convection would drive a dynamo and so generate
Scientists conjecture that a magnetic field.
since Proxima b is in the They found that around three-quarters of their
habitable zone of its star simulations of possible Proxima b planets do
it may also have an ocean indeed produce a magnetic field that lasts for at
least three billion years, and most provide a
magnetic shield that has lasted for the entire history
of the planet (four to six billion years). Zuluaga
“This is a planet close

enough that we’ll be
able to observe and
characterise it far
more fully than
other exoplanets”
and Bustamante therefore think there is a good
chance that Proxima b has a magnetic field
comparable to that of the Earth, and so is able
to protect its planetary surface. In this respect,
he announcement of the detection then, Proxima b remains an exciting prospect for
T of a roughly Earth-mass exoplanet

orbiting the closest star to the Solar
System, Proxima Centauri, is one of
the biggest astronomical discoveries of our
generation. All we know so far about Proxima b
life, and if you ever visited the world you’d be able
to use a compass to navigate its possible ocean.
As they point out, it is its proximity to the
Solar System that really makes Proxima b such
an important discovery. This is a planet close
is that it has a minimum mass 1.3 times that of enough that over the coming years we’ll be able
Earth and a year of 11.3 days. But this orbital to observe and characterise it far more fully than
period around its M-dwarf star places this other exoplanets – and so actually be able to test
new world within the habitable zone, and so our model predictions – using current and proposed
potentially Proxima b could support life. Our telescopes such as the European Extremely Large
galactic neighbours really might be closer than Telescope, James Webb Space Telescope, or Wide
anyone could possibly have hoped. Field Infrared Survey Telescope. In the farther
The problem with orbiting so close to an active future, we may even send an interstellar probe
M-dwarf star is that the solar wind could steadily LEWIS DARTNELL is an to the system to explore Proxima b up close, as we
strip away the planet’s atmosphere and so make the astrobiology researcher first started doing with the worlds in our own Solar
environment very difficult for life on the surface. at the University of System with flyby missions in the early 1960s.
Westminster and the
A strong dipolar geomagnetic field however, like
author of The Knowledge:
the Earth possesses, would deflect aside the solar How to Rebuild our World LEWIS DARTNELL was reading… Geomagnetic
wind and provide a protective cocoon for the world. from Scratch (www.the- properties of Proxima Centauri b analogues by
Jorge Zuluaga and Sebastian Bustamante have knowledge.org)
ISTOCK
Jorge I Zuluaga and Sebastian Bustamante.

investigated the likely geomagnetic properties of Read it online at https://arxiv.org/abs/1609.00707
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WHAT’S ON NOVEMBER 19
What’s on
The Story of the Solar System
Tacchi Morris Arts Centre, Somerset,
19 November, 8pm
Astronomer
Will Gater takes
Our pick of the best events from around the UK us on a journey
through the
history of the Solar
PICK System, exploring how
OF THE the planets were born
MONTH and how they grew into
the familiar worlds being
explored by our own
rovers and probes. Featuring live demos and spectacular
astrophotography, this is the story of how Earth and its
planetary neighbours came to be. Tickets are £12 for
adults and £10 for students. For booking info, go online.
willgater.com/solarsystem
Astromeet 2016
School of Music, University of Leeds,
12 November, doors 9am (event begins 10am)
Join Leeds Astronomical
Society for a day of
astronomy stalls and talks.
Among the speakers are
Prof Brad K Gibson, who
explores galaxy formation,
Þ This year’s winning entries are now on show in a free exhibition open to the public and Prof David Southwood,
who looks at the Huygens
IAPY 2016: The Winners’ Exhibition mission to Titan and Rosetta’s time at comet 67P. Entry
is £10 for adults, £5 for under-16s and students. For up
Astronomy Centre, Royal Observatory Greenwich, daily until 25 June 2017 to date information on the event, visit the website.
www.astronomyleeds.org.uk/astromeet.html
The winning images of the 2016 features the winners of the competition’s
Insight Astronomy Photographer of eight main categories, plus the two
the Year competition were announced special prizes and the Young Astronomer What Has Space Ever
during a ceremony at the Royal competition. Be sure to visit and take in
Observatory Greenwich on 15 this celebration of the beauty of the
Done For Us?
September, and are now available to cosmos. Entry to the Astronomy Centre Royal College, the University of Strathclyde,
view in a free public exhibition at the and the exhibition is free of charge. Glasgow, 17 November, 7.30pm
observatory’s Astronomy Centre. For more information on the exhibition From Mayan temples
2016 saw the judges really put to and the competition, plus videos and to modern computer
work, ploughing through over 4,500 guides on how to take amazing astro simulations, University
entries received from 80 countries images, and further information on how of Edinburgh postgraduate
around the globe. Covering distant to submit your own images in 2017, Matjaz Vidmar provides
galaxies, aurorae, the Moon, the Sun, visit the Royal Observatory’s website. a history of key astronomical
ROYAL OBSERVATORY GREENWICH/NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM LONDON, WILL GATER X 2,
the Milky Way and neighbouring planets www.rmg.co.uk/see-do/insight- technologies, how they
to name a few, this year’s exhibition astronomy-photographer-year came about and what they have contributed to
science. This lecture for the Astronomical Society of
Glasgow is free and open to the public. The society’s
BEHIND THE SCENES complete events programme can be viewed online.
www.theasg.org.uk
THE SKY AT NIGHT IN NOVEMBER
Four, 13 November, 10pm (first repeat Four, 17 November, 7.30pm)*
RETURNING TO MARS MORE LISTINGS ONLINE

LEEDS ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY, ESA - AOES MEDIALAB
As ExoMars begins its scientific Visit our website at www.

operations at the Red Planet, this skyatnightmagazine.com/
month’s episode finds out how the whats-on for the full list of
this month’s events from
mission is progressing and what
around the country.
scientists hope to learn from it.
Plus, the Sky at Night team take a To ensure that your talks,
look back at the history of observing evenings and star
humanity’s search to discover parties are included, please
whether life once existed on Mars. submit your event by filling
in the submission form at the
ExoMars is one of many missions hoping *Check www.bbc.co.uk/skyatnight
bottom of the page.
to uncover the mysteries of the Red Planet for subsequent repeat times
A PASSION FOR SPACE NOVEMBER 21
A PASSION FOR
with Maggie Aderin-Pocock

The Sky at Night SUHVHQWHU UH HFWV RQ WKH 5RVHWWD
VSDFHFUDIW DIWHU LWV LQWHQWLRQDO FUDVK LQWR FRPHW 3
O
n 30 plug? Well, I believe that
Rosetta was able
September to record and return
there are several reasons.
the Rosetta data right until Firstly, as Rosetta moves
spacecraft its final impact away from the Sun and
came to an end. It has into shadow it receives
been the space mission less sunlight; its solar
that just kept on giving, panels can generate less
and it has done so right power, which in turn
to the last. The craft has reduces the rate it can
had quite a bumpy send its data back to
journey! Rosetta launched Earth. Secondly, the
in March 2004 with the spacecraft always had a
Philae lander on board. limited lifetime and,
It had to undertake a being out in space for
circuitous series of over 10 years, some of
manoeuvres within the its components are
inner Solar System to get beginning to fail.
up to the right speed to Thirdly, there are the
rendezvous with its target, ‘marching army’ costs:
comet 67P/ Churyumov- managing a spacecraft
Gerasimenko, making flybys of Mars, transmitter was eventually turned off to takes manpower, and manpower costs, so
Earth, and the asteroids teins and Lutetia. conserve the spacecraft’s energy. It was not ending the project now minimises future
It was then put into hibernation for two and until 2 September this year that the expense. However, my favourite reason is
a half years as it travelled through space, finally location of Philae was discovered in high- that the Rosetta spacecraft had onboard
entering the comet’s orbit in September 2014. resolution images of the comet’s surface. instrumentation far superior to little
Rosetta’s Philae lander was released on Philae’s, so ending like this generates
12 November 2014 and journeyed to the The final manoeuvre high-quality data right to the very end.
comet’s surface at a leisurely 3.5km/h. Four weeks later Rosetta performed its Rosetta has gone out with a bang
However, the harpoons and thrusters final manoeuvre when the spacecraft was (actually more of a crunch) rather than
designed to tether it to 67P didn’t fire and directed to ‘land’ the comet’s surface near a whimper. I think it will go down in
Philae bounced twice, coming to rest in a some interesting features called pits. history as one of the most ambitious and
crevice. It ended up in a position where Mission scientists had previously selected challenging space projects of its time.
light was unable to reach its solar panels. the area using images taken by Rosetta With the revelations that we have already
Two days after touchdown its batteries ran during its orbits of 67P: the pits are gained and the data that is yet to come,
out of power and Philae fell silent. thought to reveal the 1-3m sized building there is no doubt that the mission will be
ESA/ATG MEDIALAB
As 67P’s orbit brought the comet closer blocks that may make up the comet seen as a monumental success. S
to the Sun, signals were intermittently – unchanged since the early Solar System.
received from Philae between June and After so much drama and such a Maggie Aderin-Pocock is a space scientist
July 2016, but Rosetta’s communication marvellous feat, why did ESA pull the and co-presenter of The Sky at Night
EXOPLANET EXCURSIONS NOVEMBER 23
JON CULSHAW’S
EX PLANET
EXCURSIONS
Jon pays a visit to the tantalisingly close planet everyone’s talking about
he recent internally lit Mars and I’m sense of opacity. The Alpha Centauri
T discovery
of an Earth-
like planet
orbiting inside the
habitable zone of
fascinated to see the effect
this has from the surface of
the rocky planet Proxima
b. This terrestrial world is
1.3 times the size of Earth
system makes a spectacular view in this
alien sky as two piercingly bright stars.
The planet’s surface is a breathtaking
blend of Earth and Moon. It’s a cosy
desert of perpetually undulating rock
our next closest star, and orbits very close to its – not so pale and bright as the lunar
Proxima Centauri, was star at just 0.05 AU. It’s a surface. The shades here are more
accompanied by much fast orbit too, completing charcoal and bronze bathed in the sepia
feverish excitement. a single loop in just 11.3 of light from the parent star as if through a
I wasn’t particularly our Earth days. Proxima b lies thick, nicotine stained window.
surprised to hear of this planet’s right in the middle of its tiny home From such an Earth-like vista it’s
discovery. Some three years ago on our star’s Goldilocks zone. a happy experience to glance up to
very first exoplanetary trip to Alpha Not all is peaceful with Proxima Cassiopeia and see the point of light
Centauri B, I’m sure the planetary Centauri, however. Like the unseen, within it, which is our very own Sun
scanners on my old Cruiser Globe vessel retractable claws of a petulant cat this glowing yellow. A quietly inspiring,
MAIN ILLUSTRATION: MARK GARLICK, SPACECRAFT: PAUL WOOTTON, PHOTO: EMMA SAMMS
detected a rocky world in this part of the flare star occasionally lashes out great comforting and joyful experience to
system. Let us zoom in aboard the radiation bursts, causing it to brighten observe that poignant connection to
Perihelion and make a closer observation. suddenly. At these moments the planet home from the surface of such a
What a charming and characterful star receives 400 times more radiation than strikingly similar Earth-like world.
Proxima Centauri is. If we consider a blue Earth does from our Sun. This certainly
hypergiant to be equivalent to floodlights will have severe consequences for Jon Culshaw is a comedian, impressionist
at Wembley Stadium, then Proxima potential life on this world unless any and guest on The Sky at Night
Centauri is a softly flickering candle in intelligent species keeps a store of
the Artful Dodger’s Dickensian window. factor 14,000 sun cream.
A low mass, red dwarf star of only Proxima b’s close proximity to its star
0.12 solar masses it has a faint, subtle appears to have made it tidally locked so
luminosity. This star is located in the I’ll steer the Perihelion to the daytime
southern hemisphere constellation of side for our on-surface observations.
Centaurus, the Centaur. Its relative What a beautiful and mysteriously
dimness and small scale means you need compelling Earth-like exoplanet. The
a telescope to view it from Earth. lack of blue light scattering makes for a
Approaching aboard the Perihelion, broodingly darker sky creating a
Proxima Centauri shimmers like an splendid astronomical vista with a deep
24 LETTERS NOVEMBER
This month’s
top prize: four
Interactive
EMAILS • LETTERS • TWEETS • FACEBOOK
Philip’s books Email us at [email protected]
The ‘Message of the Month’
writer will receive four top
titles courtesy of astronomy
constellations themselves aren’t very clear either. It’s
publisher Philips: Robin Go live for comfy a great idea as a free gift, it’s just not that easy to see.
Perry Chandler, via email
Scagell’s Complete Guide
to Stargazing, Sir Patrick lunar sketching MESSAGE
Moore’s The Night Sky,
OF THE There is a clear film protecting the planisphere’s
Robin Scagell and David plastic disc; peel this off and the text becomes
MONTH
Frydman’s Stargazing with clearer. The planisphere was designed to look like
Binoculars and Heather the night sky by day, but also to be used with a red
Couper and Nigel
light by night; what looks faint under daylight
Henbest’s Stargazing 2017
stands out more clearly under red light. – Ed
SOCIAL
MEDIA
What you’ve been saying
on Twitter and Facebook
Have your say at twitter.
com/skyatnightmag
and facebook.com/
skyatnightmagazine
@skyatnightmag asked: Þ Graham’s lunar sketches – crater Plato (top), the

what’s the farthest south Mare Nectaris (above left) and Fra Mauro (above right) Þ Shine a red light torch on your free planisphere
and you will find the constellations almost sparkle
you’ve been and seen the
Northern Lights? I very much enjoyed Will Gater’s article about
drawing lunar features, especially as I have Like nothing I’ve seen
@five15design been doing so myself for the past 15 years or so. On 14 September
An image
Vancouver, British I started with graphite pencils on white paper I observed an
by Pete
Columbia, 49.2827°N. but was introduced to pastels on black paper extremely bright light
Lawrence of
and have become a convert to ‘the dark side’. a tumbling in Ursa Major, in the
@jixxerkris Often get My drawing of Plato was done at the eyepiece vicinity of Upsilon
satellite
some great displays
but the Mare Nectaris and Fra Mauro were Ursae Majoris. I’m not
from Anglesey in North
Wales thanks to clear
drawn using an Altair GPCAM mono camera at all thinking UFO
northern views. to put a live image on my laptop screen. This but more supernova:
makes for an easier and more comfortable the light was there
@David_Scanlan sketching session. – dim – but got
#Portsmouth for me. Graham Sparrow, Bunwell, Norfolk extremely bright very
rapidly. There was
@SWilliamsUK1 It was What wonderful sketches, Graham. The black absolutely no
faint but there on 27.2.14 on white really captures the drama of observing movement (no plane or satellite), just a great intensity
at 20.30 hrs from
the Moon’s rugged terrain! – Ed and then it disappeared. This was at 21:49 BST and it
Lympstone, Devon,
was so bright it attracted my vision with the naked
50.647ºN.
eye. I’ve never seen anything like it before.
@awallacephoto Caught Constellation confusion Ian Trebinski, Chelmsford, Essex
the Milky Way and a I love the magazine and I was excited when I saw
beautiful display of that there was a free planisphere with the October The most likely explanation is a rotating satellite
PETE LAWRENCE
airglow above issue. I don’t want to look a gift horse in the catching the rays of the Sun at a single point along
#DurdleDoor #Dorset. mouth, but it isn’t very easy to read the constellation its path and appearing to flash and then disappear
names (even with my glasses on) and the just as quickly. – Ed
“I don’t need
a cunning
plan to
defeat
dementia.”
Sir Tony Robinson
Alzheimer’s Society Ambassador
I don’t have the foggiest idea how to kick dementia into the history books.
Thankfully I don’t need to, because I can help the people who do.
When dementia took my Mum and Dad I made a pledge that I didn’t want
my grandchildren to fear going the same way, so I’m leaving a gift in my
Will to Alzheimer’s Society. Without gifts in Wills one in four of Alzheimer’s
Society projects would not be funded, affecting both crucial research
and vital local services. I’m sure you also want to create a dementia-free
future for your family, but without gifts in Wills it could remain a dream for
generations to come.
Please join me by leaving a gift in your Will to Alzheimer’s Society.
For your free Will Guide, please call the charity’s Legacy team on:
0370 011 0290

Alternatively for more information visit:
alzheimers.org.uk/tonyrobinson
Alzheimer’s Society operates in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Registered charity no. 296645.
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28
Hotshots
YOUR
BONUS
CONTENT
A gallery
containing these
and more of your
stunning images
This month’s pick of your very best astrophotos
PHOTO
OF THE
MONTH
S Mars and Rho Ophiuchi

SEBASTIAN VOLTMER, SIDING SPRING OBSERVATORY, AUSTRALIA, 26 AUGUST 2016
Sebastian says: “Some Equipment: FLI MicroLine ML 16803 mono About Sebastian: “The 1994 crash of comet
weeks before the Red Planet CCD camera, Takahashi FSQ ED Petzval apo Shoemaker-Levy into Jupiter awakened my
passed Antares in Scorpius, astrograph, Paramount PME mount. passion for astronomy, and by the age of 12
I made a reservation at a I was experimenting with a telescope and
remote observatory at Siding BBC Sky at Night Magazine says: “Sebastian camera on a nightly basis. Later I studied
Spring in Australia. The is a worthy winner this month, considering the visual communication at Kassel University in
weather was very cloudy skill, knowledge and organisation that has Germany, with a focus on photography and
and most of the time the observatory’s roof gone in to creating this beautiful image. The film. My final project was called The Return of
was closed, but on the evening of the 26th the glow of Mars (centre left) and Antares (below Mars and contained footage from my own
weather was good enough to take multiple centre) is incredible; so too the bright hue of spin animations, as well as selfies by NASA’s
LRGB sequences of Mars nested in the Rho the nebula and crisp globular cluster M4 Mars Exploration Rovers. I like to take images
Ophiuchi cloud complex.” towards the bottom right.” of rare temporal events in the sky.”
HOTSHOTS NOVEMBER 29
T The Milky Way

JOHN NELLIST, KESSINGLAND BEACH, SUFFOLK, 3 AUGUST 2016
Mark says: “The beach had a good clear horizon to the south, making it ideal for a Milky Way
shot at this time of year. I wasn’t prepared for the amount of light pollution coming from
Southwold, which meant I had to adjust my settings, although I think the orange glow adds
something to the image.”
Equipment: Nikon D600 DSLR camera, Samyang 14mm lens.
S Sunspots
MARK HOOPER, TEIGNMOUTH,
17 AUGUST 2016
Mark says: “Someone asked me if I could do
a full image of the Sun through my Quark
eyepiece filter, so this was a test run of six
panels to see if I could align and process
multiple panels. Each panel is a 35 per cent
stack of 300 frames.”
Equipment: Point Grey Blackfly camera,

Sky-Watcher Evostar 80ED Pro apo refractor,
Celestron CG-5 equatorial Go-To mount,
Daystar Quark Chromosphere eyepiece filter.
T The Sculptor Galaxy

TOM BISHTON, BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA,
3 SEPTEMBER 2016
Tom says: “The Sculptor Galaxy has long been
on my list of deep-sky objects to image. Luckily
my equipment was stable enough to minimise the
shaking from sudden wind gusts, but I had to
check every frame to ensure the stars remained
round and I had enough good images to stack.”
Equipment: Modified Canon EOS 600D DSLR

camera, Sky-Watcher ED120 Pro apo refractor,
Sky-Watcher AZ-EQ6 Go-To mount.
S The Western Veil Nebula

RON BRECHER, ONTARIO, CANADA, 20-21 SEPTEMBER 2016
Ron says: “This was my first time using an OIII filter, which lets through the teal-coloured
light emitted by excited atoms of oxygen, similar to the way red (and some blue) light is
emitted by excited hydrogen atoms.”
Equipment: Moravian Instruments G3-16200 CCD camera, ASA 10-inch astrograph.
30 HOTSHOTS NOVEMBER
W Full ‘Sturgeon’ Moon

KEVIN JACKSON, SCARISBRICK, LANCASHIRE, 18 AUGUST 2016
Kevin says: “The shot was taken to coincide from my back garden
with the full Sturgeon Moon. I’d previously taken pictures of the
Moon with a DSLR, but figured I’d try for the first time stacking
with a QHY5L-II mono.”
Equipment: QHY5L-II monochrome CCD camera, Sky-Watcher Equinox

Pro 80ED apo refractor.
The Milky Way over an ancient

Mahneshan fairy chimney X
TAHA TEBYANI, MAHNESHAN, IRAN, 24 AUGUST 2016
Taha says: “My passion is to capture the stunning landscapes of Iran’s
most beautiful and historic sites against a night-time backdrop of stars.
Mahneshan is an ancient and historical region in Iran that goes back to
the Median Empire. I love the region because of its historical and
natural attractions and I regularly travel there to take photos.”
Equipment: Canon EOS 6D DSLR camera, Canon 17-40mm lens.
W The Sadr
Region
ANDRÉ VAN DER
HOEVEN, HENDRIK-
IDO-AMBACHT,
THE NETHERLANDS,
30 AUGUST 2016
André says: “I
started gathering
hydrogen-alpha data
for a monochrome
mosaic, but decided to
go for a narrowband
Hubble Palette.”
Equipment: QSI
583ws cooled CCD
camera, TMB92SS
triplet apo refractor,
Sky-Watcher NEQ6
Pro SynScan mount.
WORTH
£ 45 ENTER TO WIN A PRIZE! We’ve joined forces with Altair Astro UK to offer
the winner of next month’s Hotshots an Altair Astro
Planet-Killer 685nm Premium IR Pass Filter with AR Coating, designed to deliver sharper lunar
and planetary images with mono CCD or CMOS cameras. www.altairastro.com • 01263 731505
Email your pictures to us at [email protected] or enter online.
For terms and conditions visit www.immediate.co.uk/terms-and-conditions
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32
A
ll being well, on prior to the spacecraft’s orbital
19 October Mars insertion and will descend through
will gain a new, albeit the planet’s atmosphere down to
artificial, satellite. The the surface, recording data for
mission of ESA’s ExoMars Trace scientists and engineers back
Gas Orbiter is to investigate tiny on Earth as it does so.
concentrations of gases in the Red “The lander will use some of the
Planet’s atmosphere, in particular technologies, and will prove some
methane. This gas has been of the technologies, that we’re
intriguing scientists of late due to using on the 2020 rover mission,”
the question of whether its presence says the ExoMars programme’s
in Mars’s atmosphere is the result project manager Don McCoy. The
NASA/DETLEV VAN RAVENSWAAY/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
of a geological or biological process. “And the Trace Gas Orbiter will be

While the spacecraft will make in orbit to do the communications
important new observations at for the rover. So the two
Mars, its arrival into orbit will missions are linked in that sense,
also set the stage for another functionally and technologically.”
ExoMars mission: one that aims The ExoMars rover mission
to land a rover on the Martian has been in the works for some
surface in 2020. In preparation time. In fact, ESA’s aspiration of
for this rover, the Trace Gas Orbiter venturing to the surface of Mars
has a 1.65m-wide test lander that’s can be traced right back to the
riding along with it to Mars. Called start of the century, says McCoy.
Schiaparelli, it’ll be released “It actually came out of a strong >
Make sure you watch

November’s episode of
The Sky at Night on BBC
Four, when the team
ZLOO EH QGLQJ RXW PRUH
about what scientists
hope to learn from
ExoMars. See page 19.
FUTURE MARS ROVERS NOVEMBER 33
RISE OF THE
Will Gater looks forward to the arrival of a ESA’s ExoMars
rover and NASA’s Mars 2020 at the Red Planet
NASA’s Mars 2020 will bear no

small resemblance to its forbearer
Curiosity (pictured), which touched
down on Mars in August 2012
34
> desire to have an exploration what it does is it drills down,

programme,” he says. “In breaks off the core that it
particular, at the time has been drilling, brings it
there was a strong desire up and then it puts it into a
to explore beyond the special entry into the rover
Earth-Moon system.” which then puts it in the
Once a combination of ALD, the Analytical
parachutes and rockets get the Laboratory Drawer. It’s then
rover and its surface platform crushed, put into samples
safely onto the Martian soil, and smoothed [before being]
its task will be to look for any provided to the instruments
signs of life, past or present, inside for analysis.”
just below the surface. Like the What, then, might a
NASA rovers that have gone biological signature of life
before it, it will have a selection look like to those instruments
of instruments to make in-situ chemical analyses if it is there? “Real biological molecules are usually
as well as cameras to image its surroundings. But Top: ESA’s Trace Gas quite large, quite heavy and quite complex with
Orbiter arrives at Mars and
it’ll also have another tool at its disposal that should a lot of carbon atoms and various other atoms
releases the Schiaparelli
allow it to really get under the skin of the planet. lander; below: Schiaparelli associated with them,” says McCoy. “You’d see
on the surface, where it a lot of hydrogen, nitrogen, potassium and all
Going underground will deploy a small these other atomic species that are associated
Attached to the rover is a powerful drill capable meteorological station with biological molecules. On Earth we have a
of boring down beneath the Martian soil and pretty good sense of what a biological molecule
ESA–D. DUCROS, ESA/ATG MEDIALAB, ESA, SPACEX
retrieving a sample. It has been fitted with the would be and people will be looking at that
device because many scientists think that the kind of a comparison, I think.”
surface proper isn’t all that friendly to any potential As well as testing the ExoMars rover’s drill in a
life thanks to – among other things – the harsh variety of analogues for Martian soil while still on
radiation environment there. Earth – including a test soil laced with ice – the
“We set the depth of the drill to 2m to try ESA team have also had to think carefully about
and get below all of that to get a pristine sample where on Mars to actually send the vehicle. If there
of the actual material of Mars,” explains McCoy. are signs of life on the planet one type of location
The drill will work by extracting a small core of they may be found in are very old, undisturbed,
material from below the rover he says. “Basically landscapes that have an association with water. The
final decision on the location of the make it almost impossible to have a

rover’s landing site hasn’t been made rover that is as sophisticated as we
yet, but a group of experts assembled need to collect the right samples,” he
by ESA have selected a shortlist, which says. “And also it’s the combination
includes such locations, says McCoy. of the engineering that’s required
“They have come up with about four and the money that’s required to do
sites which typically are in the band all of that in one mission [that] is too
of 5ºS to roughly 25ºN in terms of the tall an order. And so the notion, and
latitude,” he adds. that’s all it is right now, is that there
would be a campaign of multiple
No lone ranger missions spread out over years to make
Wherever it does end up, the ExoMars it both affordable and to make the
rover won’t be the only wheeled engineering feasible.”
adventurer arriving at Mars four years For its part, the NASA rover will
from now. In 2012 NASA announced prepare up to 37 samples it collects for
it would be launching a rover to the any possible future return mission by
planet in 2020, based largely on the drilling them directly into titanium
design of the Mars Science Laboratory, tubes, which will be sealed on Mars.
Curiosity. Its scientific focus will be on “We’ll have 37 samples that ultimately
exploring Mars’s distant past. we will leave on the surface of Mars,
“We are specifically tasked with ready to be picked up by a future
seeking evidence for ancient life in two mission,” says Farley.
ways,” says Prof Ken Farley, the project Since the rover will be able to gather
scientist on the NASA Mars 2020 rover. multiple samples, it’ll be able to collect
“One is using a set of instruments material from different locations – and
that are going to be aboard the rover and the other The ExoMars rover different environments – that it visits during the
is that we are the first step in a potential campaign will drill up to 2m below course of its mission. That’s vital for addressing a
to bring samples back to Earth to be looked at for the Martian surface wide variety of scientific questions.
to acquire samples
possible ancient life and many other things that “The number of different scientific objectives that
unaffected by radiation
scientists will examine them for.” you would wish to pursue with return samples [dictates]
The rover won’t carry the means – such as a that you have a diversity of samples,” says Farley. “If
rocket – to send those samples home, however. you’re looking for ancient life the most likely things
Farley explains that trying to do so would create to be looking for are rocks that have interacted
two obstacles for the mission. “The first is it would extensively with water or have been deposited in >
ESCALATING AMBITIONS
Space agencies are not the only ones with eyes on the Red Planet
NASA and ESA aren’t the only ones with over 100 people back and forth between
aspirations of landing on the Red Planet. In Earth and the Red Planet. And now with
April this year the company SpaceX tweeted Blue Origin’s Jeff Bezos announcing that
its intention to send robotic missions to Mars his company aims to build larger rockets
as soon as 2018 using its Dragon capsule. in the future, the days of Mars being
Then in September, it announced plans to a world visited only by space agencies
build an system that could regularly shuttle may well be drawing to an end.
SpaceX hopes to make

regular trips to Mars a
common occurrence
36
TRACKS TO FOLLOW
Recent rovers that have explored the Red Planet
CURIOSITY
The Mars Science Laboratory,
Curiosity, landed in Gale Crater on
Mars in August 2012 after a descent
that culminated in the deployment
of an extraordinary rocket-powered
‘skycrane’, which lowered the rover
gently to the surface. Scientific Evidence for long-gone
highlights of its mission so far include streams have been found
the discovery of what appears to be at a few sites, including this
an ancient stream bed. outcrop designated Hottah
SPIRIT
On 4 January
2004 the
NASA Mars
Exploration
Rover Spirit
landed in
Gusev Crater.
Like its twin,
Opportunity,
it captured
hundreds of
awe-inspiring
The view from Spirit’s images during its mission, but in 2009 it drove into a
‘winter haven’ where patch of deep sand where it got stuck. As its power
the rover spent several drained it was unable to survive the Martian winter
months in 2006 and the rover’s mission came to an end.
OPPORTUNITY
If there was a
prize for long
service by a
Mars rover,
NASA’s Mars
Exploration
Rover
Opportunity
would surely
win it. It arrived
at its landing
site in Meridiani
Planum in Opportunity’s tracks just in
January 2004 and has been returning scientific data front of Victoria Crater; the
and images ever since. During its time on Mars it has rover holds the off-world
travelled over 42km at a top speed of 0.18km/h. roving distance record
Like Curiosity (shown here),

Mars 2020 will have six wheels
and be the size of a small car
> water like in a river or a lake – that’s great. It’s Above, left to right: the a postage stamp that might be indicative of a
not so great if you wish to analyse the composition Mars 2020 rover’s RIMFAX biosignature,” he says. “For example, organic matter
of volcanic rocks that tell you about the processes ground-pentrating radar, in high, localised concentrations. This would be
that differentiated Mars. You need different kinds which will look for buried exactly what you would expect cells to look like.”
ice and water; its dual
of rock to do those things.” To get the rover onto Mars so it can make such
optical camera and laser
spectroscope, SuperCam; observations the NASA team will employ a slightly
Stowing the samples modified version of the rocket-powered ‘skycrane’
NASA/JPL-CALTECH/MSSS X 2, NASA/JPL/CORNELL X 4, NASA/JPL-CALTECH/CORNELL UNIVERSITY, HENNING DALHOFF/

and the ‘adaptive caching’
SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, NASA/JPL-CALTECH/CORNELL UNIV./ARIZONA STATE UNIV, NASA, NASA/JPL-CALTECH/FFI

As the NASA rover explores the Martian surface the concept intended to store used with Curiosity in 2012. During entry, the
team will carry out what’s known as ‘depot caching’; samples for later collection lander will compare its view of the terrain to orbital
once the rover has collected a certain number of images to ensure it lands the rover in a prime spot.
specimens it will leave them at a designated ‘depot’ “From the practical point of view of picking a
point before moving on to explore further. landing site, the geologists love outcropping rock:
“Each time we collect a sample the value of our that’s where the science is. You don’t want to have a
sample collection grows. At some point what we are parking lot, a big flat thing. [The lander] will allow
carrying is scientifically worthy of return, so we have us to actually do what we call ‘land on science’, so
a very valuable cargo,” explains Farley. “At that point go to a landing site that actually has outcrop in it
the risk aversion for operating the mission will go and land right there,” says Farley.
way up, people will say ‘nah, let’s not drive over there, The nail-biting landings of the NASA and ESA
it’s too dangerous, we’re risking the cargo’. So we rovers will undoubtedly be major events for those
take the cargo and we put it on the ground. We have operating and working on them, but 2020 won’t just
basically driven the value of our cargo to zero and we be a big Mars exploration year for Western space
can continue to collect more samples and then the agencies. At the time of writing, Reuters was
value will go up and then we’ll offload them again.” ABOUT THE WRITER reporting that the Chinese state news agency,
As well as collecting valuable samples the rover Will Gater is an Xinhua, had revealed that China would be
will also scrutinise the surface with its instruments astronomy journalist, launching a rover to Mars in 2020 too. And so
for signs of past life. This will include careful studies author of several with not one but three new rovers set to arrive
of the shapes and textures of rocks in its vicinity, books and an on the Martian surface that year, Mars may soon
says Farley. “We’ll also have the capability on the astrophotographer. become more Rover Planet than Red Planet.
Follow him on Twitter:
Mars 2020 rover to look at the chemical composition, Humanity’s interest in exploring its enigmatic
@willgater
to look for variations at the scale of about the size of past, and intriguing present, refuses to wane. S
SCOTTISH SKIES NOVEMBER 39
The pristine skies

of Galloway Forest Park
earned it recognised
Dark Sky status in 2009
ABOUT THE WRITER

Eclipse-chaser and
dark skies expert
Jamie Carter is the
author of A
Stargazing Program
for Beginners: A
Pocket Field Guide
'$5. 6.<
Some of the world’s best views of the night sky are closer than you
think. Jamie Carter reveals Scotland’s darkest destinations
ARCH WHITE/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO, ISTOCK
A
sk any well-travelled Scotland. In recent years the country has and there is plenty to do by day with lochs,
astrophotographer or seen something of a dark skies movement, mountain and whisky distilleries galore
astronomer where the finest which began with Galloway Forest Park’s to explore. It’s also a favoured spot for
night skies are and you’ll get certification as a gold-tier International nacreous clouds, noctilucent clouds and,
several different answers. Chile, Namibia Dark Sky Park in 2009. Scotland now has in winter, even the mighty aurora borealis.
and Australia will crop up, but there’s numerous Dark Sky Discovery Sites, On the following pages we divulge some
one country that always gets a mention: many nominated by local astronomy groups, our favourite observing spots. >
40
S Galloway Forest Park,

Dumfries and Galloway X
The flagship area for Scottish dark skies, this 800km2 forest – which
has plenty of clearings and well-signposted Dark Sky Discovery Sites
– is the most easily accessible from the rest of the UK. A gold-tier
International Dark Sky Park, Galloway is home to Scotland’s biggest
star party, held at Drumroamin Farm each November. The road north
of Glentrool Visitor Centre is stunning by day, but at night head to
either the Clatteringshaws Visitor Centre or the eastern side of the
more remote Loch Riecawr in the north of the park for open views
over water and plenty of car parking space and hard-standing for
telescopes. The park has four dedicated Dark Sky Rangers who run
tours, walks and workshops on astronomy and astrophotography.
WHERE TO STAY: Drumroamin Farm Camping and Caravan Site,

Newton Stewart (from £12, www.pitchup.com)
T Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides

Since Dark Sky Discovery sites are largely awarded for their ease
of access rather than simply having the very darkest skies, the remote
Isle of Lewis does not have any! Cue the Cetus Project to build an
observatory at Gallan Head. A small peninsula in Aird Uig at the
most northwesterly tip of the UK, Gallan Head is listed by the Royal
Astronomical Society as an official dark skies area. However, a clear
ISTOCK, JAMIE CARTER, P.TOMKINS/VISIT SCOTLAND, KIRK NORBURY, CLARE MANSELL/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
Milky Way isn’t the only reason for the Cetus Project. The Gallan Head
Community Trust and Stornoway Astronomical Society are also hoping
to encourage study of the marine environment: orca, minke and pilot
whales, basking sharks, dolphins, porpoises and seals are all visible
from Gallan Head by day.
WHERE TO STAY: SEAcroft B&B (rooms from £70,

www.seacroftuig.co.uk)
S Isle of Coll, Inner Hebrides

Without a single streetlight on the island, the isle of Coll is one of
Scotland’s stargazing gems. This International Dark Sky Community
has low horizons, which is handy if you want views of the crescent
Moon or planets around sunrise or sunset. Held at Coll’s community
centre, An Cridhe, are ‘Coll & the Cosmos’ weekends (£75 for adults
and £50 for children aged 12 or under, 18/19 March & 16/17
September, 2017), a unique collaboration between Coll Bunkhouse and
Cosmos Planetarium (www.cosmosplanetarium.co.uk) that involves the
use of large telescopes up to an 18-inch Dobsonian, other Go-To and
Bluetooth-controlled telescopes, myriad binoculars and a digital 6m
indoor planetarium. There is also a hydrogen-alpha solar telescope for
daytime solar viewing.
WHERE TO STAY: Coll Bunkhouse (from £21, www.collbunkhouse.com)
Melrose, Scottish Borders X

Although it is true that the farther north you drive from Edinburgh
and Glasgow the darker the skies get, there are still dark skies to
be savoured in the south. In fact, the Scottish Borders offers some
fabulously dark skies, including at Melrose. Stargazers are spoilt for
choice in this part of the world. In Melrose there is accommodation in
the form of a glamorous caravan called Devanna, overlooking a lake
and perfect for staying close to dark skies. Just an hour’s drive south
into England is Kielder Forest Park International Dark Sky Park. This
area is the perfect stop-off as part of a northerly tour of the UK’s very
darkest spots.
WHERE TO STAY: Roulotte Retreat Devanna, Melrose (from £95,

www.canopyandstars.co.uk)
HUNTING THE
ALBAN AURORA
Where you need to be to have the best chance
of spotting the aurora without heading abroad
The aurora borealis can be seen from Scotland; however, so

unreliable are they that they’re best thought of as a bonus.
Outside of Scotland, the usual advice is to head to 64-70°N
(the Arctic Circle), but the auroral oval can reach much further
south. In Scotland, head in winter to the northern coast or
Orkney (both at 59°N) or, better still, the Shetland Islands
(60.5°N). Expert guidance is not essential, though note that
cameras detect a lot more green than the human eye during
faint displays and that most auroral displays appear white to
the eye. Photographers seeing a suspicious grey-ish cloud on
the horizon should shoot a 30-second exposure at ISO 1600
on a DSLR camera to be sure what’s coming their way. Auroral
displays higher in the sky won’t require such delicacy, but
The aurora glimmers

behind Duffus Castle
in Moray, on the
Scottish coast
S Taransay, Outer Hebrides

There’s only really one rule for dark-sky hunting: go where people
are not. Made famous by the BBC series Castaway 2000, it’s now photography is always the best way to capture colour. Avoid
possible to access the island of Taransay, which has no permanent June and July, when astronomical twilight never ends, with
population. A great place to glimpse the aurora borealis, it’s accessed November-February the peak season. Due to the sporadic
exclusively from the Borve Lodge Estate across the water on the isle nature of Northern Lights sightings, there are few dedicated
of Harris via a landing craft. The estate will offer photography tours. However, Aurora Expeditions organises a ‘Wild Scotland’
packages – including night sky photography – in mid-March and voyage from the Hebrides in the west to the Orkney and Shetland
late October 2017 hosted by Kirk Norbury (www.kirknorbury.co.uk). islands in the north (11 days from £4,035 per person, www.
The lodge also offers The Broch and The Rock House self-catering auroraexpeditions.com.au), while local photographer Mark
cottages (£514 for three nights). Appleton runs photography workshops in Wester Ross that
specialise in the Milky Way and Northern Lights (from £100,
WHERE TO STAY: Borve Lodge, West Harris (from £514 for three www.markappletonphotography.com).
nights, www.borvelodge.com) >
42
W Glen Nevis
Visitor Centre,
Fort William
A few miles outside Fort William in the
Lochaber district of the Highlands, the Glen
Nevis Visitor Centre was in 2009 the first
place to be nominated a Dark Sky Discovery
Site. The whole glen is rated as Milky Way
Class. Since it’s right below Ben Nevis, it’s
handy for hikers staying in the area (the
summit of Dun Deardail is also an option for
some elevation). However, for those after
more comfort and easy access to the night
sky, about 50km south down the east coast of
Loch Linnhe is Port Appin and the Airds Hotel.
Set in a wonderful, light pollution-free location
for stargazing, the rate includes a five-course
dinner and a full Scottish breakfast – if you
can get up in time after a night’s stargazing.
WHERE TO STAY: Airds Hotel and

Restaurant, Port Appin, Argyll (from £295,
www.prideofbritainhotels.com)
T Royal Observatory, Edinburgh

Even if you’re under a blanket of light pollution, it’s still possible to get closer to the Scottish
night sky. Arguably the HQ of astronomy north of the border, the Royal Observatory Edinburgh
(www.roe.ac.uk) holds frequent Public Astronomy Evenings (every Friday night from October
until April) where visitors can tour the observatory’s historic Victorian telescope dome, handle a
meteorite and observe the sky and planets through telescopes – clear skies allowing.
WHERE TO STAY: Brae Lodge Guest House, (from £62, www.braelodge.com)

PRIDE OF BRITAIN HOTELS, ROYAL OBSERVATORY EDINBURGH, SIMON VIVIAN, DUNCAN S SMITH, ISTOCK X 2
S Eriska, Argyll
and Bute
Here’s one for those looking for five stars to
go with the 2,000 already in the skies above.
Close to Port Appin but on a private island all
of its own, Eriska has 350 acres of seclusion
with vehicle bridge access. The island’s
25-bedroom, five-star Isle of Eriska Hotel
offers an Escape With The Stars Experience,
which includes two nights’ bed and breakfast
with afternoon tea, dinner in the Michelin-
starred restaurant, a hot flask and star map
(£400 per person).
WHERE TO STAY: Eriska Hotel (from £400,

www.eriska-hotel.co.uk)
Isle of Skye,
Inner Hebrides X
With no less than nine Milky Way Class Dark Sky
Discovery Sites as part of the Dark Skye project
(www.darksky-skye.com), this island is at the
forefront of Scotland’s stargazing movement. Three of
the Dark Sky Discovery Sites are found in the northwest
around Waternish, another is near Broadford, and
another two are at Kylerhea and Kinloch Forest. The
remaining three can be found on Clan Donald land at
Armadale in the southwest. Blessed with zero light
pollution, this area is known for sightings of the
aurora borealis in winter in Glendale in the north,
and noctilucent clouds in summer. The cosy Black
Shed accommodation is below the dramatic peak of
Macleod’s Table and close to three of Skye’s most
remote northerly Dark Sky Discovery Sites.
WHERE TO STAY: Black Shed, Dunvegan

(from £85, www.canopyandstars.co.uk/blackshed)
SCOTLAND’S DARKEST
DESTINATIONS
:KHUH WR QG WKH ZRQGHUIXOO\ SULVWLQH
GDUN VN\ SDUDGLVHV ZH YH PHQWLRQHG
Thurso John o’ Groats

3 10 Wick
5
Ullapool
9 Fraserburgh
Elgin
STCaithness, North Highlands Portree Inverness Peterhead
Inverurie
Other than Shetland or Orkney, the best place to spot the aurora Aviemore
Aberdeen
borealis is the area of Caithness on the north coast. Something of
6
a mecca for astrophotographers, this region boasts many places
with zero light pollution. The most accessible is the Castlehill Heritage 2
Centre in Caithness, which is designated a Dark Sky Discovery Site. 7 Abroath
Dundee
The local Caithness Astronomy Group regularly host stargazing
evenings there. The most northerly point of mainland Britain is Oban Perth St Andrews
nearby at Dunnet Head, with a spacious caravan site that is ideal
for solitary tranquillity and stargazing. 8
Paisley Edinburgh
WHERE TO STAY: Dunnet Bay Caravan Club Site (from £21.80, Glasgow
www.caravanclub.co.uk) S 4
Ayr
1
Dumfries
1. Galloway Forest Park, Fort William

Dumfries and Galloway 7. Eriska, Argyll
2. Isle of Coll, Inner Hebrides and Bute
3. Isle of Lewis, Outer Hebrides 8. Royal Observatory,
4. Melrose, Scottish Borders Edinburgh
5. Taransay, Outer Hebrides 9. Isle of Skye, Inner Hebrides
6. Glen Nevis Visitor Centre, 10. Caithness, North Highlands
44
“The latest observation

of the plumes adds
weight to evidence
for an active water
cycle on Europa”
ACTIVITY ON EUROPA NOVEMBER 45
IS THERE LIFE ON
Amanda Doyle looks at the evidence for life amid Europa’s

apparent plumes and examines the missions that could deliver proof
E
uropa is the smallest of Jupiter’s
Galilean moons, its strange icy
surface riddled with fractures. But
it is what lies beneath the surface
that is of most interest to scientists: in September,
Hubble captured images of finger-like projections
coming from Europa’s limb.
One possible explanation for these findings
is plumes of water vapour bursting out from ABOUT THE WRITER
Europa, a theory that is supported by earlier Amanda Doyle is
Hubble observations in 2012, when its a postdoctoral
spectroscope identified water vapour in the researcher at the
moon’s south polar region. Both observations University of
are strong evidence that Europa boasts a Warwick and
editor of the SPA’s
subsurface liquid ocean, making the moon
quarterly magazine
one of the best places in the Solar System
to search for alien life.
The first evidence for Europa’s The latest plume has been spotted in the same
place as this spectroscopic Hubble observation
subsurface ocean came from the
of auroral emmissions from 2012
Galileo spacecraft. Jupiter’s
immense gravity causes a tidal
bulge to be raised on Europa, being broken apart by Jupiter’s
and this tidal heating is powerful magnetic field.
sufficient to cause some of the The latest observation was
ice to melt below the surface. announced in September
Magnetometer readings 2016, when further
STOCKTREK IMAGES, INC./ALAMY STOCK PHOTO, ISTOCK, NASA/JPL-CALTECH/SETI INSTITUTE,
from Galileo showed that evidence for these plumes

Europa has an induced was revealed. Initially
magnetic field, which searching for a tenuous
can only occur if there atmosphere surrounding
is a medium in which Europa by viewing the
a current can travel, moon transiting in front
such as salty water. of Jupiter, William Sparks
from the Space Telescope
NASA/ESA/L. ROTH/SWRI/UNIVERSITY OF COLOGNE
Water in the aurora Science Institute was surprised

In 2013, a team led by Lorenz to find traces of a water plume.
Roth from the Southwest “By an interesting coincidence,
Research Institute in Texas Roth and the team announced their
announced the detection of what discovery of evidence for plumes using
appeared to be a plume rising into space [Hubble] STIS spectroscopy within a couple
in data. They used the spectrograph on of weeks of our transit program beginning,”
Hubble to determine that an ultraviolet auroral The latest plume (circled); said Sparks. “Our approach is independent, but
glow from Europa’s south pole – observed in it could rise more than that changed the landscape and people started
2012 – was possibly caused by water molecules 160km above the surface looking right away for plumes.” >
46
DRILLING DEEP
The technology for drilling
through Europa’s thick ice
crust has been tested
Drilling through the Antarctic ice to the lakes

below is an excellent testbed for studying the
type of life that might exist beneath Europa’s
surface, as such organisms are cut off from the
atmosphere and from sunlight. These Antarctic
lakes are kept in liquid form due to the immense
pressure from the ice above.
There have been numerous drilling expeditions
to such subglacial lakes, and the first successful
CHRISTIAN DARKIN/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, NICOLLE RAGER-FULLER/NSF - US NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION, NASA/JPL/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA,
breach of the overlying ice occurred in February

2012 when a Russian team reached the waters
> Sparks’ latest observation of the plumes adds If Europa has of Lake Vostok (pictured above), some 4km
weight to evidence for an active water cycle on hydrothermal vents at below the ice. DNA analysis of the surrounding
Europa, but is this an environment that could the bottom of its ocean, ice has shown that microbial life likely exists
support life? There are three key ingredients for life we might find life around in the lake, although this has yet to be confirmed
them; that’s certainly from the lake water itself.
as we know it, and water is only one of them. The
the case on Earth Not all expeditions are so lucky. On Christmas
correct ‘biogenic elements’ need to be present in
Day in 2012, a UK-led project to explore Lake
order to provide the building blocks for life and an
Ellsworth failed when they were unable to drill
energy source is also considered essential. through the 3km of ice above the lake.
If life on Europa were to avail itself of In 2013, an American team had more success
photosynthesis as an energy source, it would have to when they broke through 800m of ice to reach
be situated near the surface, where ice is potentially Lake Whillans. There is also an extensive network
NASA/JPL-CALTECH/SETI INSTITUTE, NORTHROP GRUMMAN, NASA/JPL-CALTECH, ESA/AOES
thin enough for sunlight to filter through. However, of streams, and the entire area covers around
living near the surface has its pitfalls, as radiation 60 square kilometres. Analysis of the lake water
revealed nearly 4,000 species of microbes.
from Jupiter would likely exterminate anything
unprotected by thick ice.
in freezing conditions on Europa, but we know
As on Earth, so on Europa? that there is microbial life on Earth that is
In the pitch-black depths of Earth’s oceans, extremely resilient to such hostile environments.
hydrothermal vents spew out enough hot material Microorganisms are known to survive in Antarctic
for ecosystems to thrive despite never seeing ice by producing their own antifreeze, and lakes
sunlight. If similar vents were to exist on Europa situated far below the ice also have microbial life.
they could provide a safe haven for life. It is If some form of life exists on Europa, then
unknown how the tidal heating occurs on the Listen to a Radio 4 could it be detected? “If the biomass in the plumes
icy moon but if the heating were to penetrate documentary exploring were high enough, it may be possible to find
to the core, then the flow of heat up from the the idea that Europa biosignatures,” Sparks explains. “A more likely
ocean floor could create vents. However, if the might be home to approach – and plumes are very relevant – is
living organisms.
heating is restricted to the upper layers of ice, that presumably most of the plume material gets
www.bbc.co.uk/
then venting would not occur. programmes/b00qf5wp deposited back on to the surface. Along with all
It may seem far-fetched that life could exist the other places on Europa where material appears
ACTIVITY ON EUROPA NOVEMBER 47
to have seeped out onto the surface, that would

certainly be a place you’d want to look.”
The best way to explore Europa and the
tantalising possibility of life would be to send
a lander with a powerful drill, which would
ultimately drop a probe into the ocean below.
Such an ambitious project is still many decades
away, but there are missions planned which will
take the first steps in revealing the moon’s secrets.
ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is not
a life-finding mission, but it does have the ability
to finally confirm the existence of the subsurface
ocean on Europa, as well as measure the thickness
of the ice shell. JUICE will also explore the chemistry
of the moon to ascertain if it has the right
chemical soup needed for life. Meanwhile, NASA
is planning the Europa Multiple-Flyby Mission,
also known as the Europa Clipper. While the goals
of this mission and JUICE are similar, the NASA
mission will spend more time focussed on Europa.
There is also the possibility that this mission will
include a small lander.
Both missions will further our knowledge of the
surface of Europa and what lies beneath, thus paving The white ejecta rays surrounding crater Pwyll on Europa are thought to be fresh
the way for a mission dedicated to finding life. S water-ice particles; it’s areas like this that could contain signs of microbial life
EXAMINING EUROPA
Several planned missions will further our knowledge of whether
the icy Jovian moon’s environment is right for life
James Webb Space Telescope Europa Multiple-Flyby Mission Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), NASA’s mission to Europa was approved in ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is
due to launch in 2018, will have the 2015 and a suite of nine scientific instruments due to launch in 2022 and reach the Jovian
capability of confirming the existence of has been announced for the orbiter. These system in 2030, spending three and a half
plumes of water emanating from Europa. It include high-resolution cameras, spectrometers, years studying the moons of Jupiter. It will
will also be able to observe Europa in an ice-penetrating radar and a magnetometer. perform two flybys of Europa before moving
regions of infrared light that are invisible to The latter will be used to determine the depth on to Callisto and then eventually settling
Hubble. If water plumes do indeed exist, and salinity of the ocean by measuring the into an orbit around Ganymede, the main
JWST will detect the water signatures in the direction and strength of Europa’s magnetic focus of the mission. JUICE will study surface
infrared. These observations are impossible field. Thermal mapping of the surface will also features on Europa to ascertain how they
from Earth, as the water vapour in the reveal any recent eruptions of warmer water formed. By thoroughly analysing the
atmosphere blocks the view. However, as from below the ice. The mission is due to launch Jovian system – including Jupiter itself
the plumes appear to be intermittent, it in the 2020s, and will perform 45 flybys of – JUICE will shed light on planet formation
may be difficult to time JWST observations Europa over three years, with the orbits and the conditions needed for life to
just right in order to detect the plumes. varying from a height of 25km to 2,700km. emerge on icy moons.
BO O K
WKETS
PRESENTS
NEO
D IC
LIMIT
T
AVAIL A
B LE
AN EVENING WITH
ORI N
Thursday 16 February 2017
Join us at the Royal Society in London for an evening of talks exploring
the wonderful winter constellation of Orion, the Hunter
The constellation of Orion is one of the most familiar
patterns in the night sky: the Hunter striding across the BOOK YOUR TICKETS TODAY
southern horizon throughout the winter months. Beyond
the figure of ancient Greek myth lie fascinating scientific ONLINE AT www.skyatnightmagazine.com/events
insights and spellbinding vistas that are being uncovered
by both professional and amateur astronomers.
OR CALL 0871 231 0847*
*A transaction fee applies to all bookings. Calls cost 13p per minute plus network extras.
Our talks will explore some of these areas:
`` The story of red giant star Betelgeuse as it evolves
towards a supernova.
`` How amateur astro imagers are capturing the
constellation in unprecedented detail.
`` The processes of star birth hidden deep within the
gas and dust of the Orion Nebula.
TALK DETAILS
DATE Thursday 16 February 2017
VENUE The Royal Society, 6-9 Carlton
House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AG
PROGRAMME 6.30pm – Doors open; cash
bar available
7pm-9.45pm – Talks and Q&As
10pm – Doors close
TICKETS £35
BBC Sky at Night Magazine reserves the right to replace the

speakers with alternatives of equal stature in the unlikely event
that any of them are unable to attend. Tickets must be booked in
advance. Please let us know when booking of any special access
requirements. Tickets are non-refundable. Driving to the lecture is
not advised. Nearest London Underground station is Charing Cross.
SPEAKERS
Dr Anita Richards Tom O’Donoghue Dr Pamela Klaassen
A radio astronomer working Astrophotographer Tom has been Now working on the James
with Jodrell Bank Observatory imaging the night sky for over Webb Space Telescope’s MIRI
and the Atacama Large a decade, and in 2015 his Orion instrument at the UK
Millimeter/Submillimeter Mega Mosaic won runner-up of Astronomy Technology
Array to investigate stars as the Stars and Nebulae category Centre, Pamela’s research
they age, Anita explains at the Insight Astronomy into the formation of stars
what would happen to red giant Betelgeuse Photographer of the Year Awards. He tells the gives her a unique insight into the stellar
as it evolves towards a supernova. story behind creating this remarkable image. nursery of the Orion Nebula.
ISTOCK X 4
NOVEMBER 49
PLUS
Stephen Tonkin’s
BINOCULAR TOUR
Turn to page 60 for six
of this month’s best
binocular sights
NEW LOOK
THE SKY
WRITTEN BY
PETE LAWRENCE GUIDE
Pete Lawrence is an
expert astronomer
and astrophotographer
with a particular
interest in digital
imaging. As well as
writing The Sky Guide,
NOVEMBER
This month minor planet Vesta makes a close approach towards
PETE LAWRENCE
he appears on The the fantastic Beehive Cluster, or M44, which is located at the
Sky at Night each heart of Cancer. Vesta’s approach from the west provides a
month on BBC Four.
great opportunity to catch both objects in binoculars.
50 NOVEMBER THE SKY GUIDE
NOVEMBER HIGHLIGHTS
Your guide to the night sky this month
TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY

Both Taurid meteor The waxing Yesterday’s FRIDAY
1 showers are active.

Their zenithal hourly rates
of five meteors per hour
won’t set the sky alight, but with
broad peaks and slow trails they
2 crescent Moon
(7% lit) forms a bent line
with Saturn and Venus
in the evening sky. Look for
them close to the southwest
3 Moon-planet
alignment now looks
distinctly triangular. At
17:30 UT, look towards the
southwest horizon where you’ll
4
The now
21%-lit
waxing crescent
Moon will pass
across the southern part
are worth watching for. horizon at 17:30 UT. see the waxing crescent Moon of open cluster M25 in
(13% lit), Saturn and a dazzling Sagittarius this evening.
Jupiter is less than 2º south of Venus form a beautiful bit of View with binoculars or
mag. +3.4 Porrima (Gamma (a) celestial geometry. a telescope fitted with a
Virginis) just after 05:00 UT. low-power eyepiece
from 18:30 UT.
SUNDAY W MONDAY
This evening’s Today’s full
6 waxing crescent
Moon (38% lit) is 6º to
the northeast of mag.
+0.4 Mars. Both objects are
due south at an altitude of 20º
14 Moon is also
at perigee – the
closest point to
Earth in its orbit. It appears as
the largest full Moon of the
around 17:20 UT. year at 34.5 arcminutes across.
In real terms you probably
wouldn’t know it was any different
from any other full Moon.
THURSDAY FRIDAY X SUNDAY

The Leonid meteor Variable If you have a
17 shower peaks this

evening, but it will
be badly affected by
the waning gibbous Moon (81% lit).
18 star Mira
(Omicron (k) Ceti)
is near to its
minimum brightness. At peak it’s
a naked-eye star, but at its dimmest
20 low southern
horizon see if
you can find
mag. +1.2 Fomalhaut (Alpha (_)
Piscis Austrinus), which is due
Venus appears to pass within you’ll need binoculars or a small south at 19:00 UT. If you spot it
8 arcminutes of mag. +2.8 scope to see it at all. It takes 100 you’ll be looking at the most
Lambda (h) Sagittarii, the star at days to rise to maximum, so now southerly first-magnitude star
the top of the Teapot asterism’s lid. is a good time to start watching it. visible from the UK.
W FRIDAY SATURDAY
The waning This is a good
25 crescent
Moon (15% lit)
rises around
03:30 UT, at which time it will be
1.5º from bright Jupiter. Both will
26 time to take
our Deep-Sky
Tour, which
takes in some of the objects
around the twin stars Castor
be in the east at this time. and Pollux in Gemini. These
stars are well positioned from
23:00 UT onwards.
TUESDAY WEDNESDAY
Tenth- The
29 magnitude
minor planet
Pallas is now
close to mag. +2.9 Sadalsuud
(Beta (`) Aquarii). Check out our
30 1%-lit
waxing crescent
Moon is low in
the southwest just after sunset.
PETE LAWRENCE X 8
new Asteroids and Comets section Minor planet Vesta appears at

for details on how to locate it. its closest to the Beehive
See page 59. Cluster, M44, for the month.
THE SKY GUIDE NOVEMBER 51
NEED TO
KNOW
The terms and symbols
SATURDAY X used in The Sky Guide
Despite its name, the
5 Summer Triangle asterism

remains prominent in
November. Formed from
Vega, Deneb and Altair (the
alpha stars of Lyra, Cygnus and
81,9(56$/ 7,0( 87
AND BRITISH SUMMER
7,0( %67
Universal Time (UT) is the
standard time used by
Aquila), it’s high over the southwest astronomers around the
horizon around 19:00 UT. If you world. British Summer
have dark skies wait for the Moon Time (BST) is one hour
to set and see if you can spot the ahead of UT.
Milky Way running down it.
5$ 5,*+7 $6&(16,21
$1' '(& '(&/,1$7,21
These coordinates are the
night sky’s equivalent of
TUESDAY longitude and latitude,
Look out for the
15 just past full Moon

(97% lit) rising above the
east-northeast horizon just
after 17:30 UT and see if you can spot the
bright orange star Aldebaran 1º (that’s
describing where an object
lies on the celestial ‘globe’.
FAMILY FRIENDLY
Objects marked with
two apparent Moon diameters) away. The this icon are perfect for
moonrise time is for the centre of the UK showing to children
and will vary slightly for other locations.
NAKED EYE
Allow 20 minutes for
your eyes to become
TUESDAY X dark-adapted
The Great
22 Square of
Pegasus
asterism is due
south and 60º up at 20:00 UT.
Counting the number of stars
PHOTO OPPORTUNITY
Use a CCD, planetary
camera or standard DSLR
BINOCULARS
you can see within it is an easy 10x50 recommended
way of checking your sky
clarity – if you can count seven SMALL/
or more, your sky is pretty good. MEDIUM SCOPE
Reflector/SCT under 6 inches,
refractor under 4 inches
T SUNDAY LARGE SCOPE
The
27
Reflector/SCT over 6
Moon
inches, refractor over 4 inches
is absent so
why not
binocular sweep through
Auriga on the hunt for open
clusters? Auriga is 35º up in
the east-northeast at 20:00 UT.
In particular, don’t miss M38,
M36 and M37. M38 sits at the
corner of the mouth of the
smiling Cheshire Cat asterism.
NEW FAMILY STARGAZING GETTING STARTED

The Moon rises approximately one hour and 15 minutes IN ASTRONOMY
after sunset on 15 November, rising above the horizon If you’re new to astronomy,
opposite where the Sun went down. When the Moon you’ll find two essential
is visible ask children to look for the bright, orange-coloured reads on our website. Visit
star just above and right of the Moon. This is Aldebaran, the http://bit.ly/10_Lessons for
red eye of Taurus the Bull. Point out that although they look our 10-step guide to getting
close in the sky, their true distances are very different. Invite started and http://bit.ly/
guesses as to how many times farther away Aldebaran is First_Tel for advice on
than the Moon. The answer is around 1.6 billion times! choosing a scope.
THE BIG THREE

The three top
sights to observe
or image this month
DON’T MISS 7x50 binocular

field
CANCER
Vesta a
4 Vesta
31 Dec
+
approaches d 21 Dec
the Beehive 11 Dec
WHEN: All month 1 Dec 21 Nov

1 Nov
The brightest minor 11 Nov

planet is Vesta and this M44 20
month it appears to be b
heading for the Beehive Cluster, M44 in c
e
Cancer. Although Vesta can become
bright enough to be seen with the naked
eye under good conditions, its brightness
does vary a bit. Peak brightness occurs
when Vesta is at opposition, but this too
varies according to how distant the minor
planet happens to be at this time.
The next opposition occurs on
Þ Minor planet’s Vesta’s path through the Beehive Cluster during November and December.
Positions are correct for 00:00 UT on dates shown; stars are shown to mag. +9.0
21 January 2017. On this date Vesta will
reach mag. +6.2 for a short period. At for this reason are often tricky to identify is because that +3.1 magnitude is spread
its very brightest it can appear at mag. in a single viewing. The best way to over a fairly big sky area, approximately
+5.5, just brighter than Uranus. During confirm one is to observe it over several 1.5º across. For a sense of scale, that’s
November the minor planet’s magnitude nights and look for its tell-tale movement three times the apparent diameter of
increases from +7.9 at the start of the against the stars. the full Moon. Appearing so large
month to +7.3 by the end. This places This month the task is made more also makes the Beehive a perfect target
it in easy-to-find binocular territory. interesting by virtue of Vesta’s proximity for binoculars.
Minor planets are small bodies that to M44. This is a mag. +3.1 open cluster, As mentioned above, the trick to
shine due to reflected light from the Sun. visible to the naked eye but easily hidden identifying a minor planet is to observe
From Earth they look just like stars and by any high haze or light pollution. This the field of view that you suspect it lies in
over the course of several nights.
Sketching the field accurately should
Vesta (marked) near another
famous open cluster, the
reveal that one of the ‘stars’ is moving. It
Hyades, in January 2013 can be tricky to view through binoculars
and sketch at the same time, so a
mounted telescope with a low-power field
of view might offer better opportunities if
you plan to catch it in this way. Alternatively,
a camera is a great hunting tool for minor
planets. See this month’s Astrophotography
section to find out how to image Vesta
throughout the month.
The approach to M44 gives Vesta
hunting added appeal this month. Despite
the fact that it never quite makes it to the
PETE LAWRENCE X 4
cluster itself, this is a great time to get

acquainted with the view, taking your time
to absorb those scattered stars buzzing
around their ‘star hive’. Vesta is closest to
the centre of M44 at the end of the month.
The 1%-lit waxing crescent
Mercury will be slightly higher
Moon, Mercury, Venus,
Mars and Saturn as they but also brighter at mag. –0.4.
will appear 20 minutes after You should have no problem
sunset on 30 November spotting mag. –4.0 Venus, which
Mars Object visibility has been will be significantly higher up.
exaggerated for clarity Mars will be marginally brighter
than Saturn at mag. +0.6, but
being farther from the Sun’s
glare should be easier to see.
Venus
The Moon will be much
easier to see a couple of weeks
Moon
earlier when, on 14 November
it will be full. This will also be
Mercury the closest full Moon of the year,
Saturn an event technically described
S SW as a perigee-syzygy full Moon.
This will appear slightly bigger
and brighter than an average
full Moon, but if you didn’t
know this was the case you
Thin Moon and planet conjunction probably wouldn’t notice.
A perigee-syzygy Moon is
WHEN: 30 November, from 20 minutes after sunset sometimes referred to by the
popular term ‘supermoon’.
There’s a chance to the southwest. Catching a view after the Sun has set, but make The original definition of a
see a very thin Moon of the Moon at this time is a sure the Sun is truly out of the supermoon has its roots in
on 30 November, just balance between looking early way before you do! astrology, and is any new or
after the Sun has gone down. enough so that it still has some Saturn, Mercury, Venus and full Moon that occurs when
The Moon’s phase at this time altitude above the horizon and Mars will also be visible around the Moon is within 90 per cent
will be a miniscule 1% lit and waiting long enough so that the this time. Saturn will be a tough of its closest distance to Earth.
it will be sitting in the fading sky is dark enough to see it. Start spot at mag. +0.9 because it’ll Using that definition this would
evening twilight sky, low in looking roughly 20 minutes also be the lowest of the four. be the fifth of six in 2016.
November meteors – Taurids and Leonids

WHEN: November 15-20 for the Leonids, 1-14 November for the Taurids. Moonlight will interfere
Taurid meteors often

hourly rate. It is formed from two
leave trails that are distinct streams, the Northern and
easy to see, a result Southern Taurids, both associated with
of their relatively slow comet 2P/Encke. The Southern Taurids
speed when they enter are active between 10 September and
Earth’s atmosphere 20 November with a maximum around
10 October. The Northern Taurids
show activity between 20 October
and 10 December, peaking around
12 November, once again when the
Moon is close to full. Both showers
have a broad peak, reaching a zenithal
hourly rate of five meteors per hour.
The Taurids have exhibited enhanced
fireball activity in past years but there
are no such predictions for 2016. Their
relatively slow (27km/s) entry speed
results in slow trails which are easier
There are three interesting with a middling zenithal hourly rate of to see and photograph.
meteor showers this month. 20 meteors per hour. The bright Moon, To watch for meteors when the Moon
The Leonids meteor shower is full on 14 November, will also cause a is about, locate a position where it is
known for recurring storm-level outbursts fair bit of natural light pollution. hidden from view and look up at an
at roughly 33-year intervals; sadly this is The Taurid shower offers better altitude of around 60 º in the opposite
not one of them. It peaks on 17 November prospects despite a lower zenithal direction to the Moon.
THE NORTHERN HEMISPHERE

IN NOVEMBER N
WHEN TO USE THIS CHART O
RT
KEY TO
H
1 NOVEMBER AT 00:00 UT
EAS
STAR CHARTS 15 NOVEMBER AT 23:00 UT
k
T
Arcturus STAR NAME 30 NOVEMBER AT 22:00 UT
PERSEUS CONSTELLATION
On other dates, stars will be in slightly different places
LEO MINOR
NAME due to Earth’s orbital motion. Stars that cross the sky
GALAXY
will set in the west four minutes earlier each night.
OPEN CLUSTER
HOW TO USE THIS CHART
GLOBULAR
CLUSTER _
PLANETARY
NEBULA LY
N
X
DIFFUSE
NEBULOSITY
DOUBLE STAR
VARIABLE STAR M44
Ca
Pollux
¡
sto
19 CANC
THE MOON,
r
1. HOLD THE CHART so the direction you’re facing
th
SHOWING PHASE
_
is at the bottom.
`
COMET TRACK
2. THE LOWER HALF of the chart shows the sky
ahead of you. ER
GEMINI
ky
3. THE CENTRE OF THE CHART is the point
2
tour, p6
EAST
Deep-s
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ASTEROID directly over your head.
b
TRACK
M37
SUNRISE/SUNSET IN NOVEMBER*
Procy
STAR-HOPPING
M35
PATH DATE SUNRISE SUNSET
on
1 Nov 2016 07:09 UT 16:36 UT

METEOR _ ` Elnath
11 Nov 2016 07:28 UT 16:18 UT
RADIANT
CANIS MINOR
21 Nov 2016 07:47 UT 16:04 UT a

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1 Dec 2016 08:03 UT 15:54 UT
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STAR BRIGHTNESS: 13 Nov 2016, 16:12 UT 29 Nov 2016, 07:26 UT S Be
MAG. 0 *Times correct for the centre of the UK `
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Paul and
YOUR BONUS Pete’s Virtual
_
FORNAX
CONTENT Planetarium
SOUTH
THE PLANETS
PICK OF THE Another obvious
feature of the Jovian
on the planet’s
atmosphere. Other
MONTH system is the

appearance of
Jupiter’s four
interactions also
occur, such as
eclipses by Jupiter’s
brightest moons shadow and
– Io, Europa, occultations when
JUPITER Ganymede and a satellite is hidden
BEST TIME TO SEE: 30 November,
Callisto. Collectively by Jupiter’s globe.
06:00 UT known as the Galilean There is a close
ALTITUDE: 23º moons, they were first encounter between
LOCATION: Virgo reported by Galileo Jupiter and the waning
DIRECTION: Southeast Galilei in 1610. A small Þ The four Galilean moons appear crescent Moon (15% lit)
FEATURES: Detailed and banded scope shows them as star- to dance around Jupiter – they are on the morning of
atmosphere, Great Red Spot, like points in a constant easy to see with a small scope 25 November. As both
Galilean moons dance around the planet. objects rise above the
EQUIPMENT: 4-inch or larger scope Occasionally they can be seen passing in eastern horizon, they appear separated
front of Jupiter’s disc, casting their shadows by 1.6º measured centre-to-centre.
Jupiter is a morning object slowly
increasing its apparent distance from
the Sun with each passing day. The planet
is mag. –1.7 and reaches an altitude of
23º in astronomical darkness by the
end of the month, high enough for its BOÖTES ¡ `
32-arcsecond disc to be observed through _
a telescope. Even small scopes will show Arcturus
the slightly flattened shape of the planet,
a consequence of its gaseous composition b d
and fast rotation. The spin speed varies a CRATER
VIRGO Porrima 1 Nov
with latitude; it is fastest close to the
equator, where one rotation takes just
nine hours and 55 minutes. c Jupiter
Small scopes will also reveal Jupiter’s e
30 Nov
main atmospheric belts. The most
CORVUS
prominent are the South Equatorial Belt
(SEB) and North Equatorial Belt (NEB). b a
These appear dark and run parallel to the Spica ¡
_
planet’s equator. The famous, long-lived
storm known as the Great Red Spot is _
embedded in the southern edge of the `
PETE LAWRENCE X 3
SEB in a feature known as the Great Red

Spot Hollow. The spot itself can be seen SE
through a 4-inch telescope but it may
take a bit of concentration to do so. Þ Jupiter is in Virgo, travelling from near Porrima towards Spica over the course of November
The phase and relative sizes of the planets this month. Each planet is
THE PLANETS IN NOVEMBER shown with south at the top, to show its orientation through a telescope
VENUS MARS JUPITER SATURN URANUS NEPTUNE

15 November 15 November 15 November 15 November 15 November 15 November
MERCURY
1 November
MERCURY
15 November
MERCURY
0” 10” 20” 30” 40” 50” 60”
30 November
ARCSECONDS
URANUS end. Through a telescope, its disc
BEST TIME TO SEE : appears to shrink from 7.5 to
1 November, 22:45 UT 6.4 arcseconds, a result of its
JUPITER’S ALTITUDE: 45º
LOCATION: Pisces
increasing distance from Earth.
MOONS DIRECTION: South

Uranus remains well placed, not
VENUS
BEST TIME TO SEE:
NOVEMBER
Using a small scope you’ll be able to spot Jupiter’s biggest moons.
too far from mag. +5.2 Zeta
(c) and mag. +6.0 88 Piscium.
These two stars form the base
of a pointed isosceles triangle
30 November, 16:45 UT
ALTITUDE: 10º
LOCATION: Sagittarius
DIRECTION: South-southwest
Their positions change dramatically during the month, as shown on with mag. +5.7 Uranus at the Venus is in the evening sky
the diagram. The line by each date on the left represents 00:00 UT. tip at the start of the month. and its apparent separation
From one night to the next the from the Sun increases through
DATE WEST EAST triangle gets squatter, a result November. Like all of the bright
1 of the planet appearing to planets, Venus never appears
approach the stars. By the 30th to stray that far from the
2
the ‘height’ of the triangle is ecliptic but unfortunately, the
3 less than 1º. Uranus is close to angle it makes with the western
4 the threshold of naked-eye horizon at sunset at this time
visibility from an average dark of year is shallow. That means
5 site, but even a small amount Venus doesn’t appear very
6 of haze or light pollution will high above the horizon after
do a pretty good job of hiding sunset, so despite being at mag.
7 it from view. Through binoculars –4.1 mid-month it will be
8 it looks just like a star, but in harder to spot than you might
a telescope its 3.6-arcsecond think. This situation will
9
disc has a distinct green hue. change towards the end of the
10 year and into early 2017 though.
11
NEPTUNE
BEST TIME TO SEE: MERCURY
12 1 November, 20:00 UT BEST TIME TO SEE:
13
ALTITUDE: 28º 30 November, 16:15 UT
LOCATION: Aquarius ALTITUDE: 2.5º (low)
14 DIRECTION: South LOCATION: Sagittarius
15 Neptune is one zodiacal DIRECTION: Southwest
constellation west of Uranus Inner planet Mercury spends
16 and also well placed during the month in the evening sky,
17 November, managing to gradually increasing its apparent
culminate in darkness on distance from the Sun. All the
18
every evening throughout the same, its position is poor from
19 month. Its mag. +7.9 dot can the UK and it’s not easily seen
be seen 2.5º southwest of mag. in November. Its mag. –0.5 dot
20
+3.7 Lambda (h) Aquarii. Like lies 3.5º from mag. +0.9 Saturn
21 Uranus, a telescope is required on the evening of the 23rd.
22
to reveal Neptune’s smaller,
2-arcsecond diameter blue disc. SATURN
23 BEST TIME TO SEE:
24 MARS 1 November, 17:15 UT
BEST TIME TO SEE: ALTITUDE: 6º
25 1 November, 18:00 UT LOCATION: Ophiuchus
26 ALTITUDE: 13º DIRECTION: Southwest
LOCATION: Sagittarius Saturn isn’t well placed for
27
DIRECTION: Just west of south telescopic viewing, but there
28 Mars treads celestial water this are opportunities to see it. The
month, the planet holding the planet is mag. +0.5 and 4º
29
same relative position against northwest of mag. –4.0 Venus
30 the horizon at the same time in the evening sky on the 1st,
in the evening all month long. and between the waxing
01
Its brightness dims from mag. crescent Moon (7% lit) and
8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 +0.4 on the 1st to +0.6 by month Venus on the 2nd.
arcminutes
Jupiter Io Europa Ganymede Callisto YOUR BONUS CONTENT Planetary observing forms
< Purbach forms the Lunar X (inset)
with La Caille and Blanchinus
ARZACHEL when the Sun illumates precise
portions of their rims
LUNAR X
Purbach A, the largest craterlet

RUPES RECTA
THEBIT inside the main crater’s rim.
Towards the middle of
Purbach’s floor, the ridges
suggest the ghostly outline of a
crater some 20km across.
G
Whether this is a true ghost
LA CAILLE
crater – a crater which has been
flooded with lava so that only
W
PURBACH its upper rim is showing – isn’t
A
totally clear. It does have its
own designation though, being
BLANCHINUS known as Purbach W. It’s also
not that clear whether these
ridges also connect to
Purbach’s central mountain
REGIOMONTANUS
complex, which itself is
WERNER indistinct if there at all. The
ridges tower above the main
floor to a height of around
700m. In contrast, the
surrounding rim walls rise
to a height of nearly 3km
WALTHER
above Purbach’s floor.
A few hours before first
quarter, Purbach becomes
part of what’s known as the
“Purbach sits at the top of an ancient Lunar or Werner X. As the
morning light of the Sun
trio of battered craters, the others catches the tops of Purbach’s
eastern rim and portions of the
being Regiomontanus and Walther” rims of 68km crater La Caille
and similarly sized Blanchinus,
to the south and 141km the illuminated rim tops
MOONWATCH Walther below that.
Walther is the youngest of
appear to form a giant letter X
floating in darkness on the
the three with an age estimated terminator. Timing is important
N
PURBACH at between 3.85 and 3.92 billion
years, and it looks the best
if you hope to spot it as it only
remains visible for around four
TYPE: Crater
defined. Regiomontanus hours. Over the next few months,
SIZE: 118km diameter
appears pushed up hard against the next chances to spot the X
AGE: 3.9-4.6 billion years
LOCATION: 25.5°S, 2.0°W
Purbach to the north and has from the UK are from 14:58 UT
BEST TIME TO OBSERVE: the least-defined rim of the on 6 December during the day
First quarter or six days three, especially to the west. and 20:08 UT on 3 February
after full Moon (7 Nov Purbach’s on the other hand 2017, which is in darkness.
and 21-22 Nov) stands out fairly well but also The Lunar X isn’t the only
MINIMUM EQUIPMENT: has its moments. It runs into lunar tourist attraction near
2-inch telescope trouble where it interfaces with Purbach. When the phase is
Regiomontanus and as it arcs right, look to the northwest
around to the west, it appears of Purbach G to locate the
to have split into two separate 58km circular crater Thebit.
levels. The northern portion of Located 90km west of Thebit’s
The Moon’s southern central south of the centre of Arzachel the rim is interrupted by 27km centre is a superb example of a
meridian is defined by two and you’ll be looking at the Purbach G, a slightly tear-shaped lunar fault known as Rupes
large crater chains. The three at centre of 118km Purbach, a large crater with a tiny craterlet on its Recta or the Straight Wall.
PETE LAWRENCE X 3
the top are the most distinctive, but quite worn crater. Purbach floor close to its southern edge. This is a 110km fault that casts
formed from 154km-diameter sits at the top of an ancient trio Purbach’s floor is flat apart dramatic shadows which
Ptolemaus, 118km Alphonsus of battered craters, the others from a set of ridges raised exaggerate its actually rather
and 98km Arzachel. Head 210km being 126km Regiomontanus between Purbach G and 8km shallow inclined slope.
NEW COMETS AND ASTEROIDS
Trace the progress of minor planet Pallas as it glides through Aquarius
Minor planet Pallas was described can be applied to
discovered in 1802. It’s one Pallas’s path takes it both objects.
M2
closer to Sadalsuud in
of the larger asteroids Unusually for such a large
November; positions
at 512km across and can correct for 00:00 UT
body, the orbit of Pallas has a
currently be seen drifting AQUARIUS high inclination of 34.8º
through Aquarius, not too degrees. This allows it to cross
far from mag. +6.5 globular parts of the sky other large
cluster M2. During the course bodies cannot venture into. Its
of the month it moves in an current location is about 12º
arc towards mag. +2.9 from the ecliptic and offers the
Sadalsuud (Beta (`) Aquarii) opportunity of a wide-field
and is visible during the early capture with globular cluster
1 Nov
part of the evening. M2 in shot. If you enjoy following
Pallas was at opposition Vesta moving towards the
Pallas
on 22 August. Back then it Beehive as described in the Big
` 11 Nov
was positioned much farther Sadalsuud Three, you can now follow it up
to the west in Ophiuchus and with the slightly more
1 Dec 21 Nov
was close to its perigee with challenging target of Pallas in
Earth, so it shined at mag. the region of M2. During the
+8.7. During November it’ll is located. Sketch or photograph between observations. In this evening of 30 November, Pallas
be fainter than this, starting that area and repeat over the month’s Big Three and will lie 24 arcminutes southwest
the month at mag. +10.0 and course of several evenings Astrophotography sections, of Sadalsuud and this should
ending it at +10.3. You’ll need throughout the month. If you you’ll find tips on how to find make it a bit easier to locate
a telescope to find it. It’s best have managed to catch it, minor planet Vesta during despite the fact that it will
to use a low power to view Pallas will be obvious by the November. Although brighter be at its dimmest for the
the area where you think it fact that it appears to move than Pallas, the techniques month on this date.
NEW STAR OF THE MONTH

Algol – the ‘winking demon’ of autumn d
is an easy to observe variable star
The constellation of Perseus weather. The longer nights during 2.9
a o
depicts the Greek hero who November, December and January h 3.9
cut off the head of the Gorgon help enormously here. During
+ Mirphak
Medusa. The rather gory end November there are favourable 1.8
for Medusa is marked by the eclipses on the 6th at 03:54 UT, _ 4.0
3.0 f
star Algol (Beta (`) Persei), 9th at 00:42 UT, 11th at 21:30 UT b m e
which represents her eye. Just to and 29th at 02:24 UT.
enhance the image further, the Plotting Algol’s light curve reveals
eye appears to wink. that it sinks deep to a rounded bottom
PERSEUS
Algol is 93 lightyears away and before rising up to full brightness g
3.8
normally shines at mag. +2.1, again. The rounded shape indicates 3.8
but at regular intervals dips in that the eclipse we see from Earth i
brightness to mag. +3.4. The cause is not total – that would produce a 2.9
of the dip is well known – it’s due flat bottomed curve – but partial. ¡ Algol
to a dimmer companion star that Only part of the brighter primary star `
appears to eclipse the brighter is hidden from view by the dimmer /
4.7
primary. Eclipses occur every two secondary during a main eclipse.
4.0 j l
days, 20 hours and 49 minutes The reverse situation, where part of
and last for 9.6 hours. Known as the secondary is hidden by the
an eclipsing binary, the frequency primary, results in a much shallower
of eclipses and brightness of the dip in brightness only detectable by
system means that this is a photoelectric means. We now know
relatively easy variable star to that Algol is a triple star system c k
observe. Catching an eclipse with the main pair involved in the
requires good timing and good eclipse dimming as seen from Earth. Þ You can compare Algol’s brightness to the other stars in Perseus
This star appears as a central sun surrounded
STEPHEN TONKIN’S by the glow of the unresolved stars in the rest of
BINOCULAR TOUR the cluster. It also maintains the distance illusion

that began with our previous two clusters: at
nearly 4,000 lightyears away, NGC 1027 is
November delivers a little lion and three close nearer than the brighter Melotte 15 and more
distant than the fainter Markarian 6. � SEEN IT
clusters whose brightness belies their distance
5 PAZMINO’S CLUSTER

� Tick the box when you’ve seen each one brighter stars form a V near the centre and that, 15x Larger binoculars are best for this target
even with averted vision, only a few more fainter 70 – not because it is hard to find or see, but
1 KEMBLE’S KITE stars can be seen scattered throughout it. Unless because they reveal more of its true nature.
10x We start with an asterism named for you have exceptional skies, do not expect to see Slightly more than 1.5° from mag. +4.3 star
50 prolific Canadian binocular observer even a hint of the nebulosity (the Heart Nebula) CS Camelopardalis, in the direction of NGC
Lucian Kemble. Just over 1.5º west of mag. +4.6 that surrounds the cluster. � SEEN IT 1027, lies an unremarkable little trapezium of
Gamma (a) Camelopardalis is the semi-regular 7th- and 8th-magnitude stars. This is Stock 23,
variable star V805 Cassiopeiae, which looks 3 MARKARIAN 6 also known as Pazmino’s Cluster. With 15x70
yellow-orange in binoculars and ranges from 15x Markarian 6 is just under 1º to the south- binoculars you can see that this is much more
mag. +6.3 to +6.5. It is the brightest of a group 70 southwest of Melotte 15. If you look 0.75º than a trapezium: you will probably be able to
of 10 mostly 8th- and 9th-magnitude stars south from Melotte 15 you will reach a solitary resolve about a dozen stars against a faintly
spread across a region 0.5x1.5°. They take the 8th-magnitude star; Markarian 6 is a mere 10 glowing patch of sky about 10 arcminutes in
shape of a diamond kite with its tail extending arcminutes to the west. What you should see is diameter. � SEEN IT
south towards Perseus. Once you have identified an arrow of half a dozen 9th-magnitude stars
it, take a look at the star at the northern tip of pointing southwards. It is fainter than Melotte 6 THE LION CUB
the kite: it is an easy double star. � SEEN IT 15, so you’d be forgiven for assuming it is much 10x This asterism looks remarkably like the
farther away. It’s actually just under a quarter 50 brighter stars of Leo. Navigate to a patch
2 MELOTTE 15 of the distance. � SEEN IT of sky 1° from CS Camelopardalis in the
10x Melotte 15 is the third apex of an equilateral opposite direction to Pazmino’s Cluster. Here
50 triangle with mag. +3.0 Segin (Epsilon (¡) 4 NGC 1027 you will find a semicircle of 8th-ish magnitude
Cassiopeiae) and mag. +6.7 Iota (f) Cassiopeiae. 10x NGC 1027 is much more obvious. It’s stars. Imagine the semicircle to be the equivalent
In 10x50 binoculars, it appears as a large 50 almost as big and as bright as Melotte 15, to the sickle asterism of Leo, then use the inset
(20-arcminute) glow with five or six brighter but there the similarity ends. Slightly more than on the chart to guide you to brighter stars that
stars resolved. You should notice that these 1º east of Melotte 15 is a 7th-magnitude star. comprise the rest of it. � SEEN IT
NGC 663
CASSIOPEIA Double Cluster
CS NGC 654
NGC 869
Stock 2 NGC 884

¡ Segin
6 Trumpler 2
3 o
IC 1805 Markarian 6
W
NGC 1027 d
Melotte 15
5°
Tombaugh 5 a
Cr 463 2 IC 1848
S
4
f Collinder 33
Collinder 34
N
PERSEUS
5 Stock 23
E
Trumpler 3
CS
1 6
CAMELOPARDALIS
V805 V805 IC 342

1
a
NGC 1502
a
NEW THE SKY GUIDE CHALLENGE
The smallest double stars you can split with the naked eye this autumn and winter
You may have found the last
¡ pair quite challenging because
the stars were of unequal
brightness. If the component
TAURUS magnitudes are similar, splitting
them becomes easier. To
V illustrate this, follow Orion’s
b3 Belt northwest to locate orange
mag. +0.9 Aldebaran (Alpha
(_) Tauri). This sits at the end
b1 of the southern arm of a
b2 V-shaped pattern formed by
Hyades
the Hyades star cluster. Halfway
along the arm is the optical
double Theta1 (e1) and Theta2
Aldebaran
(e2) Tauri, a mag. +3.4 and +3.8
_ pair separated by 5.5 arcminutes.
If you don’t see them as a pair
m2 e1 at first, relax and concentrate
on this area. Their double nature
m1 e2 a should just pop into view.
Our final winter double
challenge is in the Pleiades
cluster in Taurus. The main
shape is that of a box with a
Þ Follow the V of the Hyades to find Theta (e) Tauri, a double with components of similar magnitudes
handle extension to the east.
Most stars in the night sky penetrating vision’, Mizar and at the bottom of the sword, The handle star is mag. +3.6
have a companion or two, the Alcor shouldn’t really give mag. +2.8 Nair al Saif (Iota Atlas (27 Tauri) and should be
Sun turning out to be a bit you too much of a problem. (f) Orionis) – its name relatively easy to see. Located
unusual in that it’s on its own The pair also has the accolade means ‘the Bright One of the 5 arcminutes above Atlas is his
in space. Separation between of being the only double star Sword’. It has a mag. +4.8 mythological spouse Pleione
components plays a big role in the sky for which both companion star located (28 Tauri) shining away at mag.
in deciding how to observe components have names. very close in a southwest +5.0, so there’s a brightness
them. Typically, binoculars As the winter approaches, direction (below and right mismatch to make this pair
or a telescope are the tools of Orion becomes prominent. from the UK). With a just that little bit harder to
choice, but there are a number Locate his Belt and his short, separation of just 8 arcminutes, see. Congratulations if you
that can be seen with the fainter sword below. Look this is a much tougher spot can see them all, but don’t
naked eye. This then raises the carefully and identify the star than Mizar and Alcor. feel too upset if you can’t.
question, what’s the smallest
separation you can see just using
your eyes? The answer isn’t
likely to be definitive because
vision quality varies from one
person to the next. Below are
a number of close doubles Atlas and Pleione
visible in the late autumn
and winter skies to test just
how close you can go.
Let’s start with a very easy
one to get you in the mood.
The second star in from the
end of the Plough asterism’s,
handle is mag. +2.2 Mizar
PETE LAWRENCE X 3
(Zeta (c) Orionis). Its true

companion in space is mag. Nair al Saif
+4.9 Alcor which sits 1º away
in an east-northeast direction.
Once regarded by Arabic
astronomers as a ‘test for Þ Nair al Saif and Atlas/Pleione are both trickier to split as one component is dimmer than the other
+30
º
m
Castor 1
h30
0m
h0
07
_
08
5°
l
N
2.5 m
E ° `
Pollux
+2
5º
NGC 2371 +30

2 º
o
p
W f
0m
h0
08
S
g
NGC 2331
6
Eclip
tic GEMINI
+2
0º
NGC 2420
+25
º
00m
3 Wasat
07h
NGC 2392
b
Eclip
tic
c
Mekbuda
+1
5º
+20
º
h
m
h30
07
NGC 2304
00m
Abell 21 4
07h
5 NGC 2395 +1
5º
through a 6-inch scope, requiring a good,
'((3 6.< dark sky to see at all. A 10-inch scope

reveals that the main nebula appears as
two objects. This is so convincing that it has
THIS DEEP-SKY TOUR
HAS BEEN AUTOMATED
ASCOM-enabled Go-To
TOUR
actually got two NGC designations, 2371 mounts can now take you to
and 2372. They are aligned southwest- this month’s targets at the
northeast, with the southwest one (NGC 2371) touch of a button, with our
the brighter of the pair. A 12-inch scope at Deep-Sky Tour file for the
200x magnification should reveal the nebula’s EQTOUR app. Find it online.
See Castor’s secret stars, central star. For a challenge, see if you can
spot a faint outer halo surrounding the main
a twin nebula and a cosmic pair. NGC 2371/2 is sometimes referred Geminorum, 5.2º to the southeast, and keep
kite in the sky this month to as the Peanut Nebula or – perhaps more going. You’ll arrive at NGC 2395, a mag.
appropriately – the Gemini Nebula. � SEEN IT +8.0 open cluster close to the boundary

� Tick the box when you’ve seen each one between Gemini and Canis Minor. A 6-inch
scope shows a low-concentration group of
3 THE ESKIMO NEBULA around 20 members with two 10th-magnitude
1 CASTOR Mag. +3.5 Wasat (Delta (b) Geminorum) stars rather dominating the view. A 10-inch
Despite being mythological twins is 10º south and slightly west of Castor. scope increases the member count to around
there is no real physical connection Once you’ve found it, look 2.3º southeast to 40 and reveals a number of interesting star
between mag. +1.6 Castor (Alpha (_) find the Eskimo Nebula, NGC 2392. This ‘strings’ – an apparent linear or curved
Geminorum) and mag. +1.2 Pollux (Beta mag. +9.2 planetary nebula is a great target arrangement of stars. The overall appearance
(`) Geminorum). Point a 6-inch or larger for small scopes, which should have a good of NGC 2395 is that it has an approximately
telescope at Castor and, using a high power chance of revealing its mag. +10.5 central triangular shape. � SEEN IT
eyepiece, it becomes evident that it’s not a star as well. The nebula is distinctly bluish
single star but rather a pair of mag. +1.9 and shows a hint of darkening within its
and +3.0 stars separated by around 20-arcsecond diameter area. Using a high 5 THE MEDUSA NEBULA
5 arcseconds. This is a gravitationally bound magnification with a 10-inch scope reveals ‘Easy to find but tricky to see’
system with a period of 445 years and a granular texture to the nebula, while a is a good tag line for Abell 21,
average physical separation of 118 AU. 12-inch scope will also show an outer glowing the Medusa Nebula. It’s located a
There’s a mag. +9.1 third member to the system, ring, 45 arcseconds across. The bright central fraction over 0.5º southeast of NGC 2395
located 1.2 arcminutes south. Spectral analysis region is supposed to represent the face of and although listed as mag. +10.2, its
reveals them all to be spectroscopic binaries. an eskimo, the outer ring being the fur of 12.4x8.5-arcminute size gives it a low
So the visually single star Castor actually turns a fur-lined hood. � SEEN IT surface brightness closer to mag. +16.0.
out to be a sextuplet system. � SEEN IT However, don’t be put off as parts of the
4 NGC 2395 nebula have been reportedly seen in
2 THE PEANUT NEBULA Return to Wasat and from there scopes as small as 3 inches under very
dark conditions. We would recommend
NGC 2371 is a 13th-magnitude locate mag. +4.0 Mekbuda (Zeta
planetary nebula 3º southwest (c) Geminorum). Draw a line from this star using a 10-inch or larger scope together
of Castor. It’s a challenging hazy patch through through mag. +3.6 Lambda (h) with an OIII filter. This is an old, spread
out planetary with uneven brightness.
Rather than looking like a complete disc,
it has a more crescent-like appearance.
< The Eskimo Nebula is so named The part of the nebula missing from view
because it is said to look is that closest to NGC 2395. � SEEN IT
like a hooded face; it’s
also known as the 6 NGC 2331
Clown Nebula We double back toward Castor for this
month’s final object, mag. +8.5 open
cluster NGC 2331. Extend a line from Lambda
Geminorum to Wasat and carry on for the
same distance again. This will bring you to
mag. +3.8 Iota (f) Geminorum, which forms
the pointed end of an isosceles triangle that
has mag. +4.4 Tau (o) Geminorum and NGC
2331 as its base. The cluster is loose and
CHART: PETE LAWRENCE, PHOTO: JOHANNES SCHEDLER/CCDGUIDE.COM
difficult to discern from the background stars.

Measuring 15 arcminutes across, you’ll need
to use a low magnification to view it properly.
With a good imagination, NGC 2331
resembles the outline of a kite, pointed end
north. Larger instruments may pick out a small
pattern to the east reminiscent of the Cheshire
Cat asterism in Auriga; two main stars with a
curving smile underneath. � SEEN IT
YOUR BONUS CONTENT

Print out this chart and take an
automated Go-To tour
ASTROPHOTOGRAPHY
Vesta approaches the Beehive Cluster
to reveal Vesta works best if the images
RECOMMENDED EQUIPMENT have been taken using the same setup. If
DSLR, 127mm or shorter lens for a non full frame camera, 200mm or shorter you intend to use a zoom lens, it therefore
lens for a full frame model becomes important to take a note of the
focal length setting.
In order to repeat an image from one
night to the next, it is necessary to note
how the stars are positioned with respect
to the edge of the image frame. The box
pattern of Gamma, Delta, Theta and Eta
Cancri is useful here as it can be used as
an alignment reference.
Extending the bottom edge of the box
west eventually brings you to mag. +4.7
Zeta (c) Cancri. If you align the main box
so that its eastern edge is close to the left
edge of your camera’s image frame, and
the line from Delta to Zeta Cancri runs
parallel to the bottom frame edge, then
you won’t go far wrong. Once you have
this right you can have a degree of
confidence that one of the ‘stars’ you’re
imaging is actually minor planet Vesta.
Attempting to photograph the region
every night will be difficult. The weather,
Once you’ve blended all Moon and life can all get in the way.
your shots in a layer- However, a handful of images with a few
based graphics editor, days between them should still reveal
Vesta’s path towards M44 Vesta’s movement. If successful, why not
will become clear extend the project? The cluster and Vesta
remain well positioned right through into
Vesta appears in our skies as a brightening Their names translate as the northern next spring. Also, don’t miss the chance
star-like dot this month. It’s too faint for and southern donkeys and they are to catch minor planet Pallas as well. See
the naked eye but an easy find through supposed to be eating hay from the manger. our new Comets and Asteroids section on
binoculars, and brightens from mag. +7.9 The western side of the box is marked page 59 for details on how to find it in
on 1 November to +7.3 by the end of the by two mag. +5.3 stars, Eta (d) and Theta Aquarius close to globular cluster M2.
month. Part of the problem when trying (e) Cancri. Using this stellar ‘box’ it
to see or image Vesta is to first actually should be possible to work out the relative
locate it, but this month the task is a little position of Vesta from our finder chart in KEY TECHNIQUE
simpler thanks to where it is in the sky on page 52. In order to catch the box, CAPTURING THE ESSENCE
– close to the bright and easy to find open M44 and Vesta on a single photographic Despite its potential to appear brighter than
cluster known as M44, the Beehive. frame we need to work with a long-edge any other minor or dwarf planet, Vesta still
Although the minor planet never quite size of 10 º to be comfortable. This is only appears as a star-like dot through
makes it to the cluster, it does swing fairly achievable using a non-full frame DSLR binoculars or a telescope. It is able to hide
amongst the background stars really well,
close to it. Located at the heart of Cancer, fitted with a 127mm focal length lens, or making the task of identifying it a bit like
the Beehive Cluster and its surrounding a 200mm lens if using a full frame model. looking for a needle in a haystack. If you
stars make a great photographic backdrop In practical terms, anything between take photographs of the area you believe
in addition to providing a good 50-127mm (80-200mm for full frame) it to be in over the course of several nights,
navigational framework to find Vesta. will be ideal. A long frame length of 10 º Vesta is revealed by virtue of its motion.
The Beehive Cluster is also known as gives a height of 6.7º. This month we’re going to describe how
ALL PIUCTURES: PETE LAWRENCE
to use this technique to show the passage

Praesepe, which means ‘manger’. The Once you’ve selected your lens, aim
of Vesta as it appears to approach the
cluster is boxed in by four middle and to use it for the entire sequence. The Beehive Cluster, M44.
dim naked-eye stars. The eastern side of comparative technique we’re going to use
the box is formed from mag. +4.7 Asellus
Borealis (Gamma (a) Cancri) and mag.
Send your image to: [email protected]

+3.9 Asellus Australis (Delta (b) Cancri).
STEP BY STEP
STEP 1 STEP 2
You’ll need to use a lens which gives a long frame edge coverage of Set the lens to manual focus (M/MF) and pre-focus at infinity. Live view
10º. For non-full frame cameras this means a 127mm or shorter lens, a bright star to do this. Select the lowest f/number, then close the lens
or 200mm or shorter for full frame models. A fast, low f/number is by a stop or two. Set ISO to mid-high for fixed tripods or mid-low if
desirable but not essential. The shots can be taken from a fixed tripod tracking. A 10-30-second exposure should suffice. A remote shutter
but a tracking mount makes it a lot easier to achieve a better result. release and bulb mode can be used for longer exposures if required.
+8.9
+9.0
+8.3
+8.5
b c
+8.6
+9.8
STEP 3 STEP 4
Identify the star ‘box’ described in the main text. Align the east side so Use a remote shutter release to take a test shot of the area and review
it’s parallel with the left-hand frame edge, and its mid-point is on the it. We’d recommend a magnitude threshold of at least +9.0 for this
frame’s horizontal centre line. The mid-point of the line from Delta project and have indicated a couple of stars which will allow you to
to Zeta Cancri should be on frame’s vertical centre line. Depending on see whether you’ve met this requirement. If you can see them in your
how tight your framing is, Vesta should enter frame in early November. image, then you’re easily going deep enough to record Vesta.
STEP 5 STEP 6
Once you’re happy that you’re getting the results as described, it’s time To show Vesta, load the results as separate layers in a graphics editor,
to start taking your shots. Take several, transfer them to a computer and with the oldest at the bottom. Hide all but the bottom layer. Make the
review, picking the best one. Label it with the time and date it was taken. one above visible and carefully move and rotate so the stars align.
Placing the selected and retitled images in a dedicated folder will When done, set the upper layer’s blend mode to Lighten. Repeat for all
make locating them for Step 6 much easier. upper frames. Vesta’s path relative to the stars should become clear.
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THE MILKY WAY NOVEMBER 69
THE MILKY WAY

FROM THE
INSIDE OUT Elizabeth Pearson investigates how we map
the Galaxy whilst we’re buried inside it
MARK GARLICK/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY
f you were sitting in the living room few local stars before gas and dust shrouds To start such cosmic cartography
I of a house, with solid walls around

you, would you be able to tell what
the rest of the house looked like?
This is the problem faced by astronomers
trying to map out what our Galaxy looks
the view, blocking the light from the Milky
Way’s distant reaches. Yet despite this
they have managed to not only map out
our local neighbourhood, they can see
right across town thanks to the largest
the first question that needs answering
is the morphology – the form, shape
and structure – of the Galaxy we live
in. We know from looking at our
celestial neighbours that galaxies can
like while sitting on a planet within it. survey of our Galaxy to date, released be elliptical, spiral, irregular or dwarf,
Buried inside its disc, all they can see is a in September by ESA’s Gaia satellite. but what is the Milky Way like? >
This is what we think the

Milky Way looks like, a disc
with a bar running through
the centre and spiral arms
of stars streaming from it
> Luckily, you can answer that query When you peer into these youthful stars to trace out the Milky Way’s
yourself the next time you’re under a dark the band of the Milky structure close to Earth.
sky looking at our view through the Galaxy Way, you are looking Beyond around 10,000 lightyears the haze of
– the Milky Way. With the naked eye it just towards the heart of dust throughout our Galaxy became too thick,
our home Galaxy
looks like a diffuse cloud of light, but through blocking out the light from stars behind it and
a telescope it resolves into a band made from bringing the mapping effort to a halt. It was only
billions of stars. The Milky Way is our view when Jan Oort led the first large-scale radio
through a huge plane of stars, showing we are survey a year later that the a map of the whole
sitting within a huge stellar disc. Galaxy could be drafted. This project, Benjamin
“From looking at other galaxies we know explains, mapped hydrogen gas between the
that most discs show stars using the 21cm
some spiral structure,” “The Milky Way is our view spectral line it produces.
says galactic astronomer “That line can be seen
ISTOCK, HOPKINS RESEARCH GROUP/CALTECH, NASA/GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER
Prof Robert Benjamin

from University of
through a huge plane of stars, across the entire Milky
Way because the
Wisconsin-Whitewater.
“Because the Galaxy is
showing we are sitting within radio penetrates the
gas,” he adds.
a disc galaxy it is almost
certainly a spiral galaxy.”
a huge stellar disc” As hydrogen is a
vital ingredient in
These other spiral galaxies show arms of stars and creating new stars, where the regions where the gas
dust wrapped around a central bulge of old stars, so was thickest dictated where a spiral arm should
it was thought likely that the Milky Way was the same. be. The surveys showed that the structure was
definitely present in the Milky Way, but what was
We started with the stars less clear was where the arms actually lay. Though
Proving this, though, has not been an easy task. determining the direction of a clump of gas is easy,
The best way to find our Galaxy’s spiral structure working out how far away it is proved difficult.
was to map out the location of the arms. Dense For these radio observations, the distance was
with dust, the arms are prime sites for stars to form, determined using the Galaxy’s rotation. Different
and are alive with bright, young O and B class parts of the disc move with different speeds
stars. In 1958 astronomer William Morgan used depending on how far out from the centre they
THE MILKY WAY NOVEMBER 71
TWO ARMS OR FOUR?

The exact nature of our Galaxy’s tightly wound arms is hard to untangle
The uncertainties and huge error margins caused by
mapping the Milky Way from within can often lead to
controversy over their interpretation. One of the
biggest debates in recent years has been over how
many arms our Galaxy has: two or four.
“If you were an alien in a galaxy far, far away,
you would see four arms, because the arms that you
see at visible wavelengths are really just showing the
very bright blue stars near areas of star formation,”
says research astronomer Ronald Drimmel from the
Italian National Institute for Astrophysics. “The real
question is if you looked at the old stars, where most
of the mass is. That would be a two-armed spiral.”
The two most massive arms of the Galaxy
– Perseus and Scutum-Centarus – have many of
these older stars, and their strong gravitational
pull causes gas and dust to pile up between them.
Two lesser arms, called Sagittarius-Carina and the
Outer arm, don’t have as many elderly stars to
make up the mass, but are rich enough in gas to
be bright with star formation.
To confuse matters further, there are also many
bridges and spurs jutting off the major arms. One
An astronomer 300,000 lightyears of these – the Orion spur, originating in the
away would see the Milky Way’s Sagittarius arm and crossing the Perseus arm
disc sitting in a halo of stars, as – is particularly relevant to us here on Earth; it’s
shown in this artist’s impression the location of our Sun.
are. When objects are moving fast enough the entire sky between 1989 and 1993, COBE
the light they emit gets stretched out, changing revealed an asymmetry in the gas of the Milky
its frequency, an effect known as Doppler Way’s core. This was the first hint that our
shift. This size of this stretch can be used to home was not only a spiral, but a barred spiral.
find the object’s speed, which provides an An elongated bar of stars extends through the
estimate the distance. However, this method centre of the Milky Way, at an angle of 27º
is notoriously uncertain. There’s no way to from the Sun, with the two major arms spinning
tell if an object is moving at a certain off from either end.
speed because it’s far away, or because
random fluctuations mean it happens But then it gets cloudier
to be moving a bit faster. The Beyond this busy central region
result is measurements have things begin to get a bit less
an error margin of more defined, as the problems
than 20 per cent. caused by the Galaxy
Despite these flaws, getting in the way
the radio surveys began of itself only intensify.
to reveal the general “The area of greatest
shape of the Milky Way. uncertainty is anything
As well as the arms, the that’s the other side of the
surveys found that stars galactic centre, but inside
were densest in the direction of the Sun’s orbit,” says Benjamin.
Sagittarius, suggesting this was the “Anything within the Sun’s orbit
direction of the Galaxy’s central bulge. The is very hard to measure with Doppler shift
exact centre was thought to lie in the middle of a COBE and IRAS data because it gets confused with stuff that’s closer and
complex radio source 25,000 to 28,000 lightyears allowed us to create this that happens to be going at the same velocity. The
from the Sun. This was confirmed in 1974 when it 1999 dust map of our main structures are identified. But exactly how to
was found to host a supermassive black hole, one of Galaxy at microwave and place them is still debated.”
submillimetre frequencies
which is known to lie in the cores of many galaxies. This could be about to change thanks to two
Another layer of this central region was peeled new sets of observations. A type of star found in
back by the infrared COBE satellite. Mapping areas of high star formation, known as a maser, >
72 THE MILKY WAY NOVEMBER
> emits clear radio waves that can the disc, but also the globular clusters
penetrate through the entire and stars that orbit high above the
Milky Way. In recent years, Milky Way’s disc.
a team has been using “There are stars that move
the Very Long Baseline outside the plane, but are
Array to find the dominated by masses within
distances to these the plane,” says Benjamin.
masers by recording “If you know the velocity
their parallaxes of a star, you can usually
– measurements work backwards to find
calculated out where the mass is, so
directly from kinematics [the study the
geometry, making movement] outside the
them much more disc will tell you a lot
accurate than about what’s going on
those found via the inside the disc.”
The Sun
Doppler method. It’s these stars that have
Another satellite is helped mark out the limits
currently in the process of our Galaxy. Spotted 50,000
of taking the parallaxes of lightyears away from the galactic
not just a handful of bright centre they denote where the
stellar objects but over one arms of the Milky Way, and our
billion stars, around one per cent map, come to an end. S
of the Milky Way’s stellar content.
This map of unprecedented accuracy will
stretch out from the Sun from rim to bulge ABOUT THE WRITER
We rely on artist’s Dr Elizabeth Pearson is BBC
thanks to one satellite – Gaia. impressions based on Sky at Night Magazine’s news
Though Gaia’s full map will not be completed observational data to see editor. She gained her PhD
until 2020, the first data from the mission what the Milky Way might in extragalactic astronomy
was released in September. The emerging look like from the outside at Cardiff University.
atlas charts not only the stellar layout within
GAIA’S BILLION STAR SURVEY

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WKH ELJJHVW PDS RI RI WKH VN\ WR GDWH EXW PRUH LV WR FRPH
Since July 2014, the Gaia satellite has The web-like bands that appear to cross the
been scanning the skies from its image are artefacts from the fact
vantage point 1.5 million that Gaia’s two telescopes scan
km from Earth. The the sky in bands. Over the
spacecraft is in the rest of its five-year mission,
process of taking the satellite will fill in
the precise these gaps to create
positions of a smooth image of
over a billion the Milky Way.
stars brighter The craft has
than mag. three instruments
+20.0 within on board, which
and above the are fed light from
NASA/JPL-CALTECH, ESA/GAIA/DPAC, ESA–D. DUCROS/2013
disc of the Milky the telescopes by a

Way, with the end system of 10 mirrors.
goal of producing a The astrometry instrument
three-dimensional map of allows Gaia to record the most
the Galaxy’s near side. This final accurate parallax distances ever taken,
catalogue will be 20 times the size and while its spectrometer will be able to measure
twice as accurate as its predecessor, the the radial velocity – speed along the line of
Hipparcos catalogue. revealing dark wisps of dust clouds. Around sight – of stars brighter than mag. +17.0.
The first image from the mission was the disc are close to 400 bright star clusters, Finally, a photometer will measure stellar
released in September and is pictured above. seen as bright points, along with our Galaxy’s colours, allowing astronomers to determine
It shows that the central band of the Milky companions, the two Magellanic Clouds, stellar characteristics such as age, mass,
Way‘s disc is thick with stars, their absence clearly visible in the lower right corner. temperature and chemical composition.
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EXTRAGALACTIC STAR HOPPING NOVEMBER 75
DISCOVERING
ANDROMEDA There’s a wealth of hidden
gems waiting to be found
in our neighbouring galaxy.
Pete Lawrence describes
how to image them
ABOUT THE WRITER

Pete Lawrence is an
expert astronomer
with a particular
interest in digital
astro imaging.
TOMMY NAWRATIL/CCGUIDE.COM, ISTOCK
M31 is the closest large

galaxy to our own and
is destined to collide
with the Milky Way in
four billion years’ time
76
EG And
1 G280
M32
C269 4
HIP 3293
3
2
NGC 206
G076
G078
TYC 2788 1373-1

TYC 2788 1857-1
hile the notion of actually to reach mag. +2.1 star Mirach (Beta something of an underwhelming
W touring a distant galaxy (`) Andromedae). Turn by 90º to head experience. However, there’s more to
MAIN CHART: PETE LAWRENCE, M32 & M110: MICHAEL BREITE/
may still belong to the northwest for a short distance towards M31 than at first meets the eye.
STEFAN HEUTZ/ WOLFGANG RIES/CCGUIDE.COM, ISTOCK
realm of science fiction, dimmer mag. +3.9 Mu (+) Andromedae The elongated smudge is actually
we can bring you the next best thing – a and then dimmer still mag. +4.5 Nu (i) just the galaxy’s core, measuring 50x15
sightseeing tour of M31, the Andromeda Andromedae. The elongated smudge of arcminutes, although visually it may
Galaxy. This object is currently well M31 sits just west of this star. Its location appear slightly smaller. Photographically
positioned and visible to the naked-eye is marked on this month’s all-sky chart. there’s more to be seen. The photo above
under reasonably dark skies. Find it from The galaxy’s naked-eye visibility shows M31’s spiral arms out to an apparent
the Great Square of Pegasus by imagining creates the expectation that – despite its size of 120x50 arcminutes; extremely
a diagonal from the southwest to northeast 2.5 million lightyear distance – M31 must deep shots reveal it to be even larger, its
corner (lower-right to upper-left as look amazing when viewed through delicate outer halo covering an area 180x55
seen from the UK), and extending it for binoculars or a telescope. Unfortunately, arcminutes. The main spiral arms are
approximately the same distance again it doesn’t and for many the galaxy is much harder to see visually than the core
M32 is a satellite galaxy of M31, an elliptical

dwarf packed with old red and yellow stars
M110 is M31’s second satellite and another

dwarf, though this one is fainter than M32
properly dark adapt and use a low-power

eyepiece. Averted vision may help you see
the boundary edge of the core better.
M110 sits at the acute point of an
isosceles triangle, the base of which is
formed by M32 and our new sightseeing
N target, M31’s brightest star cloud NGC
M110 206. This is much more diffuse than the
There are globular and open clusters galaxies, but not too hard to spot using a
waiting to be found in Andromeda; low-power eyepiece. Again, averted vision
our inset charts (marked here and helps enormously as does moving the
expanded over the page) will guide you
bright core out of the field of view.
M31 is a classic target for
astrophotography and, like the Orion
and tend to appear as a marginal, textured galaxy M110. This is notably dimmer than Nebula, must be one of the most
brightening of the background. M32 but still relatively easy to see. Finding photographed objects in the entire night
Let’s start our galactic tour with the these objects gives us direction and a feel sky. A camera will make it much easier
brighter landmarks, ones that can be easily for angular distance that we can use to to identify the features that have been
seen through the eyepiece. The core is locate other features. described above but also open up the
obvious and dropping due south from its opportunity to navigate to other objects
centre brings you to the relatively bright Find your bearings hidden within M31’s rich treasure chest.
elliptical galaxy M32. The distance A short distance of 6 arcminutes along the Many of the following objects are visible
from the core centre to the middle of line from the centre of the core towards visually, but do require apertures above
M32 is 24 arcminutes. M110 places you within the galaxy’s 10 inches to see convincingly. The
Return to the core and, on the opposite most obvious dust lane. This skirts along photographic charts throughout this
side to M32, head out from the main axis the northwest edge of the core and its article will help you to navigate.
of the galaxy at a right angle. At a distance visibility depends on telescope aperture, The stars that appear across and
of 36 arcminutes, you’ll arrive at the dwarf sky darkness and clarity. Let your eyes around M31 belong to our own Milky >
78
1 2
G280
G078
G280 can be found within a rectangular box of stars; within this G078 can be found near the middle of a line between M110 and HIP
frame, look for a ‘boomerang’ and you’ll find G280 at its bend 3293; look for a triangle in this area and G078 is at the sharpest point
> Way. The stars populating M31 itself in a halo around the main galaxy. cover individually here so we’ve picked a
are so distant that they appear to merge Impressive examples local to the Milky few of the brighter ones to get you started.
together to produce the overall shape Way include M13 in Hercules, M3 in If you get a taste for chasing them, there’s
and form of the galaxy. However, some Canes Venatici, Omega Centuri and an excellent Andromeda atlas available
of the actual ‘stars’ that are visible do turn 47 Tucanae. The last two are best seen online (http://ned.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/
out to be local to the M31 system, it’s just from the southern hemisphere. ANDROMEDA_Atlas/frames.html).
that these aren’t individual stars at all, Some of M31’s globulars are vast, but
but rather tight collections of them. The being so distant they appear to us as Start with the brightest
most obvious examples are globular nothing more than slightly fuzzy stars. The brightest is G001 (also designated
clusters and in some cases, open clusters. There are a lot of them too, some of which Mayall II) at mag. +13.8, but as it lies
Globulars are vast, gravitationally bound, can be photographed relatively easily with only 2.5º to the southwest of the centre
spherical collections of stars that orbit modest equipment. There are too many to of M31’s core, it requires a bit of effort
to find. Imagine M31’s core at the right
angle of a triangle with M110 at one
vertex. The other vertex is marked by the
M32 mag. +6.8 star HIP 2948, 2.2 times the
HIP 3293
distance from the core’s centre to M110.
M31 Locate mag. +7.0 HIP 3293, 13 arcminutes
N
southwest of M32 and draw a line from
it through HIP 2948, extending for
0.8 times that distance again to arrive at
HIP 2948 mag. +7.8 HIP 2643. From here you should
M110
TYC 2788-319-1 be able to identify the line HIP 2643 makes
with HIP 2651 and TYC 2788-319-1 from
HIP 2651 our finder chart, and from here it should
be possible to locate G001. It’s distinctive
G001
because it has two faint stars close by,
the trio appearing like Mickey Mouse’s
HIP 2643
TYC 2788-319-1 head with the stars as the ears.
If you found G001, then the rest, despite
being fainter, shouldn’t be too difficult
G001 HIP 2651 as they reside within the ‘traditional’
boundaries of the main galaxy. Next in
HIP 2643
brightness are G280, G078 and G076, all
mag. +14.2. G280 lies within the box-
shaped asterism shown in Inset Map 1.
PETE LAWRENCE X 7, ISTOCK
There is a small ‘boomerang’ shaped

pattern inside the box, with the middle
‘star’ in the boomerang being G280.
Globular cluster G001 lies beyond the Andromeda Galaxy. To find it you’ll need to star hop to Imagine a line between M110 and HIP
the stars in the large inset using M110, then use those stars to edge your way to G001 itself 3293. Roughly halfway along is the triangle
3 4
G076
C269
NGC 206
Þ G076 is surrounded by stars of similar brightness but easy to spot Þ Our only open cluster of this session, C269 can be found at one apex
once you have found this W pattern reminiscent of Cassiopeia of an equilateral triangle; it will appear as an elongated smudge
shown in Inset Map 2. G078 is the triangle shown on the main chart. Next identify in Inset Map 1. Extend the southwest
‘star’ pointing at M31’s core. It stands out the small W pattern one-third side for the same length again towards
well because it sits in front of a part of one of the way along this line and from M31’s core to locate the equilateral triangle
of M31’s dark dust lanes. here, using Inset Map 3, you should be marked in Inset Map 4. C269 should be
able to identify G076. easy to identify now.
Now go deeper If seeing globular clusters in another So there you have it – a brief introduction
G076 is in a similar situation but it’s harder galaxy strikes you as being pretty to decoding some of Andromeda’s many
to find because there are many stars of a amazing, what about open clusters? hidden treasures, in which we have barely
similar brightness around it. Go back to You won’t see individual stars but some scratched the surface of this incredibly rich
M32, then identify HIP 3293. Draw a line clusters are visible as elongated smudges. object. Next time you view of photograph
from it to the pair of stars TYC 2788-1373- One of the brightest is C269. To locate M31, remember there’s far more to it than
1 and TYC 2788-1857-1, both of which are it, go back to the box pattern marked at first meets the eye. S
IMAGING ANDROMEDA
The equipment you’ll need to capture detailed images of M31
TO SEE THE MAIN FEATURES TO SEE THE DETAILED FEATURES
Photographing M31 is relatively The more detail achieved in
easy to do thanks to its high your images the more faint
core brightness. A DSLR or MILC globulars and clusters you’ll be
camera and a 200mm lens able to identify. An autoguided
should be capable of producing mount is recommended. The
a great result. A tracking mount larger the aperture the better
is recommended to keep resolution you’ll get but even a
features within the galaxy 4-inch scope fitted with a DSLR
sharp. Fully open the lens but or CCD camera should reach the
close by a stop or two to reduce objects mentioned. For the more
edge distortions. Exposures adventurous, consider using a
should be pushed as long as cooled CCD camera, imaging
your tracking system allows M31 in panels. Take multiple
without trailing but keep an eye shots of the same section and
on the relative brightness of the final image which may be adversely stack together for a clean result. Assembling the panels like a giant
affected by light pollution. To start, try exposures of 30, 60, 90 and jigsaw will produce a highly detailed mosaic in which you can lose
120 seconds. Low to mid-range ISO and the RAW format for your yourself as you go globular hunting! Accurate calibration is essential
camera will provide the cleanest images. Use a program such as to eliminate unwanted gradient effects. The process of attempting to
DeepSkyStacker to combine a number of shots, so improving the join panels together by star pattern matching is also a very useful
ratio of the image signal to the background noise. This will make it way of getting acquainted with the galaxy. It’s only when you start
easier to enhance the image without losing detail to noise. to do this that you realise just how huge an object M31 actually is.
80
SKILLS
SKILLS
80 The Guide
82 How to
84 Image Processing
87 Scope Doctor
Brush up on your astronomy prowess with our team of experts
The Guide With

Kev Lochun
Tidal locking and the lunar cycle

Why our Moon only ever shows us one face, yet appears different night after night
W
hen we talk about the point to remember is that although only
Moon we often describe a fraction of the Moon may be lit from
it as having a ‘familiar our vantage point, a full 50 per cent
face’, a nod to the of the Moon is lit at any one time.
distinctive pattern of bright We just can’t always see it.
highlands and dark maria that has The cycle of lunar phases (also
been turned towards us for known as a lunation) runs from
millennia, visible to every new Moon to full Moon and
human who has ever stood on back again, and takes 29.5 days
Earth. But why do we only see to complete. Use our illustration
this one side of the Moon? We to help you imagine that you are
know that Earth spins about its looking down on Earth, the
axis, so why don’t we get to see Moon and the Sun, and that
the full lunar surface as our they are in a line with the Moon
Moon does the same? in the middle. This is the point
If you could have a bird’s-eye of new Moon, where no sunlight
view of the Moon orbiting Earth, falls on the lunar hemisphere facing
you would see that the Moon rotates us. At full Moon the reverse is true:
once on its axis every 27.3 days, which Earth sits in the middle of a line with
also happens to be the same amount the Moon and the Sun, and the near side
of time it takes to complete one orbit of the Moon is fully lit.
of our planet. The result is that from The familiar near side, forever turned towards
There are two more points in the lunar
our perspective on terra firma we see us; some people can see the face of man in it cycle with precise names, first quarter and
the same lunar hemisphere at all times; last quarter. First quarter occurs between
if the Moon were to spin faster or slower across the surface much in the same new and full Moon, and marks the point
than once per orbit we would see all of manner as our ocean tides. This effectively when the Moon is 50 per cent illuminated
it. In the proper astronomical parlance, acted as a brake, gradually slowing our to us on Earth, appearing as a near-perfect
we say that the Moon is ‘tidally locked’ companion’s spin speed until it fell into semicircle. Last quarter occurs between full
to Earth. You may also come across the equilibrium with its orbital period. At and new Moon, and in this case the opposite
PETE LAWRENCE, ISTOCK X 2, ILLUSTRATION BY STEVE MARSH
expression ‘synchronous rotation’, this point the hemisphere facing us half of the lunar near side is illuminated.
which means the same thing. became locked in place. In both cases, these phases occur when the
It wasn’t always this way. When the Earth sits at the right angle of a triangle
Moon formed some 4.5 billion years ago, But our view still changes with the Sun and the Moon.
it was spinning much more rapidly than Though the Moon always keeps that That both of these phases are called
it is today. Earth’s gravity causes a rocky same side towards us, even a cursory quarters is something of a misnomer
tidal bulge in our companion, which glance will show you that it is not – the quarter being referenced is the
means it is lemon-shaped rather than a consistently illuminated from one night proportion of the lunar cycle the Moon
neat sphere, with a pinched end facing to the next. What you are seeing here is has progressed through, not the
our planet. Back in the Moon’s fast- the changing phase of the Moon. By phase, illumination we see from Earth.
spinning early history, the location of we simply mean the proportion of sunlit The rest of the lunar phases are
that bulge kept changing, shifting Moon visible from Earth. The essential described as being waxing or waning
SKILLS THE GUIDE NOVEMBER 81
The Moon’s phase changes First quarter

based on its relative position Sunlight
to Earth and the Sun
Waxing gibbous Waxing crescent
Full Moon New Moon
Waning gibbous Waning crescent
Last quarter
(growing or shrinking) and crescent or Although it takes the Moon 29.5 days You may also wonder why, given the Moon
gibbous (less than or more than 50 per to complete a lunar cycle (a period known sits in the middle of a line with Earth and
cent illuminated). After new Moon, the as the synodic month), it only takes 27.3 the Sun at the point of new Moon, solar
terminator – the line separating lunar day days to complete one orbit of our planet (a eclipses are such rare events. And likewise,
and night – appears to creep from east to sidereal month). This discrepancy arises why we don’t experience guaranteed lunar
west, giving rise to the waxing crescent from one lunar cycle being defined as the eclipses at the time of full Moon. It’s
phases. After first quarter, the Moon time it takes for the Moon to return to because the Moon’s orbit around Earth is
moves through its waxing gibbous phases the same phase as seen by an observer tilted by around 5° with respect to Earth’s
until it reaches full Moon. From here the on Earth – because Earth itself is moving, orbit around the Sun. What happens, in
phases play out in reverse order, from hurtling through space on its own orbit most instances, is a near miss. S
waning gibbous to last quarter then around the Sun, it takes the Moon that
waning crescent back to new, where the little bit longer to catch up than complete Kev Lochun is BBC Sky at Night
cycle starts all over again. an orbit of its own. Magazine’s production editor
The first quarter and last quarter Moons, so called because they mark transitional points in the 29.5-day lunar cycle, not the proportion of
illumination we see as observers on Earth
82
SKILLS
With
Ben Kent
How to…
Turn a coffee container into a dew shield
Transform an everyday object into a vital astro accessory
TOOLS AND
MATERIALS
MATERIALS
Catering-sized coffee container
to fit your telescope, 6mm self-
adhesive neoprene, 3mm self-
adhesive neoprene.
TOOLS
Craft knife, scissors, metal file, fabric
tape measure, black duct tape or
electrical tape, marker pen.
Schmidt-Cassegrains being most prone

to dew forming on the front lens. This can
be eliminated using a dew heater, but a
cost-effective alternative is to use a dew
shield. This is a tube that slides over the
end of the telescope, insulates the front
lens and prolongs your observing time.
Again, these can be purchased, but they
are also simple to make – we show you
how to do so here using a catering-sized
coffee container and some neoprene.
Catering-sized coffee containers are
perfect for this project and are suitably
robust, but you’ll need to find one with a
diameter that matches your telescope.
Ours came from a canteen, but you could
also ask a local café or restaurant if they
have any they are going to be throwing
The finished dew shield is black on its inner surface, cutting down on annoying reflections
away. Adhesive-backed neoprene on both
ou are out observing on a clear and the lens has dropped to below the the inside and outside of the container
Y
ALL PICTURES: BEN KENT
evening but you notice bright ‘dew point’. Water vapour has condensed provides insulation and a barrier to water
stars growing dim, the sky on your lens and shortened your observing vapour – if your container is cardboard
looking misty and ultimately session. Irritated, you call it a night. this will prevent it from becoming soggy.
hardly anything can be seen at all. Your Dewing is an issue that most The neoprene also helps the dew shield fit
telescope has radiated its heat to the sky observers face, with refractors and snuggly over the telescope tube and, being
SKILLS HOW TO NOVEMBER 83
black, prevents any reflections on

the inside.
Start by removing the base of the STEP BY STEP
container, carefully cutting around the
interior rim using a craft knife. Take
care to keep as close to the rim as possible
and not to squeeze too hard as you cut,
otherwise you may distort the tube.
Once the base has been removed file
off any sharp edges so you can’t injure
yourself or rip the neoprene. Measure
the outside of the container and take a
note of the circumference, then cut the
neoprene to the same length. This ensures
that the neoprene will wrap completely
around the container.
STEP 1 STEP 2
Fixing the neoprene Use a craft knife to make a slit in the base
of your container at the edge of the rim.
Measure the outside circumference
of the coffee tin with a fabric tape
Remove a small portion of backing from
Carefully slide the knife around the rim to measure and note the length. Cut a
the neoprene and stick down the end on cut out the base. File off any sharp edges piece of 6mm neoprene to the same
the outside of the container, ensuring the so you don’t cut yourself or damage the length and check that it wraps
edge is flush with the rim. We found that neoprene later on. completely around the tin.
removing a bit of backing and sticking
that bit down is the most effective way
as the adhesive is strong. Doing it like
this also allows you to make adjustments
as you go along. Trim off any excess
neoprene that sticks over the rim, then
cut an additional strip of neoprene and
use it to cover the seam.
You will need to measure the inside
circumference of the container and then
cut your neoprene to match. The length
of internal neoprene should be in the
region of 20mm less than the length of the
container. Carefully apply the neoprene STEP 3 STEP 4
to the inner surface just as you did before. Peel off the backing as you go and wrap Measure the inside circumference
Lining the inside can be awkward, so the self-adhesive neoprene around the of the container, then cut the 6mm
you may find it easier to cut this piece outside of the container, keeping the neoprene to match the length and
of neoprene into several panels and attach edge flush with the rim. Cut a strip of divide this into a number of smaller
neoprene the same length as the panels. Cut a strip of 3mm neoprene
them sequentially.
container and cover the seam. to the same length.
Coffee containers have a rim where
the lid fits. You need to push the neoprene
up against this when lining the inside,
leaving a gap at the other end. Fill this gap
with thinner neoprene to create a ridge for
the telescope tube to rest against. Cut a
shorter length of neoprene to cover any
seams where the ends meet. Finally wrap
the outside of the dew shield with black
electrical tape or black duct tape to give
the neoprene extra protection from
nicks and tears.
An extension of the project would be to
combine it with a dew heater band built
into the rim. This will ensure that your STEP 5 STEP 6
optics will remain clear for the duration of Attach the 6mm neoprene panels to Wrap black electrical tape or duct tape
the inside of the container, pushing it around the outside of the dew shield,
an observation session, as even with a dew
up to the lip, then fix the 3mm neoprene taking care that there are no bubbles
shield the lens will eventually mist up. S over the gap between the rim and the or it will lift. This gives it a neater finish
thicker neoprene. Again, cover the seam and also protects the neoprene from
Ben Kent is an amateur astronomer using 3mm neoprene. damage in use.
based in Aberdeenshire
84
SKILLS
Image With
Ian
Evenden
PROCESSING 6KDUSHQLQJ ZLWK D KLJK SDVV OWHU

Make your photos pop with this straightforward Photoshop sharpening method
W
hen digital cameras
opened up home image
editing to everyone, there
was a lot of excitement
around sharpening, as many thought it
would allow them to adjust the focus
of their photos and rescue out of focus
images. This isn’t the case. Sharpening
is an adjustment of the contrast in an
image at a tiny level, and can improve
a photo that’s merely ‘soft’, but it can’t
work miracles.
When it comes to astro images, you are
often dealing with points of light against
a dark background and therefore a high
contrast ratio. In these instances, the
two-click application of Photoshop’s
Unsharp Mask tool – so useful for daytime Applying a high pass filter can make your image unrecognisable at first – this is of the Moon
photography – just isn’t enough.
If you can improve the contrast in your out more strongly from their less sharp has something very similar built into
images in some way, then your photos will background, increasing visual contrast both the full program and the cut-down
appear sharper naturally. You might be and apparent sharpness. Elements. It just calls it something
able to do that by taking your captures If you do your astrophotography with different: High Pass.
away from light pollution, picking a night a DSLR or smartphone camera, there’s a If you apply the High Pass filter
with good seeing to reduce atmospheric way to get the same effect without needing directly to an image you are likely to be
variations, or muttering a prayer to Tyche a stacking application. Users of GIMP can disappointed. Photoshop will make your
(the Greek goddess of luck) that nothing find wavelets as a plug-in, while Photoshop photo a grey mess with a few areas in it
disturbs your tripod during a long
exposure. With widths measured in
micrometres, even the tiniest of
movements can cause light to spill
over onto adjacent photosites on the
imaging sensor, ruining a sharp image.
Sharpen without stacking

A common method of sharpening used
by CCD camera owners is to shoot many,
many frames of an astronomical object,
stack them to reduce image noise and
improve contrast, then apply a process
ALL PICTURES: IAN EVENDEN
known as wavelet sharpening, which is

built into applications such as RegiStax.
Wavelet sharpening increases contrast
in high-frequency areas of the image,
which means those that are already
the most sharp. This makes them stand It’s best to apply the filter to a layer rather than the image itself, as it will give a better result
SKILLS IMAGE PROCESSING NOVEMBER 85
The high pass filter’s radius slider controls how strong the filter’s Once you are happy with your filter, combine it with the base data
effect is; when using it, use the preview image to guide you by changing the filter layer’s blend mode; try Overlay or Hard Light
you might recognise from your original stop on the list should be Overlay. Pick it’s not strong enough, either go back
image. These are the highest contrast this, and your image should snap into and try High Pass again with a different
areas, while anything below a set some sort of recognisable focus, noticeably pixel setting, or try the Hard Light blend
frequency cutoff has been rendered sharper than it was before. To really see mode. Remember to use Layer > Flatten
grey. To get the best out of the filter, the difference, use the ‘eye’ button at the to combine all your layers before you save
you need to apply it to a layer. left of the top layer’s entry in the palette to your new image as a JPEG. S
Open an image in the application, toggle its visibility on and off.
then head for the Layers palette (it is If Overlay’s effect is too strong, fade it Ian Evenden is a journalist working in the
often found on the right-hand side of out using the Opacity slider to the right. If fields of science, tech and photography
the interface). Select the Background
Layer – the only one there most likely
– right-click it and select Duplicate Layer.
Give the new layer a name, and make
sure it’s on top of your background
layer in the layer stack. This is the one
we’re going to filter.
From the Filter menu, select Other, then
High Pass. You’ll get a grey image with
just one slider, labelled radius. This is the
distance in pixels the filter acts over, and
what matters isn’t the number, but the
look of the preview window as you use the
slider. Starting from the left-hand side,
slowly push the slider to the right until
you can see the image’s details pushing
through the sea of grey. For an image
of the Pleiades cluster in Taurus we used
2.0 pixels, while for the Moon we found
6.5 pixels was better. It depends
completely on your image and on what
looks good to your eye.
Blend to get the effect

Once you’ve hit OK, you’ll still be able to
see the sea of grey. In order to bring out
the details, we need to blend this with the
unfiltered layer below. In the Layers
palette, make sure your topmost layer (the
grey one) is selected, then drop down the
box marked Normal. This is the blending
mode, and affects how the bottom layer The difference the high pass filter makes is apparent in this image: on the left is our untouched
can be seen through the top one. Your first original capture of the Moon, on the right the crisper view of the processed lunar disc
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SKILLS SCOPE DOCTOR NOVEMBER 87
Scope
I’m looking for a portable secondary
With telescope that I can take travelling
Steve ZLWK PH VSHFL FDOO\ FDPSLQJ $Q\
Richards suggestions?
DOCTOR
ALICE DAVENPORT
Camping out in the wild is a great way to observe

the night sky as, by its very nature, you will tend to
be far away from the intrusion of light pollution.
However, with all the equipment required for a
Our equipment specialist cures your comfortable expedition, you will be limited in how
optical ailments and technical maladies much astronomy gear you can take with you.
For convenience when travelling, a refractor is
the obvious choice as collimation will not be
Should I get a Barlow lens or zoom required before you can start observing. A short-
tube instrument with an aperture between 2.75
H\HSLHFH IRU P\ &HOHVWURQ $VWURPDVWHU and 3 inches will give a good balance between
90 to improve my observations of portability and usability. You will also need to
consider a suitable mounting for the telescope and
Jupiter and Saturn? here, an altazimuth mount would make the most
JACK REEVES sense, as they are relatively light and compact.
Telescopes that would fit your requirements
The Celestron Astromaster 90 has celestial objects appear to shimmer well include the Altair Astro Starwave 70ED f/6
a focal length of 1,000mm which, through changes in the refractive travel refractor, Altair Astro Lightwave
combined with the 20mm and index of the atmosphere caused 72ED-R and the Explore Scientific ED
10mm eyepieces included in the by air turbulence. Poor seeing APO 80mm f/6 Essential.
set, will give you magnifications can have a very detrimental Altair Astro’s Starwave
of 50x and 100x respectively. effect on your view. 70ED is a light and
Upgrading the default eyepiece that Rather than use a magnifying portable instrument
comes with your telescope is one of Barlow lens with your existing
the easiest ways to improve your eyepieces, you may be better off
setup, especially if you feel your view buying a better quality eyepiece more
of the planets is coming up rather suited to your favourite objects. The
small. The maximum magnification advantage of this approach is that if
that you should consider with your you upgrade your telescope in the
particular telescope is about 180x future, you will already have a good
but this assumes that you have eyepiece to complement it.
STEVE’S TOP TIP

excellent seeing. Seeing Plössl or Orthoscopic eyepieces are
is a description of excellent for planetary observations
how much and would be a better choice than a
na
zoom eyepiece with its multiple lens What is the difference betwee
1.25 -inch and a 2-in ch eye pie ce?
elements. Your shortlist should
in physical
include a 6mm Apart from the obvious difference
the two if
Baader Classic size, there is no difference between
and field-stop
Orthoscopic, they have the same focal length
the field of view,
6mm William diameter, which determines
ntag e of a 2-inc h over
Optics SPL but therein lies the adva
. The cave rnou s bod y of
or possibly a 1.25-inch eyepiece
allow s for a larg er field -stop
a 7mm a 2-inch eyepiece
diam eter, whic h ope ns up the
Celestron and eye lens
s system
X-Cel LX. possibilities of producing a multi-len
A wide
with a wide apparent field of view.
the impr ession
apparent field of view removes
and crea tes a much
of observing through a tube
ce at the eyep iece .
more immersive experien
PAUL WHITFIELD X 2
< The Celestron Astromaster Steve Richards is a keen astro imager

90 and 7mm X-Cel LX eyepiece and an astronomy equipment expert
Email your queries to [email protected]

Astronomy Binoculars
BT81S-A with
HF2 Mount &
Tripod Package
This 81mm astronomy
binocular delivers crystal clear,
sharp views through its new
optical design. Its lightweight
body ensures that you can take
it to any observing location.
Package includes 2x SLV eyepieces,
tripod, swing bracket, red dot finder
and fork mount.
Special Offer Price

£1599
SRP £1784 SAVE £185
www.vixenoptics.co.uk
For more information and stockists of Vixen and

Opticron astronomy products please call
01582 726522 quoting reference SN1116.
Distributed in the UK by Opticron, Unit 21, Titan Court, Laporte Way,
Luton, LU4 8EF
REVIEWS NOVEMBER 89
HOW WE RATE
Reviews
Each category is given a mark out
RI YH VWDUV DFFRUGLQJ WR KRZ ZHOO
it performs. The ratings are:
+++++ Outstanding
+++++ Very good
+++++ Good
Bringing you the best in equipment and accessories +++++ Average
each month, as reviewed by our team of astro experts +++++ Poor/Avoid
94
Find out how the twin
4-inch lenses of these
binoculars fare in the field
SEE INTERACTIVE 360° MODELS OF

ALL OUR FIRST LIGHT REVIEWS AT
WWW.SKYATNIGHTMAGAZINE.COM
This month’s reviews
FIRST LIGHT BOOKS GEAR

WWW.THESECRETSTUDIO.NET X 4
90 Meade
ETX 90
Observer telescope
94 Altair Astro
100mm
giant binoculars
98 Explore
Scientific long
eye relief 92º eyepiece
102 We rate four
of the latest
astronomy titles
104
wall clock
Including
this Jovian
Find out more about how we review equipment at www.skyatnightmagazine.com/scoring-categories
90
FIRST LIGHT See an interactive 360° model of this telescope at

www.skyatnightmagazine.com/ETX90observer
Meade ETX 90
Observer telescope
A removable tube and speaking handset make this scope stand out
WORDS: PAUL MONEY
T
he Meade ETX 90 Observer is the latest in operation. It then gets the time and date and you are
VITAL STATS a long line for this model – Meade has almost ready to begin. For the Go-To to work in
been producing the ETX 90 for well over altaz mode, Meade offers two methods for initial
• Price £469 two decades. This revamped version has start-up: true north or magnetic north. Once we
• Optics Maksutov- new features added for the relaunch. had levelled the tripod and telescope tube using the
Cassegrain
It is a 3.5-inch f/13.8 Maksutov-Cassegrain telescope supplied magnetic compass/bubble level, we found
• Aperture 90mm
(3.5 inches) tube atop a computerised dual-arm fork mount and that both options produced good results after we
• Focal length a sturdy steel tripod. It is supplied with an AudioStar had performed an alignment procedure. There are
1,250mm (f/13.8) controller that has a built-in speaker: as well as the three ways to align – easy, one star and two star.
• Mount Computerised 30,000 objects in its database, there are four hours The tripod mounting plate can also be tilted
dual-arm fork of audio describing astronomical objects. Also to turn the mount into an equatorial system.
altazimuth included are 26mm and 9.7mm 1.25-inch eyepieces, This allows you to track the stars for basic
• Tripod Adjustable a red-dot finder, a hard carry case and a soft case for astrophotography or use the scope for prolonged
steel tripod with
the tripod. Assembly was easy and required no observing sessions without having to endure the
equatorial tilt plate
tools, ideal for a quick set up and go system. Add field rotation that occurs in altaz mode. We used
• Handset AudioStar
hand control, the finder and an eyepiece along with connecting both modes for our tests, though bear in mind you
30,000-plus the hand controller and you are almost set. need to also set the hand controller to altaz or
object database, Power is supplied by six AA batteries, which are equatorial mode for the Go-To to work properly.
integrated speaker not included. The battery compartment is set in the
• Power Requirement mount near the locking lever for the azimuth motion. On tour with an audio guide
Six AA Batteries or Power can also be provided by a 9-12V powertank, We took the ‘tour’ option and enjoyed hearing
9-12V DC power tank but you will need to purchase the Meade compatible interesting facts about the most popular targets.
• Extras 26mm and
cigarette cable to plug into the ETX mount. The optics have ultra-high transmission coatings
9.7mm 1.25-inch
On starting up for the first time the AudioStar and the scope has a focal length of 1,250mm, giving
eyepieces, red-dot
finder
controller requires the usual basic information magnifications of 48x and 129x with the supplied
• Weight 8.6kg – your location and if daylight savings time is in 26mm and 9.7mm eyepieces respectively. We felt the >
• Supplier Opticstar
• www.opticstar.com
• Tel 0161 969 9008 DETACHABLE TUBE
Meade has made the latest version extra versatile by allowing
the telescope tube to detach from the dual-arm fork mount. The
mount is no longer directly attached to the telescope as
a fixed unit, but instead there is a special carriage held
between the forks that the tube sits in. Once removed
the tube can be attached to a different tripod – that
SKY SAYS… could be a photo tripod, for example, if you wished
We were pleased to use the scope for simple observing without Go-To
that we could or as a daytime spotting scope. The tube attachment
‘foot’ doubles as a short Vixen-style bar,
see many of meaning it can be mounted on a different
the bright tracking mount too – useful if you have a
Messier objects dedicated equatorial mount for long exposure
astrophotography. We tried this out by
despite the long attaching the tube to our own NEQ6 mount
focal ratio and took a series of images of globular cluster
M2 in Aquarius and open cluster M103 in
Cassiopeia, obtaining satisfying results.
FIRST LIGHT NOVEMBER 91
FLIP MIRROR OPTICS

AND REAR The telescope has a 3.5-inch aperture
OPTICAL PORT and a focal length of 1,250mm
giving a focal ratio of f/13.8. It
The ETX 90 has an easy, gave good views with pin-sharp
smooth to use focusing stars out to 90 per cent of the field
knob. It also possesses a of view using the supplied 26mm
flip switch that can allow eyepiece, with only minor distortion
you to either direct the light towards the edge.
path up at a right angle to
the eyepiece holder or to
a port on the rear where you
can attach a camera using a
T-adaptor.
TRIPOD
The stainless steel tripod
is sturdy and can easily
hold the weight of the
mount and telescope tube.
It can be adjusted for
height and features a
tilting platform to make
the system equatorial
instead of altaz. There
is also a useful eyepiece
spreader tray.
AUDIOSTAR HAND
CONTROLLER
The AudioStar controller has a database
of 30,000 objects including Messier, NGC
and Caldwell catalogues, planets, named
stars, double stars and variable stars. It
also features a built-in speaker and audio
descriptions of 500 objects.
92 FIRST LIGHT NOVEMBER
FIRST LIGHT
> latter was close to the
SKY SAYS… limit of usefulness. The
Now add these: long focal ratio of f/13.8
is good for bright subjects
1. 45° erecting such as the Moon and
prism brighter planets, but
2. T-Adaptor unfortunately none of
for a camera them were in a suitable
position for viewing on
3. DC Power the limited number of
Cord with clear nights we had.
Globular cluster M2, stacked from A single 60-second exposure of open
cigarette However, we did view seven 60-second images at ISO 2500 cluster M103 captured at ISO 2000
Uranus and Neptune,
lighter adaptor
with the first a lovely
greenish-blue disc and
the second a distinct bluish colour,
making it stand out well. The Go-To
placed them close to the centre of the view, which
helped confirm their identity.
We turned to the deep sky and were pleased that
we could see many of the bright Messier objects
despite the long focal ratio. These included
planetary nebulae M27 and M57, star clusters M11
and M34 and the magnificent Andromeda Galaxy,
M31. The latter did fill the view, but using the
controller’s movement keys we could trace out the
disc and even got a hint of a dust lane and the two
companion galaxies, M32 and M110. We did notice
a little vignetting on the bottom half of the view
when using the 26mm eyepiece; this turned out to
be the flip mirror system, which didn’t quite tilt all
the way back, but the effect was not too obtrusive
and did not affect the 9.7mm eyepiece.
Using the flip switch at the rear of the telescope
tube, you can direct the light away from the eyepiece
to the camera port; note you will need a suitable
T-adaptor to connect your own camera. The mount
is suitable for simple astrophotography of the Moon
and brighter planets but not ideal for deep-sky imaging.
This is an enjoyable beginner system that will
give you a lot of fun exploring the night sky with
the benefit of audiotours. S
VERDICT
BUILD & DESIGN +++++
EASE OF USE +++++
FEATURES +++++
WWW.THESECRETSTUDIO.NET, PAUL MONEY X 2
*2 72 75$&.,1* $&&85$&< +++++

OPTICS +++++
OVERALL +++++
'8$/ $50 )25. 02817

The dual-arm fork mount is sturdy and easily attached to the tripod via
two bolts. There are ports for the hand controller, power from an
external power tank, an on/off switch and an aux port. The mount also
houses a battery compartment that takes six AA batteries.
GALAXY ON GLASS
“They fit like a glove has never been so apt; using a professional camera
you need good grip and dexterity, they enable me to feel the camera
controls like my own skin but with the added bonus of keeping my
hands warm and dry.” Pat Felon, ITV Cameraman.
MACWET GLOVES PROVIDE:

t Incredilble touch and feel - you won’t realise
you’re wearing them!
t Unrivalled grip in dry, wet or humid conditions
t The perfect fit - available in 14 sizes
Spectacular wall art from astro photographer Chris t A choice of 6 colours, two styles and two cuff lengths
Baker. Available as frameless acrylic-aluminium
t Durablility - machine washable and long-lasting
mix or framed backlit up to 1.2 metres wide. A big
impact in any room.
All limited editions.
TO ORDER CALL: 0845 6039075
www.cosmologychris.co.uk/glassart EMAIL: [email protected] | WWW.MACWET.COM
www.facebook.com/galaxyonglass
94
FIRST LIGHT See an interactive 360° model of these binos at

www.skyatnightmagazine.com/altair100giant
Altair Astro 100mm

giant binoculars
7KH EHQH WV RI ELQRFXODUV ZLWK WKH SRZHU RI WZLQ WHOHVFRSHV
WORDS: STEPHEN TONKIN
SKY SAYS…
W
e love the view of 7KH OLJKW EDI HV Universal Astronomics T-mount (rated
VITAL STATS the night sky that
LQ WKHVH ELQRFXODUV at 13.5kg) or a Manfrotto 501 video
you get through large head (rated at 6kg). They were usable
• Price £1,050 binoculars, so we were
GR WKHLU MRE up to about 45° altitude on the video
• Optics Multicoated delighted to be offered the opportunity H[WUHPHO\ ZHOO head, above which its limited capacity
• Aperture 100mm UHVXOWLQJ LQ D
(4 inches)
of trying out this mighty 4-inch model made it difficult to use, but the fact
• Magnification 30x
from Altair Astro. They come in a KLJK FRQWUDVW that the binocular’s centre of mass is
• Angular field of view foam-lined box, and are supplied with WR WKH LPDJH forward of the mounting base enables a
2.2° 18mm ultra-flat eyepieces (1.25-inch higher altitude than it would be possible
• Focusing Individual fit) and a 0.25-inch Whitworth socket cap bolt to attain comfortably otherwise. The T-mount was
focus with a 3/8-inch adaptor for mounting the ideal. There are no trunnions for a yoke-type mount
• Eye relief 20mm binoculars onto a tripod quick-release plate. so, if that is your preferred mounting option, you
• Interpupillary distance The eyepieces are individually focused and are would need to use one with a mounting plate.
54-76 mm
secured into their holders with self-centring
• Weight 7.1kg
• Supplier Altair Astro
compression rings. You alter the interpupillary Insignificant aberration
distance with levers on the eyepiece holders. These We tested the binoculars first with a gibbous Moon
• www.altairastro.com
• Tel 01263 731505 move smoothly and are suitably stiff so that you are in the sky and found the eyepieces easily snapped
unlikely to alter the interpupillary distance when to a crisp focus on the lunar terminator. We saw
focusing or changing eyepieces. The focusers a tiny amount of chromatic aberration on-axis
themselves are also smooth and move very easily, but, even off-axis, this was minimal. The objective
which makes focusing a doddle. The eyepieces are lenses are well-corrected for an achromat.
threaded for standard 1.25-inch filters The crisp and detailed view of the terminator
and have fold-down eye-cups with was maintained up to the edge of the field of view.
sufficient eye relief for you to be There were no spurious reflections with the Moon
able to see the entire field of view anywhere inside the field of view, demonstrating
wearing spectacles. that the anti-reflective coatings are fit for purpose.
For testing purposes, we mounted With the Moon just outside of the field of view,
the binoculars on either a there was no glare, suggesting that the two light >
FLAT AND WIDE COMBINED

The unique pleasure of large binoculars is their ability to show a large amount of
sky to both eyes at once. To really take advantage of this, the field of view needs
to be as large as you can easily take in without having to move your eyes
around excessively and flat enough that the entire visible field is in focus at
once. The combination of the 4-inch, f/5.5 objectives and the standard
18mm ultra-flat eyepieces delivers a 2.2° field of view (65° apparent field)
that is sharp to the edge. Although there is some false colour on bright
objects, this is kept very well under control and is not visible on objects
fainter than mag. +2.0. The light baffles do their job extremely well,
resulting in a high contrast to the image. Stray light is well controlled
apart from occasional reflections from the prisms. Another feature of
binoculars is the false stereopsis that results from using both eyes. The
Moon looks spherical and open clusters appear to have depth, an
entirely spurious phenomenon that results from differing colour and
brightness of the stars, but a pleasurable one nevertheless.
6&5(: ,1 /(16 &$36

The objective caps screw into the lens cell, eliminating the
likelihood that they will fall off and get lost or damaged
in the dark. They also hold the dew shields in their
retracted position so that they cannot accidentally
extend at an inopportune moment.
5,*+7 $1*/('
EYEPIECES
A feature of straight-through binoculars is
that observing targets higher than about
50° can be very uncomfortable, especially
if you are standing, because of the angle
you have to impose on your neck. The 90°
eyepieces make observations near
the zenith extremely comfortable.
SIGHT
One disadvantage of binoculars with right-angled eyepieces is that
some form of finder is essential. Not only is the carry-handle drilled to
accept a standard two-hole mounting shoe for a finder, but there is a
useful ‘V-notch and post’ type sight incorporated into the handle itself.
FIRST LIGHT
DEW SHIELDS
Mounted binoculars are normally pointed at the sky for
an entire observing session, increasing the likelihood
that dew will form on the optics. The dew shields
extend by 67mm, which we found to
be adequate at keeping dew off
for a couple of hours on a
moderately humid night.
SKY SAYS…
Now add these:
> baffles in each optical of the field of view; it disappeared when we tried to
1. Altair Sabre tube are doing their job. centre it. We found that it was due to a bright star
altaz mount Cygnus was well- just above the field of view which, when directly CHOICE OF
2. 100mm placed at the time of above, caused two of these diagonal streaks, one in MOUNTING
review, so we took a each eyepiece. It did not occur when the bright object
L-Bracket OPTIONS
look at double star was below or to the side of the field of view. This is
for Altair Albireo. Its two almost certainly due to a reflection off a prism edge The base has two
100mm giant components were and a minor niggle when all is said and done. 0.25-inch Whitworth
binoculars crisp and displayed By now, the Andromeda Galaxy was at a decent holes, spaced to match
a Vixen-style dovetail
the golden yellow and altitude. It overflowed the field of view and the
3. Pair of Altair bar, and one 3/8-inch
sapphire blue that you sharper cut-off due to the dust lane in its nearer
1.25-inch Whitworth hole. They are
would expect from a edge was obvious all the way across. standard photographic
premium light faithful colour rendition. These are well-implemented achromatic mounting threads, so
SROOXWLRQ OWHUV Inspired by the cleanness binoculars that would be best suited to keen they fit a range of tripod
of the split, we targeted observers who want a capable large instrument quick-release plates. We
another double, Gamma Delphini, without having to go to the expense of a premium found that using two holes
whose components are separated by apochromatic design. S eliminates the possibility
only nine arcseconds. Not only was it cleanly that the binoculars will
split, but dark space between the two components rotate on the plate.
was visible right to the edge of the field of view, VERDICT
with no refocusing required. This is indeed a BUILD & DESIGN +++++

true flat-field combination. EASE OF USE +++++
We panned back up to the Dumbbell Nebula, +++++
FEATURES
which showed definite structure. It was during
FIELD OF VIEW +++++
this test that we noticed the one optical flaw we
found with these binoculars: initially we noticed OPTICS +++++
a small diagonal smudge of light near the bottom OVERALL +++++
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Taught by Professor Eric R. Snodgrass
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98
FIRST LIGHT See an interactive 360° model of this eyepiece at

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([SORUH 6FLHQWL F ORQJ H\H UHOLHI

12mm 92° eyepiece
$ ZHLJKW\ XOWUD ZLGH RFXODU WKDW KHOSV \RX RDW DPLG WKH VWDUV
WORDS: STEVE RICHARDS
SKY SAYS…
E
yepieces offering a wide elements cannot fog up. Though
VITAL STATS apparent field of view We had to this rarely happens in any event,
continue to be popular with be quite exact a more useful effect of this feature
• Price £372 astronomers as they provide is that the internal sealing rings
• Focal Length 12mm
in our eye
an immersive experience when make the eyepiece waterproof.
• Apparent field of view placement to
92°
observing celestial objects. Adding to Daytime observing of tree
its already comprehensive range of
enjoy the whole branches against the bright backdrop
• Eye relief 19.9mm
eyepieces, Explore Scientific has HOG EXW ZKDW of a blue sky showed that there was
• Optical elements Eight
in six groups recently introduced this 12mm long D HOG LW ZDV no false colour. The field stop was
• Barrel size 2 inches eye relief eyepiece featuring an very sharply defined but did show
• Extras Dust caps, ultra-wide apparent field of view of 92° and a little blue tinge, although this was not at all
soft case an Argon-purged interior. With a specification intrusive. Observing the seven-day-old Moon
• Weight 1,036g like that, we were keen to try it out for ourselves. early one summer evening against the same blue
• Supplier Telescope On opening the attractively produced retail sky produced a wonderful high contrast view
House
box, we couldn’t help but be amazed by the with no colour fringing on the lunar limb.
• www.telescopehouse.
com sheer size of this ocular, standing 160mm tall
• Tel 01342 837098 and weighing in at over 1kg. Adding to this first Impressive star shapes
impression is the size of the eye lens, which we The view of the night sky through this eyepiece was
measured at 44mm in diameter. Impeccably breathtaking. We had to be quite exact in our eye
finished, it has a great feel of quality and an placement to enjoy the whole field, but what a field
undeniable heft. it was. Star shapes remained excellent across more
The 2-inch barrel was an excellent fit in our than 90 per cent of the field of view, with small
star diagonal. It was held firmly in place when purple spikes becoming apparent after this
using the single retaining screw of the anti-marring threshold. We particularly enjoyed the views of
brass compression ring, despite the tapered security double star Albireo in Cygnus, Brocchi’s Cluster,
shoulder, which can sometimes be an issue. M27, Kemble’s Cascade and the Andromeda Galaxy
The eyepiece is Argon-purged, which means demonstrating the versatility of this eyepiece.
that normal air is excluded from the interior, with Observing the nine-day old Moon against a
the effect that the inner faces of the lens fairly dark summer night sky gave us the most >
BRILLIANT IMMERSION
The apparent field of view of an eyepiece is defined by the total angle of
movement through which your eye travels when traversing the field from edge
to edge. The maximum peripheral field of view for an average adult is around
170°, which includes physical movement of the eye. This peripheral view explains
why we can easily view the sharply defined edges of the field stop on most
eyepieces, a circumstance that leads to the impression of observing through
a ‘porthole’ when observing through narrow-field eyepieces.
An increase in the apparent field of view reduces this effect and produces
a more immersive and natural observing experience. An ultra-wide field of
view like that attained from this eyepiece, with its 92° apparent field of view,
can give the surreal impression that you are ‘floating amongst the stars’.
This increase is achieved by the use of a complex optical design with eight
lens elements arranged in six groups and, key to achieving this field of view
with a long eye relief, is the 44mm wide eye lens.
LONG EYE RELIEF

The eye relief is quoted as being a fraction under 20mm but in
common with most other eyepieces, the eye lens is recessed.
We measured the available eye relief to be 16.2mm from the
top of the folded down eyecup making it excellent for normal
use and just adequate for glasses wearers.
7$3(5(' ,1&+ %$55(/

A wide-field eyepiece like this requires a large aperture
so the stainless steel barrel is a 2-inch push-fit.
Externally finished in a bright satin with a
tapered shoulder, the internal surface is
threaded to take standard 48mm
filters, which are installed
very close to the 25mm-
diameter field lens.
58%%(5 (<(&83
The eyepiece includes a soft rubber fold-down eyecup and
conveniently, the dust cap can be installed in either the raised or
folded position. The eyecup gave excellent protection from extraneous
light sources and was comfortable to use. Folded down we were only
just able to view the field edges when wearing glasses.
FIRST LIGHT
RUBBER GRIP
A heavy eyepiece like this one requires especially careful handling
to avoid accidents when attaching to the telescope’s focuser, so the
effectiveness of the rubber grip encircling the body is critical. The
dimpled finish proved highly effective and was placed in exactly
the right position for a comfortable and natural hold.
MULTICOATING AND BAFFLING

The individual lens elements are fully multicoated to reduce unwanted reflections and
therefore increase the light transmission through the eyepiece. On close examination,
we found that the coatings were evenly applied and displayed a slight red tinge with
hints of green in some light. The inside of the body has matt black micro-baffles.
> fantastic view of the popular crater trio 2-inch eyepiece holder from the end of the focus
Ptolemaeus, Alphonsus and Arzachel, with a tube by a quarter of a turn. The altitude axis on our
SKY SAYS…
pleasantly wide expanse of other features in 10-inch Dobsonian telescope, however, had Now add these:
attendance. However, what really stole the show sufficient friction to support the weight at any angle 1. Explore
was a staggeringly good view of the linear rille without any counterbalancing being required.
6FLHQWL F [
Rupes Recta which, because of the wide field We very much enjoyed using this eyepiece for
of view, was clearly visible in the same frame a wide range of observations and particularly focal extender
as the craters. This is a great way to view our enjoyed observing the Moon and star clusters. We 2. Explore
natural satellite. would recommend the eyepiece to intermediate 6FLHQWL F
When not wearing glasses, the full width of and advanced observers who want to experience
LQFK OLJKW
the field was readily visible with a crisp field a really wide field of view and are able to
stop, but we could only just discern the field edge accommodate its size and weight. S SROOXWLRQ OWHU
when wearing glasses with the rubber eyecup 3. Revelation
folded fully down. In common with many long eye 3 $
relief eyepieces, eye placement was quite critical to VERDICT
universal
avoid shading and black-outs. Once placed BUILD & DESIGN +++++
correctly, the vista jumped out at us. GLJLVFRSLQJ
EASE OF USE +++++
The weight of the eyepiece in the star diagonal
EXTRAS +++++ adaptor for
did create a small issue with our refractor that ODUJH H\HSLHFHV
EYE RELIEF +++++
we had to manage carefully at some orientations.
Several times during a slew to a new object the OPTICS +++++
eyepiece’s weight was sufficient to unscrew the OVERALL +++++
VN\DWQLJKWPDJD]LQH FRP 2016

,'31'3<2ধ'9Astronomy Specialists
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@Tring_Astro [email protected]
Herts, HP23 5EF
TM
102
Books
RATINGS
HHHHH Outstanding
HHHHH Good
HHHHH Average
HHHHH Poor
New astronomy and space titles reviewed HHHHH Avoid
An Astronomer’s Tale BOOK

OF THE
TWO MINUTES WITH
Gary Fildes
Gary Fildes MONTH
Century When did your love
£16.99 z HB of astronomy begin?
I guess when as a small
Inspiration comes in all shapes and sizes: child I crawled beneath
often in the guise of being in the right my Dad’s Christmas tree
place at the right time and meeting the
and stared up at its lights.
right people – luminaries such as the late
I was transported to a parallel reality, and
and great Carl Sagan or Patrick Moore, or
my curiosity was awakened. I became
one of today’s great popularisers, a Brian
very contemplative, wondering about the
Cox or a Neil deGrasse Tyson. Sometimes,
beginning of the Universe. I used a scope
it’s simply a case of reading the right book.
for the first time in 1974 and was hooked.
In An Astronomer’s Tale: A Life Under the
Stars, we have a tome that gets to the heart
How did you come to found
of amateur astronomy.
Kielder Observatory?
This is the amazing personal account of
After starting the Kielder Forest Star
Gary Fildes, the former bricklayer who
Camp I initiated a project to build an
founded Kielder Observatory in
observatory in the forest. I couldn’t raise
Northumberland, which is dedicated to But that wasn’t enough for Gary.
the money until I met Peter Sharpe, the art
bringing the cosmos to everyone from a He had, and still has, a passion for
superb dark-sky site. As we discover, communicating astronomy to others curator at Kielder Water and Forest Park.
Gary’s journey was far from easy and this book describes how Peter helped me and, six years later, the
and in the early chapters we he was inspired to observatory opened with me at the helm.
find out how he had to develop the Kielder
hide his love of the night Observatory from a What’s next for you and the observatory?
sky as a child and glimmer of an idea, I just want to continue doing what
teenager, because and the story of I enjoy most, spreading the word and
studying the stars was how it became a inspiring all of us to look up. As for the
‘not the done thing’ reality. Along the observatory, we will continue to inspire
in his home city of way, each chapter the next generation of scientists, artists
Sunderland. also has a useful and stargazers. Many amazing new
A bit of a jack-the-lad beginner’s guide to discoveries await us and I want our
in his early years, the two months of observatory to help make that a reality.
book reveals how Gary night-sky gems to look
often got into fights during out for, as well as extra And your favourite observing target?
football matches, but in a Kielder Observatory offers information on such Saturn is a highlight for any astronomer.
brutally honest appraisal he public outreach events for diverse topics as aurorae, On a still night with good seeing it is
explains how one moment amateur stargazers year round planets and the Perseid amazing how much detail you get with a
changed his fortunes. He realised he had meteor shower, among many others. 16-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain. I occasionally
responsibilities to his wife and young I can heartily recommend this book sit outside with Lyra (my Border Collie
pup) and just look up. I think one the most
KIELDER WATER AND FOREST PARK
family and so he took up training to be a as an inspiration to all public outreach

bricklayer. Discovering that his neighbour volunteers as, like Gary, they too reach important lessons I have learned is to just
was an avid amateur astronomer led to his for the stars. enjoy stargazing and not try to be
membership of Sunderland Astronomical HHHHH understanding it so much.
Society and, eventually, a yearning for
dark sites in which to enjoy the majesty PAUL MONEY is BBC Sky at Night GARY FILDES is the founder and lead
of the night sky. Magazine’s reviews editor astronomer at Kielder Observatory
BOOK REVIEWS NOVEMBER 103
Mars Jet Propulsion Laboratory controllers

hurriedly sent up new programming Spaceman
Making Contact to the orbiter and instructed Mariner 9
to wait for the dust to settle before An Astronaut’s
Rod Pyle beginning its mapping sequences. And Unlikely Journey to
Carlton Books for the first time we saw the dry
£25 z HB meandering channels and river deltas Unlock the Secrets
that hinted at a wetter past Mars. of the Universe
Our explorations Each mission is covered, including the
of our planetary first vistas from the Martian surface by Mike Massimino
next-door neighbour the twin Viking landers; the first rover, Simon & Schuster UK
make a fascinating Sojourner; the Mars Reconnaissance £20 z HB
story of ingenious Orbiter, like a spy satellite orbiting Mars;
engineering designs and the nuclear-powered, laser-wielding, At the time of
and groundbreaking selfie-snapping Curiosity rover. writing, 555 people
scientific discoveries. Space writer Rod The book is gloriously illustrated with have been to space
Pyle guides us through 50 years of history, colour photographs, design schematics and it sometimes
covering the successes and failures of the and maps, and the text is brought alive seems like nearly
American, Russian, European and now with first-hand accounts from the all of them have
Indian probes to Mars. engineers and scientists involved in written memoirs.
Pyle recounts how scientists receiving these daring missions. It closes with the
So how does this
the imaging data from the Mariner 4 current development of plans to send
new book by former NASA astronaut
flyby were too impatient to wait for the human missions to the Red Planet and
Mike Massimino stand out? It helps
slow computer processing of the day and the new players in space exploration:
that Massimino’s 18-year astronaut
cut the numerical printouts into strips, private companies like Elon Musk’s
career was anything but standard:
arranged on the wall and coloured them SpaceX. Highly recommended.
he flew on the final two servicing
in by hand. When Mariner 9 arrived it HHHHH
missions to the Hubble Space
encountered a Mars enshrouded in a
Telescope, involving some of the most
global dust storm and all the probe LEWIS DARTNELL is a UK
insanely complex spacewalks ever, to
could photograph were cloud tops. NASA Space Agency research fellow
replace equipment that had never
been designed with retrieval in mind:
some 111 tiny screws needed
Astrophotography undoing at one point.
In between these two missions,
The Most Spectacular Astronomical Mass (to use his astronaut call sign)
Images of the Universe helped to plan a robotic Hubble
to images from the Herschel and Spitzer servicing mission after the 2003
Rhodri Evans Columbia disaster left NASA believing
Andre Deutsch Ltd space telescopes, revealing the normally
invisible structures of gas and dust that another Shuttle mission would be too
£25 z HB
form the skeleton of our Galaxy and others. risky. This makes him better qualified
With a subtitle that Evans’s structure follows a fairly familiar than most to know the actual value of
promises “the most journey out from the Solar System putting humans in space. In the end,
spectacular images (including new images from the Rosetta NASA had to give up on matching
of the Universe”, you and New Horizons missions), through our astronaut capabilities with robots and
probably won’t be Galaxy and Local Group to the distant a Shuttle was despatched after all.
surprised to discover cosmos, but the book distinguishes itself He’s also a longstanding space
that this is a glossily from some of its rivals by highlighting the fanboy: inspired to join the astronaut
produced ‘coffee-table’ book. The market telescopes involved in making the images, corps by frequent re-watching of
for such titles is a crowded one, but alongside the astronomical objects themselves. 1983’s The Right Stuff, he’s clearly
Astrophotography delivers on its mission: With books such as this the quality of never lost sight of the coolness of his
Cardiff University astrophysicist Rhodri image reproduction is often key, and the job. As a result, his writing has a
Evans has collected some of the most book doesn’t disappoint on this count. clear, vivid style. Massimino’s
beautiful and intriguing images gathered Evans’s supporting text, meanwhile, is well impression of what it feels like to
by space probes and telescopes. informed and interesting throughout spacewalk, or to be the only person
Some of Evans’s choices are interesting. – though I must confess the choice of awake in an orbiting Shuttle, will
Alongside favourites such as the Antennae typeface used in the chapter introductions stay with readers a long time.
Galaxies and Eagle Nebula, he includes some left me with something of a headache. ++++H
fascinating and less well-known targets, HHHHH
often inspired by his own research in SEAN BLAIR writes for the European
Space Agency website
infrared astronomy. As well as familiar GILES SPARROW is a science writer and
Hubble views in visible light, we are treated a fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society
104 GEAR NOVEMBER
Gear
Elizabeth Pearson rounds up the latest astronomical accessories
1 1 ZWO Mini 1.25-inch 4

Electronic Filter Wheel
Price £207 • Supplier First Light Optics
www.firstlightoptics.com
Quickly swap between filters with the help of
this electronic filter wheel. It holds up to five
1.25-inch filters, is powered via a USB cable
and weighs only 300g.
2 Geoptik X Y Guide Mount

Price £149 • Supplier Rother Valley Optics
01909 774521 • www.rothervallyoptics.co.uk
Finely adjust the altaz orientation of your finder
or guidescope with the help of this mount. It can
be mounted to scopes up to 4 inches in aperture.
5
3 Jupiter Clock
Price £18 • Supplier Present Indicative
01189 588586 • www.presentindicative.com
This clock features a view of Jupiter’s southern
hemisphere as seen by the Cassini probe,
2 showing its many bands and storms – including
the Great Red Spot.
4 Optolong Hydogen-Alpha
7nm Clip Filter
Price £178 • Supplier 365 Astronomy
020 3384 5187 • www.365astronomy.com
Bring out the detail of hyrogen-alpha emission
in your astro imaging with the help of this
filter, which clips directly into your DSLR
camera. Various sizes are available.
5 Astronomy Greeting Cards

Price £15 • Supplier We Are Stardust
http://wearestardust.uk
Send your love of astronomy to your friends
6
3 and family with these greeting cards. Each
pack contains six cards and features an
astronomy fact on the reverse.
6 ([SORUH 6FLHQWL F LQFK

0.7x Reducer/Corrector
Price £244 • Supplier Telescope House
01342 837098 • www.telescopehouse.com
This corrector from Explore Scientific reduces
the effective focal length of your scope while
also flattening the field. Its large aperture
helps to control vignetting. Supplied with
adaptors for Nikon and Canon DSLRs.

Our HI-LUX coating can be applied to almost any
reflector, in virtually any condition or no matter how
old. Improves the reflective efficiency of your mirrors.
High Reflectivity
Coating
Find out more on
our website: Optics >
Mirror Recoating
or call / email
tech enquiries: [email protected]
Telephone 01782 614200

www.orionoptics.co.uk
NEW DISCOVERY BLACK LIGHT TELESCOPES, BINOCULARS,

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FIND THE TELESCOPE SERVICE LINK ON ALL PAGES
106 EXPERT INTERVIEW NOVEMBER
WHAT I REALLY WANT TO KNOW IS…

What is the secret of AR Scorpii?
Tom Marsh is investigating why a white dwarf star is
lashing its docile companion with a mysterious ray
INTERVIEWED BY PAUL SUTHERLAND
I
n May 2015, a group of amateur We were quickly able to rule out a black hole, so
astronomers from the UK, Germany that left either a white dwarf or a neutron
and Belgium, noticed odd star. We made a series of observations,
behaviour in a variable star using the ESO’s Very Large Telescope
in the constellation of Scorpius. in Chile and other instruments.
It was varying in brightness We took spectra, which showed
extremely rapidly and in a way that it was a white dwarf that
not seen in any other star. had a companion, a cool
I’ve been leading a type of star called an
team trying to get to the M-star, which is like
bottom of what is going the Sun but with only
on. It turns out that we one-third of its mass.
have identified an exotic The two stars were in
new type of binary a binary orbit, taking
system where a white 3.6 hours to circle each
dwarf is repeatedly other, which is the same
and brutally lashing its as AR Scorpii’s regular
companion star with period of variation.
powerful but mysterious Some stars are known
blasts of radiation. to be a little bit like this,
The amateur astronomers where they have a magnetised
were looking at variable stars white dwarf spinning with a
that are also X-ray sources. They companion, and they are thought
came across this star, designated to have been spun up by the tidal
AR Scorpii, which had been observed to transfer of mass stripped from the
be emitting X-rays by the ROSAT satellite. companion and falling onto the white
AR Scorpii had originally been described as a dwarf. But AR Scorpii is very unusual in two ways.
Delta Scuti-type star, after the dwarf Cepheid star One of AR Scorpii’s First of all, the strong pulsations mean that it
that pulsates in brightness, but that classification unusual features is that it doesn’t have that disc of material to add to the
was completely incorrect. AR Scorpii’s variations lacks a disc of matter to white dwarf, because such extra material would
have a very different cause. fire onto the white dwarf tend to weaken the pulsations. The other really
odd thing is that it is an incredible source of energy
Mysterious dual nature because it emits over practically all wavelengths
AR Scorpii is highly variable. It brightens and fades you can think of, all the way from X-rays to radio.
in a regular way over a period of 3.6 hours. But on That is extremely unusual. Such a very broad
top of that it is pulsing every two minutes; every spectrum of emission indicates something called
1.97 minutes to be precise. If a pulse coincides with synchrotron emission, from very rapidly moving
the brightest point in its main cycle of variation, it relativistic electrons – near the speed of light – in
can reach mag. +13.6. But at its faintest, and magnetic fields. They get accelerated into a ray
ABOUT TOM MARSH
between pulses, it shines at a much dimmer +16.8. that repeatedly lashes the companion star. We are
Prof Tom Marsh, of
M. GARLICK/UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK/ESO
This behaviour was so unusual that we took a the University of not sure how the process happens yet. We want
look at AR Scorpii using the 4.2m William Herschel Warwick’s Astrophysics amateur astronomers to help monitor the pulses
Telescope on La Palma. Within minutes we could Group, is particularly in future to help us.
see some unbelievable variations. The two-minute interested in the Of course, AR Scorpii is probably not unique. It
periodicity was clearly there, plus an intermediate evolution of binary stars. is fairly close to us at around 350 lightyears, and
AR Scorpii has forced
pulsation every minute, of the kind that is quite bright. It would be amazing if it was the only
him to add to his
characteristic of a rotating, magnetised star. The expertise across all
one in our Galaxy. There must be more we have
only things that can spin that rapidly are white wavelengths in astronomy. not discovered, so while we continue to study this
dwarfs, neutron stars, or black holes. amazing star, we will also hope to find more like it. S
The Southern Hemisphere in November
With Glenn Dawes
N
WHEN TO USE THIS CHART O
RT
The chart accurately matches the sky on the
H
1 NOV AT 00:00 UT
EAS
dates and times shown. The sky is different at
15 NOV AT 23:00 UT other times as stars crossing it set four minutes
T
earlier each night. We’ve drawn the chart for
30 NOV AT 22:00 UT
M
latitude –35° south.
37
M3
OCTOBER HIGHLIGHTS STARS AND CONSTELLATIONS
5
GE
Venus’s beacon has been an obvious The southern evening sky is home to M
IN
addition to the early western evening a number of faint constellations, and I
for some months. Since appearing from being able to identify some of them is a
b
behind the Sun in June it has been moving great way to show off at star parties. The
a
towards the Earth, slowly growing in size Small Magellanic Cloud lies on the edge of
geuse
18t
and brightness. A small telescope reveals a Tucana, the Toucan, with the bulk of this
h
Tree clust
15-arcsecond diameter disc. The latter half ‘bird’ lying in the direction of the more er
_
Christma
s
of November sees Venus pass close to the distinctive avian constellation, Grus, the Wi
C
nte Nebula
AN
inverted Teapot of Sagittarius. The apex star Crane. Between the Crane and mag. +0.5 r Tr
`
ian Rosette
g
IS M
le
of its lid appears to be temporarily replaced Achernar (Alpha (_) Eridani) lurks Phoenix.
by a brilliant Venus, which passes 0.3° west of
INO
Directly west of the mag. +1.2 Fomalhaut
mag. +2.8 Lambda (h) Sagittarii on the 17th. (Alpha (_) Piscis Austrini) lies Sculptor.
Pro
_
c
a
yon
`
M
50
THE PLANETS
Siriu
The western evening sky is dominated while Mercury is relatively poor in
EAST
by Venus, setting around 22:00 EST. November and December. Mars is an
s
_
M
Beneath it is a passing of the baton, low in evening object, setting around midnight. O
CANIS MAJO
NO
a
M
47
_
the twilight: as Saturn sinks into the glow, The morning sky comes to life with the CE
M4
RO
M4
Mercury rises, the two passing on the 22nd. return of Jupiter, but it remains low in the 8 S
Saturn disappears by the month’s end, eastern dawn sky for most of the month.
b
R
DEEP-SKY OBJECTS
PUPPIS
The constellation of Cetus, the NGC 779 (RA 1h 59.7m, dec. –5° 58’).
Whale, is in the northern evening At mag. +11.2 the galaxy has a bright
sky. Mag. +3.5 Eta (d) Ceti (RA 1h stellar nucleus with its near edge-on
Gu
m
8.6m, dec. –10° 11’) is the perspective being betrayed by
brightest and most eastern the distinctly elongated core 11
a
member of an obvious arc of measuring 2x0.5 arcminutes. PYX

IS
four stars (0.7° across). The Return to Eta Ceti: 5.5° west-
`
other members of this semi- southwest is planetary nebula

circular binocular asterism NGC 246 (RA 0h 47m, dec. –11°
are around 6th magnitude. 52’; pictured). This 3-arcminute,
MICHAEL BREITE/ STEFAN HEUTZ/ WOLFGANG RIES/CCDGUIDE.COM
mag. +10.4 ghost is much brighter

VE
LA
Look 13° east-northeast from Eta towards the western edge, with three
Ceti and you’ll reach spiral galaxy prominent 12th magnitude stars.
SO
UT
CHART KEY
H EA
STAR T
S
GALAXY DIFFUSE ASTEROID BRIGHTNESS:

NEBULOSITY TRACK MAG. 0
OPEN CLUSTER & BRIGHTER
DOUBLE STAR METEOR MAG. +1
GLOBULAR RADIANT
MAG. +2
CLUSTER VARIABLE STAR QUASAR MAG. +3
PLANETARY
MAG. +4
NEBULA COMET TRACK PLANET & FAINTER
NORTH
SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE
a
_
Capella
ula
b
Almach
_ A
PERSEUS ED
eb
M110
M
nN
O T
M34 DR ES
oo
a M31
AN
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