086.htm

ASTRONOMY
Vol. 27, No. 8, AGUST 1999

CONTENT

The Little Stars That Couldn't 36
Astronomers think that brown dwarfs — those pesky objects
caught between planets and stars in size — may outnumber
stars by two to one. Robert Naeye.

A Brown Dwarf Contest 43
Fabulous prizes await the winners of Astronomys contest to
come up with a more appropriate name for brown dwarfs.

Cassini's Nuclear Risk 44
As Cassini prepares to fly past Earth tills August, the conflict
rages between environmentalists who fear disaster and space
explorers seeking to study Saturn. David Grinspoon.
COVER

The Spacecraft's Got Swing 48
Find out how NASA steals a tiny bit of a planets energy to
shoot a planetary probe deeper into space. James Oberg.

Virtual Astronomy 54
Researchers use automobile-size computers to probe the
structure of the universe, stellar interiors, and the merging
of neutron stars. Adam Frank.

Lift Off! 74
The sight and sound of a space shuttle blasting off from Cape
Canaveral is one you won't soon forget. Djuna lvereigh.

Kids' Corner: Casting a Shadow 80
With a lunar eclipse in July and a solar eclipse in August, this
is a great time to explain the intricate dance among the sun,
moon, and Earth that causes these spectacles. Jeanette Brown.

Euro Eclipse 84
Here's all you need to know to get the most out of this
Augusts total eclipse of the sun. Richard Talcott.

Behind the Scenes 6
Darkening Skies

Talking Back 14

AstroNews 24

Millions of New Comets
Corning

Eta Carinae Unexpectedly
Flares Up

Universe: 12-15 Billion
Years Old

Quiet Black Holes Detected
in Nearby Galaxies

Early Martian Magnetism
Tape-Recorded in Rock

Sky Show 62

Everyone's favorite meteor
shower, the Perseids, peaks
this month in a moon-free
sky, while newly discovered
Comet Lee pushes into the
morning sky. Martin Ratcliffe
and AUster Ling.

AskAstro 94

Star Stuff 98
Products

A New Discovery

A Desert View of the
Milky Way

Play Ball

Finding Stars

Books

The Night Sky Observer's
Guide

The History and Practice of

Ancient Astronomy

Bytes

The Sky for Macintosh

Looking Ahead 108

Advertiser Index 117

Hot Shots 118

O Beautiful for

Southern Skies

Ultimate Exposure 122

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ASTRONOMY
VOL.

84 2.htm ws-1252"> Behind the Scenes
On Launching an E-zine

16 Talking Back

26 AstroNews
Forecast: Space Storms Due
in 2000-2001
Spring Storms Strike Uranus
Three Big Planets Orbit
Nearby Star
Hot-dog Galaxies?
Modeling Deepens Mystery
of Earth's Heat
General Relativity as a
Cosmic Ruler
Seeking Alien Rocks Randy Korotev
Star's Hot Wind Fans
into Spiral
Sky Show
While Venus shines brilliantly,
most of North America will
see the full moon dip partially
into Earth's dark shadow.
Martin RatcUffe and Alister Ling.
AskAstro
Star Stuff
Products
Frame a Tarantula
Video Coupler
Combat the Dew
Books
Apollo 8: The Mission Reports
Apollo 9: The Mission Reports
Our Worlds: The Magnetism
and Thrill of Planetary
Exploration
Cosm ic Adven tu re
Sky Atlas 2000.0
Bytes
The Webweaver Picks
Looking Ahead

116 Advertiser Index
Hot Shots
Bagging the Closest Planet
to the Sun
Ultimate Exposure
The Supernova Guru
Bill and Sally Fletcher

086.htm

ASTRONOMY

VOL . 27 , NO . 5

38 Galactic Genesis
Seventy-five years after Edwin Hubble deduced the nature
of galaxies, astronomers still debate how they form and
evolve. David /. Eicher.

48 Black Hole Hunters
Meet the people who search the centers of galaxies for the
supermassive black holes that power quasars, blazars, and
the like. Steve Oison,

56 A Googolplex of Galaxies
Hundreds of billions of stars form a galaxy, and 100 billion
galaxies stretch across 100 billion trillion miles. When it
comes to the universe, big numbers rule. John P. Wiley, Jr.

58 Clusters in Collision
Witness the carnage as large galaxies devour small in the
packed confines of big clusters. David Graham.

64 Let There Be Light
The early months of 1999 saw two new 8-meter telescopes
join the other giants atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii. Kelly Whitt.

78 Spirals and Giants and Dwarfs Oh My!
The spring sky offers galaxies for every observing taste, from
bright sentinels in the nearby universe to colliding pinwheels
and huge clusters far away. Steve Gottlieb and Richard JakieL

86 Exploring Crater Rays
Born in the aftermath of enormous impacts, the bright lunar
crater rays attest to the solar system's violent history. Jim Bell.

92 Kids' Corner: Home Spiral
While the starry band of the Milky Way blazes in a dark sky,
use it as a visual tool for learning about our galaxy and
others. Andréa Gianopoulos.

6 Behind the Scenes
• A Visit to The X-Files

18 Talking Back

22 AstroNews
• A Burst Like No Other
• Possible Earth-mass Planet
Found
• Message in a Bottle
• Japanese Mars Probe Delayed
• Eros Revealed
Faster than Light
• The Disks of Taurus

• View of a Supernova Remnant
* Looking for Ghosts

• SOHO Back in Business

66 Sky Show
• While Mars and Venus
continue to blaze in the
evening sky, diminutive Pluto
glows at its brightest for 1999.
Martin Ratcliffe and Alister Ling.

96 AskAstro

106 Star Stuff
Products

• Interactive Astronomy
• Seasonal Star Hopping
• QuikFinder
Books

• Worlds Without End: The
Exploration of Planets Known
and Unknown
• The Celestial River
• Wishbone: Unleashed in Space
• 40 Nights to Knowing the Sky
Bytes
• Touring the Universe Through
Binoculars Star Atlas

____________________________________

086.htm

ASTRONOMY

•Vol. 27, No. 6 , June 1999

38 Catching Cosmic Ghosts

44 Cosmic Flood

50 Enlightenment

56 Meet the Radio Man

76 Celestial Portraits: Libra and Serpens Caput

86 A Gem for All Seasons

6 Behind the Scenes
Roving Around JPL

16 Talking Back

24 AstroNews
• Estimating the Universe's Age
Satellite Terminator Ready
for Testing
• Star-rich Field in Centaurus
• Development Threatens
Arizona's Night Skies
• Sharpest Image Yet from VLT
• SETI Shifts from Radio
to Lasers
• Wet Minerals in Martian Sand

62 Sky Show
• Balmy June evenings offer a
feast for planet gazers as both
Venus and Mercury reach
their greatest apparent
distance from the sun.
Martin Ratcliffe and Alister Ling.

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086.htm

ASTRONOMY

March 1999-Vol. 27, No. 3

94 Get the Most from Summer's Eclipse
Lance Peck

40 Forging a New Solar System
With innovative techniques and an inventive mind, Gérard
Kuiper led the rebirth of planetary astronomy. 5. Alan Stern.

46 Passing the Bar Exam
Our galaxy isn't the simple spiral we've thought all these
years: New studies prove it has a large bar running right
through its center. Michael Szpir.

52 Neutron Stars with Attitude
When a supercharged blast of high-energy radiation washed
over Earth last August, it heralded a massive starquake
wracking the surface of an exotic "magnetar." Steve Nadis.
COVER

58 King of the Mountain
Europe is building a huge telescope in the Chilean Andes
that's destined to be the finest in the world. Govert Schilling.

80 Mile-High Astronomy
While the Rocky Mountains dominate the scenery, Colorado
offers wonderful skies and great astronomy destinations for
the interested visitor. Nancy Hendrickson.

88 Reborn Classic
Celestron's 8-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope gets a
face-lift, but it still provides first-rate optics in an affordable
package. Phil Harrington.

94 Descent into Darkness
Fiery red prominences and a wispy corona will dazzle those
adventurers who chase the moon's shadow to Europe or Asia
this August. Richard Talcott.

102 AskAstro
We answer your questions about the science and hobby
of astronomy.

6 Behind the Scenes
• All the News that Fits

16 Talking Back

24 AstroNews
• Hubble Goes South
• Universe on Overdrive
• Leonids A'Poppin'
Extrasolar Planets: Eighteen
and Counting
Europa's Cracked Surface
The Closest Supernova Yet?

Clouds on Titan
• Space Streakers

58 A Giant Captures the Sky European Southern Observatory

68 Sky Show
• While Mercury puts on its
best evening show of the year,
brilliant Venus climbs up to
meet the Ringed Planet.
Martin RatcUffe and Alister Ling.

106 Star Stuff
Products
Big Eyes on the Skies

• View Mars in 3-D
• Mars Meets Bach
Books
• Stars and Planets
• Constellation Guidebook
Bytes
• Impact: Ground Zero

______________________________________

086.htm

ASTRONOMY

VOL. 27, NO. 9, SEPTEMBER 1999

36 The Beginning and the End
Hubble captures a tangled region of newly minted stars, dusty
cocoons, and a massive star ready to explode. Robert Naeye.

COVER

38 Give Peas a Chance
The Big Bang may have given birth to our universe, but many
cosmologists are asking what started the Big Bang. Some bet
it was an exotic object called a pea instanton. Tom Yulsman.

48 Architects of Time
One of humanity's first forays into measuring time,
Stonehenge laid a foundation for turning the motion of
Earth into the precise clocks of today. James TrefiL

54 The Art of Skyspeak
Quick — name that bright red star in Orion. If you said
Beetlejuice instead ofBetelgeuse, our handy pronunciation
guide will fix you up in no time. Bob Berman.

72 Kids' Corner: Crater Crazy
View the wide variety of impact craters on the moon, then
take a turn at making one of your own. Andrea Gianopoulos.

76 Celestial Portraits: Pisces and Cetus
A watery realm of two fish and one whale offers backyard
observers a smorgasbord of galaxies as well as a wonderful
variable star. Tom Polakis.

84 Adaptive Optics Meet CCDs
Attention all telescope owners — there's a new imaging
system that self-adjusts for sky conditions and a mount's
tracking error. Gregory Terrance.

6 Behind the Scenes
• Astronomy's Seductions

16 Talking Back

24 AstroNews
• New Topographic Map May
Explain Martian History
• Storm Chasers Combing
the Cosmos
• The Polar-Ring Galaxy
• Estimate of the Universe's Age
Dips 15 Percent
Leonid Stream Is Braided

38 HOW It All Began European Southern Observatory

• A Favorite Supergiant Gets
Even More Popular
• Could a Nearby Burst
Scorch Earth?

60 Sky Show
• The gas giants Jupiter and
Saturn rise before midnight,
and Venus grows to its most
brilliant in the morning sky.
Martin Ratcliffe and Alister Ling

90 AskAstro

96 Star Stuff
Products
Mapping the Stars and Moon
• iStargazer Steve Dob
• Laser Collimator

Books
• Measuring the Universe: Our
Historic Quest to Chart the
Horizons of Space and Time
• The Five Ages ofthe Universe:
Inside the Physics of Eternity

Bytes
View the Sky

104 Looking Ahead

113 Advertiser Index

116 Hot Shots
"That's Scorpius"

120 Ultimate Exposure

84 Bringing HighTech
to Your Backyard
Astronomy: Jim Forbes

______________________________________

086.htm

ASTRONOMY
VOL. 27 , NO. 10 , 1999

40 Back to the Future
NASA's future looks bright, and Hubble's images of the past
continue to delight Robert Naeye.

44 Accelerating the Cosmos
The cosmological constant, Einstein's "biggest blunder," rises
from the dead with an astounding new feature. James Glanz.

52 An Unlikely Revolutionary
As a Catholic scholar and administrator, Nicolas Copernicus
created ideological chaos by removing Earth from the center
of the universe, Rosemary SuUivant

58 Surviving in Space
Before astronauts can fly to Mars, scientists have to ensure
that such a trip would be survivable, Diana Steele.

76 Ware's World
One astrophotographer proves that print film isn't dead yet.
Robert Reeves.

84 Less Is More
Think astronomy is an expensive hobby consisting of high-
ticket telescopic gadgets and gizrnos? Think again.
Bob Berman.

COVER

90 Falling for Jupiter and Saturn
They're big, they're bright and they're up all night. Catch
Jupiter and Saturn at opposition. Phil Harrington.

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