This is the fifth installment of our ten-part series on the brightest stars and, with it, we’re pleased to present the red supergiant star, Betelgeuse, the right shoulder of Orion, the hunter. Even though we’re still in August and Orion is a winter constellation, its prominence as a near-term supernova candidate makes it especially interesting.[…]
With this edition of the sky tonight, the sky has changed slightly since last week. Today we look at the sky for the week beginning Sunday, July 18th. Sunday, July 18th, we have brilliant Venus and ruddy red Mars still well placed in the Southwest sky and setting at 9:50 PM, EDT, following the sun[…]
This is the fourth installment of our ten-part series on the brightest stars and, with it, we’re pleased to present Sirius, the brightest star in Canis Major, the Great Dog. As we transition to winter, with the Winter Solstice occurring this year on the 21st of December (don’t forget to watch the Conjunction of Jupiter[…]
In this video, Dr. Jim Daly of Astronomy for Change discusses the star Vega, where it is in the night sky, how it compares to the sun and the mythology surrounding Lyra, the constellation that it’s in. As an exercise in Astrophysics and imagination, Dr. Daly describes what would happen to our solar system if[…]
Related videos available at the foot of the page. With this third in installment in our ten-part series on the ten brightest stars we’re pleased to present the red supergiant star Antares, the Heart of the Scorpion. Derived from the Greek, the star’s name refers to it as a “rival to-Ares” (“opponent to-Mars”) with a[…]
This is the second installment of our ten-part series on the brightest stars and, with it, we’re pleased to present Vega, the “Contact Star” (made famous by the feature-length Hollywood production of the same name, starring Jodie Foster and Matthew McConaughey). Vega, at 25 light-years distant, is the fifth brightest star in the sky and[…]
Link to video at foot of page Back in 2016 we published an article Where are the five brightest stars in our sky? Since then, this article has been one of our most popular and, accordingly, we’re going to continue the discussion, expanding the list from 5 (6, really, when you consider the sun) to[…]
