Portal:Astronomy

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The Astronomy Portal

Introduction

Astronomy (from Ancient Greek ἀστρονομία (astronomía) 'science that studies the laws of the stars') is a natural science that studies celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies, and comets. Relevant phenomena include supernova explosions, gamma ray bursts, quasars, blazars, pulsars, and cosmic microwave background radiation. More generally, astronomy studies everything that originates beyond Earth's atmosphere. Cosmology is a branch of astronomy that studies the universe as a whole.

Astronomy is one of the oldest natural sciences. The early civilizations in recorded history made methodical observations of the night sky. These include the Babylonians, Greeks, Indians, Egyptians, Chinese, Maya, and many ancient indigenous peoples of the Americas. In the past, astronomy included disciplines as diverse as astrometry, celestial navigation, observational astronomy, and the making of calendars. Nowadays, professional astronomy is often said to be the same as astrophysics.

Professional astronomy is split into observational and theoretical branches. Observational astronomy is focused on acquiring data from observations of astronomical objects. This data is then analyzed using basic principles of physics. Theoretical astronomy is oriented toward the development of computer or analytical models to describe astronomical objects and phenomena. These two fields complement each other. Theoretical astronomy seeks to explain observational results and observations are used to confirm theoretical results.

Astronomy is one of the few sciences in which amateurs play an active role. This is especially true for the discovery and observation of transient events. Amateur astronomers have helped with many important discoveries, such as finding new comets. (Full article...)

General images - load new batch

The following are images from various astronomy-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1One of the rolls of amateur astronomy groups is outreach programs bringing astronomy to the general public (from Amateur astronomy)
Image 2An image of the Cat's Paw Nebula created combining the work of professional and amateur astronomers. The image is the combination of the 2.2-metre MPG/ESO telescope of the La Silla Observatory in Chile and a 0.4-meter amateur telescope. (from Amateur astronomy)
Image 3Segment of the astronomical ceiling of Senenmut's Tomb (circa 1479–1458 BCE), depicting constellations, protective deities, and twenty-four segmented wheels for the hours of the day and the months of the year. (from History of astronomy)
Image 4Arabic astrolabe from 1079-80 AD (from History of astronomy)
Image 5Southern Hemisphere (from History of astronomy)
Image 69th-century diagram of the positions of the seven planets on 18 March 816, from the Leiden Aratea. (from History of astronomy)
Image 7Historical Jantar Mantar observatory in Jaipur, India. (from History of astronomy)
Image 8History of the Universe – gravitational waves are hypothesized to arise from cosmic inflation, a faster-than-light expansion just after the Big Bang (from Physical cosmology)
Image 9Mayall telescope at Kitt Peak National Observatory (from Observational astronomy)
Image 10Amateur astronomer recording observations of the sun. (from Amateur astronomy)
Image 11One of the Oldest Observatories in South America is the Quito Astronomical Observatory, founded in 1873 and located 12 minutes south of the Equator in Quito, Ecuador. The Quito Astronomical Observatory is the National Observatory of Ecuador and is located in the Historic Center of Quito and is managed by the National Polytechnic School. (from Observational astronomy)
Image 12Ultra HD photography taken at La Silla Observatory. (from Observational astronomy)
Image 13Babylonian tablet in the British Museum recording Halley's comet in 164 BC. (from History of astronomy)
Image 14Calendrical functions of the Berlin Gold Hat c. 1000 BC (from History of astronomy)
Image 15Sir Patrick Moore was one of the world's leading popularisers of astronomy. (from Amateur astronomy)
Image 16Hubble Space Telescope. (from History of astronomy)
Image 17Portrait of the Flemish astronomer Ferdinand Verbiest who became Head of the Mathematical Board and Director of the Observatory of the Chinese emperor in 1669 (from Astronomer)
Image 18The Astronomer, 1668, by Johannes Vermeer (from Astronomer)
Image 19The Nebra sky disk, Germany, 1800-1600 BC (from History of astronomy)
Image 20The Crab Nebula as seen in various wavelengths (from Observational astronomy)
Image 21ALMA is the world's most powerful telescope for studying the Universe at submillimeter and millimeter wavelengths. (from Observational astronomy)
Image 22Historical accuracy of atomic clocks from NIST. (from Theoretical astronomy)
Image 23The Northern Hemisphere page from Johann Bayer's 1661 edition of Uranometria - the first atlas to have star charts covering the entire celestial sphere (from History of astronomy)
Image 24An amateur astrophotography setup with an automated guide system connected to a laptop. (from Observational astronomy)
Image 25An assembly in Estonia to observe meteors (from Observational astronomy)
Image 26The main platform at La Silla hosts a huge range of telescopes with which astronomers can explore the Universe. (from Observational astronomy)
Image 2750 cm refracting telescope at Nice Observatory. (from Observational astronomy)
Image 28The Antikythera Mechanism was an analog computer from 150–100 BC designed to calculate the positions of astronomical objects. (from History of astronomy)
Image 29Sunset at the equinox from the prehistoric site of Pizzo Vento at Fondachelli Fantina, Sicily (from History of astronomy)
Image 30Places like Paranal Observatory offer crystal clear skies for observing astronomical objects with or without instruments. (from Amateur astronomy)
Image 31Map of the Milky Way Galaxy with the constellations that cross the galactic plane in each direction and the known prominent components annotated including main arms, spurs, bar, nucleus/bulge, notable nebulae and globular clusters. (from History of astronomy)
Image 32Comparison of CMB (Cosmic microwave background) results from satellites COBE, WMAP and Planck documenting a progress in 1989–2013. (from History of astronomy)
Image 33"El Caracol" observatory temple at Chichen Itza, Mexico. (from History of astronomy)

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This is a Featured article, which represents some of the best content on English Wikipedia..

Earthrise
Taken from Apollo 8 by William Anders

Apollo 8 (December 21–27, 1968) was the first crewed spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit and the first human spaceflight to reach the Moon. The crew orbited the Moon ten times without landing, and then departed safely back to Earth. These three astronauts—Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders—were the first humans to personally witness and photograph the far side of the Moon and an Earthrise.

Apollo 8 launched on December 21, 1968, and was the second crewed spaceflight mission flown in the United States Apollo space program after Apollo 7, which stayed in Earth orbit. Apollo 8 was the third flight and the first crewed launch of the Saturn V rocket, and was the first human spaceflight from the Kennedy Space Center, located adjacent to Cape Kennedy Air Force Station in Florida. (Full article...)

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Did you know - show different entries

... that the Lyman-alpha blob 1 is a blob of gas 300,000 light-years across located some 11.5 billion light-years from Earth?
... that 51 Ophiuchi has a disk of dust and gas that is likely a planetary system in the late stages of formation?
... that the Magellan Planet Search Program has discovered five eccentric Jupiter-mass extra-solar planets since the program started gathering data in December 2002?
... that asteroids with two moons, like 1994 CC, comprise only 1% of the near-Earth objects?
... that pictures by amateur astrophotographer Steve Mandel help to explore faint nebulae of the Milky Way?

More Did you know facts

More Did you know (auto generated)

... that in 1948 and 1952, nuclear physicist Leslie Shepherd published scientific papers on the use of nuclear technology for interplanetary and interstellar space travel?
... that the producers of The Jet Propelled Couch hired "Miss Color TV", Vampira, and several Miss Americas to portray attractive creatures inhabiting an imaginary planet?
... that Carole Ann Haswell was part of the team that discovered the super-Earth-like exoplanet Barnard's Star b?
... that The City in the Middle of the Night, a 2019 climate-fiction novel by Charlie Jane Anders, is set on a tidally locked planet?
... that pushbacks of migrants in the Aegean Sea have been described as "a human rights violation that encapsulates a will to eliminate a person's presence on the face of the planet"?
... that Nandivada Rathnasree, who ran Delhi's planetarium, proposed that astronomers could be taught using India's stone-built observatories?

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WikiProjects

WikiProject Astronomy	WikiProject Solar System



WikiProject Cosmology	WikiProject Spaceflight

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Credit: NASA

IC 443 (also known as the Jellyfish Nebula and Sharpless 248 (Sh2-248)) is a galactic supernova remnant (SNR) in the constellation Gemini. Its distance is roughly 5,000 light years from Earth. Image is part of the northeastern shell of IC 443, aka the Jellyfish Nebula.

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Astronomy News

26 April 2022 –: In the morning, the Moon, Jupiter, and Venus are seen aligning with each other. (Space.com)
4 April 2022 – Discoveries of exoplanets: Astronomers announce the discovery of K2-2016-BLG-0005Lb, an exoplanet that is said to resemble Jupiter. The discovery was made using the now-retired Kepler space telescope. (ScienceAlert)
30 March 2022 –: The Hubble Space Telescope observes the most distant single star ever. The star, named Earendel by astronomers, is 28 billion light-years away. It is the farthest detection of a star, dating back 900 million years after the Big Bang. This discovery surpasses Hubble's record from 2018, when it discovered a star that existed when the universe was roughly four billion years old. (CNN)
21 March 2022 – Discoveries of exoplanets: NASA announces that they have discovered their 5000th exoplanet since 1992, when astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan and Dale Frail announced the discovery of two exoplanets orbiting PSR B1257+12. (Science News)

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May anniversaries

1 May 1959 – The former Beltsville Center is renamed to Goddard Space Flight Center in honor of Dr. Robert H. Goddard, rocket pioneer who achieved first launch of a liquid-fueled rocket
4 May 1967 – Lunar Orbiter 4 is launched to perform a photographic survey of lunar surface features
7 May 1975 – Explorer 53 (SAS-C), a NASA X-ray astronomy space telescope, is launched from the San Marco Range in Kenya, Africa
7 May 1997 – English-language French science fiction action film, The Fifth Element is released showing passenger inter-constellation vehicles, spacefighter craft, and various non-human creatures
14 May 1935 – The planetarium at Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles, California opens
14 May 1973 – The first American space station, Skylab, is launched
18 May 1969 – The Apollo 10 human spaceflight is launched, testing all aspects of the lunar landing mission, except the actual lunar landing
20 May 1978 – Pioneer Venus is launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida becoming the first spacecraft placed in orbit around Venus
30 May 1971 – Mariner 9 robotic space probe is launched becoming the first spacecraft to orbit Mars

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Space-related Portals

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Astronomical events

All times UT unless otherwise specified.

1 May, 04:11	Moon occults Uranus
5 May, 07:40	Eta Aquariids peak
5 May, 08:57	Uranus at conjunction
5 May, 12:46	Moon at apogee
16 May, 04:11	Full moon and total lunar eclipse
17 May, 15:23	Moon at perigee
21 May, 19:14	Mercury at inferior conjunction
27 May, 02:51	Moon occults Venus
28 May, 13:42	Moon occults Uranus
30 May, 11:30	New moon