May's best stargazing week is about to begin. How to see a lion, an upside-down bear, a mini 'planet parade' — and more.
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.
Why do stargazers get so excited about a new moon? At 10:02 p.m. EDT on Monday, May 26, our natural satellite will slip between Earth and the sun and completely disappear from view. As it does, it will leave the night skies free from moonlight, which serious stargazers view as light pollution.
In the week before the new moon, and for a couple of nights after, the night sky gets as dark as possible. That makes the period from May 20 to May 30 the best time of the month to get outside and look up. Here's what to see from mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, including the continental U.S., at about 10 p.m. (unless otherwise stated).
Most people can find the seven stars of the Big Dipper in the night sky, but did you know it's not a constellation? Known as an asterism — a shape of stars — the Big Dipper forms the rear end (and, unhelpfully, long tail) of Ursa Major, the great bear." May is a great time to trace out the many stars of Ursa Major because it's almost directly overhead in the early evening in the Northern Hemisphere as darkness falls, though the bear is upside down.
The easiest way to begin finding it is to start with the bear's three visible paws, which are each marked by a set of double stars — Alula Borealis and Australis, and Tania Borealis and Australis for the bear's two back paws, and Talitha and Talitha Australis for the one visible front paw. Below the latter, the star Muscida marks the bear's head.
Look to the south as soon as it gets dark, and you'll see a backward question mark of stars that mark the head and forequarters of Leo, the lion. The dot in that question mark (called "the sickle" by stargazers) is the bright star Regulus, which means "little king," according to EarthSky.
If you only get up early once this month, make it 45 minutes before sunrise on Friday, May 23 when, in the east, a crescent moon will appear close to a very bright Venus, with Saturn close by.
Return to Ursa Major and trace its tail — the handle of the Big Dipper — in an "arc to Arcturus" to the next bright star in the night sky. The fourth-brightest star in the night sky, Arcturus is the brightest star in the constellation Boötes, the herdsman, a key yet little-known shape of stars in spring. Its nine stars trace out the shape of what looks most like a kite, but skip that and focus on what's easy — four stars that are in the shape of a "Y" or champagne flute.
Hidden in the halo of the Milky Way galaxy are strange groups of ancient stars called globular clusters. Huddled in dense balls and thought to be the remains of ancient galaxies gobbled up by our own, there are about 150 of these in the night sky. Remarkably, they are the oldest visible objects in the universe.
One of the best is M13 in the constellation Hercules, the hero, which is high overhead after dark. You'll need a pair of stargazing binoculars, or better still a good backyard telescope, to glimpse it as a dense fuzzy patch. It contains more than 100,000 stars, according to NASA, and is 25,000 light-years distant on the outskirts of the galaxy.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Northern lights may be visible from these 13 US States tonight
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Though geomagnetic activity is beginning to wane, the northern lights could still put on a show tonight (June 3). Earth is still reverberating from not one but two coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that hit in the early hours of June 1 and late June 2, wreaking havoc on our magnetic field and triggering incredible auroras around the world. Space weather forecasters from the U.K. Met Office predict there is still a slight chance of further strong (G3) geomagnetic storms, with minor (G1) and moderate (G2) intervals expected. The NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center predicts that the Kp index will peak at 4.67 over the next 24 hours. For an up-to-date breakdown of timings, check out NOAA's 3-day forecast. (Kp is a measurement of geomagnetic activity, with an index that ranges from 0 to 9; higher Kp indicates stronger auroral activity.) You can also keep up with the latest forecasts and geomagnetic storm warnings with our aurora forecast live blog. In the U.S., Alaska has the highest chance of seeing the northern lights tonight. If predicted G3 storms are reached, auroras could be visible down to Illinois and Oregon, according to NOAA, though the chance for more G3 storms is slim. Below we have listed all 13 states that appear either fully or in part above the possible view line for auroras tonight, according to NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center. They are ordered most likely to least likely based on their proximity to the center of the auroral oval and how much of each state is within or near the view line. Remember, auroras can be fickle. Sometimes they can appear much farther south than predicted, and other times they barely show up at all. There are many conditions that have to align for the perfect show. It is possible that many more states could witness auroras tonight, or perhaps far fewer will. Alaska Minnesota North Dakota Montana Wisconsin Michigan (Upper Peninsula) South Dakota Maine Vermont New Hampshire Idaho Washington Oregon If you live in one of the 13 states forecasted to have a chance of seeing the northern lights tonight, head to a north-facing vantage point as far away from light pollution as possible! The best time to look for auroras will be about 1 a.m. local time, as our window of darkness for observing the northern lights shrinks during summer months. Use your mobile phone to scan the skies, as the camera is great at picking up faint auroras before your eyes spot them. This can help you pinpoint where in the sky you should be focusing your attention. But remember to keep an eye out elsewhere too as auroras can pop up in front, behind or even above you! Happy aurora hunting. If you want to make sure you're all clued up on when to look for auroras download a space weather app that provides forecasts based on your location. One option I use is "My Aurora Forecast & Alerts," available for both iOS and Android. However, any similar app should work well. I also use the "Space Weather Live" app, which is available on iOS and Android, to get a deeper understanding of whether the current space weather conditions are favorable for aurora sightings.
Yahoo
15 hours ago
- Yahoo
The mysterious hill in Sudan that looks like 'landlocked lips'
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. QUICK FACTS Where is it? West Darfur, Sudan [12.370771816, 23.322227802] What's in the photo? A hill shaped like human lips Where did the photo originate? Google Earth When was it taken? 2012 This intriguing satellite photo, captured by Google Earth satellites in 2012, shows a strange hill formation in Sudan that bears a striking resemblance to pursed human lips blowing a kiss into space. Not much is known about the bizarre structure, but experts told Live Science how it likely formed. The striking hill, which is around 3,000 feet (900 meters) long and 1,200 feet (350 m) across at its widest point, is located in Sudan's West Darfur state, roughly 60 miles (95 km) east of the country's border with Chad. The feature appears to be surrounded by agricultural fields and small black dots that are probably trees. In the 2012 photo, the surrounding ground has been dried out by drought, and the hill's slopes have a pinkish hue, accentuating its mouth-like look. But in more recent imagery, both the hill and its surroundings look green and are covered with significantly more vegetation (see below). The hill's elevation and age are unknown. The structure does not have an official name, but it is labeled as "Landlocked lips" campground on Google Maps (although it is unclear if there is actually a campsite there). Related: See all the best images of Earth from space However, based on the available satellite imagery, experts do have a general idea of how the hill may have formed. "I see a narrow unit of exposed rock running down the middle of this feature," Josh Roering, a geomorphologist at the University of Oregon who specializes in landscape dynamics, told Live Science in an email. "It looks like there's a dike or narrow unit of resistant rock running through the middle of that ridgeline that erodes more slowly than the surrounding rock and thus sticks out." Dikes are geological features that bisect larger horizontal sheets of rock, according to the European Geosciences Union. They are most commonly formed via volcanic activity or tectonic plate movements, but they can also emerge from sedimentary processes. However, it is unclear what type of dike this hill's central line may be. MORE EARTH FROM SPACE —A mysterious 'black hole' in Pacific Ocean that sparked wild rumors online —'Shining anus' volcano in Tonga coughs up cloud of smoke during recent eruption —The heart-shaped 'Spirit Lake' sculpted by Mount St. Helens' epic eruption "If correct, the shape and extent of that resistant rock unit thus sets the scale of the feature as the less resistant surrounding rock forms sloping terrain on either side," Roering said. Similar structures can be found in the New Mexico desert and the Mackenzie dike swarm in Yukon, Canada. However, without being able to study the formation up close, Roering said this is just "speculation."
Yahoo
15 hours ago
- Yahoo
Black holes could work as natural particle colliders to hunt for dark matter, scientists say
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. To unlock the secrets of dark matter, scientists could turn to supermassive black holes and their ability to act as natural superpowered particle colliders. That's according to new research that found conditions around black holes are more violent than previously believed. Currently, the most powerful particle accelerator on Earth is the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), but since it was used to discover the Higgs Boson in 2012, it has failed to deliver evidence of physics beyond the so-called "standard model of particle physics," including the particles that comprise dark matter. That has led scientists to propose and plan even larger and more powerful particle colliders to explore this as-yet undiscovered country of physics. However, these particle accelerators are prohibitively expensive and time-consuming to build. Fortunately, the cosmos offers natural particle accelerators in the form of the extreme environments around supermassive black holes. We just need a little ingenuity to exploit them. "One of the great hopes for particle colliders like the LHC is that it will generate dark matter particles, but we haven't seen any evidence yet," Joseph Silk, study team member and a researcher at Johns Hopkins University, said in a statement. "That's why there are discussions underway to build a much more powerful version, a next-generation supercollider. But as we invest $30 billion and wait 40 years to build this supercollider, nature may provide a glimpse of the future in supermassive black holes." Dark matter is the mysterious stuff that seems to account for around 85% of all matter in the cosmos. That means the matter we understand — everything we see around us that's composed of atoms made of electrons, protons and neutrons — accounts for just 15% of stuff in the matter remains frustratingly elusive because it doesn't interact with light, making it effectively invisible. This is why we know it can't be made of standard atoms because these particles do interact with light. That has spurred the search for new particles that could comprise dark matter, with a great deal of this effort conducted using particle accelerators like the LHC. Human-made particle accelerators like the LHC allow scientists to probe the fundamental aspects of nature by slamming together particles like protons at near-light speeds. This creates flashes of energy and showers of short-lived particles. Within these showers, scientists hunt for hitherto undiscovered particles. Test particles like protons are accelerated and guided toward each other within the LHC and other "atom smashers" using incredibly strong magnets, but supermassive black holes could mimic this process using gravity and their own spins. Supermassive black holes with masses millions, or billions, of times that of the sun sitting at the hearts of galaxies are often surrounded by material in flattened clouds called "accretion disks." As these black holes spin at high speeds, some of this material is channeled to their poles, from where it is blasted out as near-light-speed jets of plasma. This phenomenon could generate effects similar to those seen in particle accelerators here on Earth. "If supermassive black holes can generate these particles by high-energy proton collisions, then we might get a signal on Earth, some really high-energy particle passing rapidly through our detectors," Silk said. "That would be the evidence for a novel particle collider within the most mysterious objects in the universe, attaining energies that would be unattainable in any terrestrial accelerator. "We'd see something with a strange signature that conceivably provides evidence for dark matter, which is a bit more of a leap, but it's possible.'The key to Silk and colleagues' recipe of supermassive black holes as supercolliders hinges on their discovery that gas flows near black holes can sap energy from the spin of that black hole. This results in the conditions in the gas becoming far more violent than expected. Thus, around spinning supermassive black holes, there should be a wealth of high-speed collisions between particles similar to those created in the LHC here on Earth."Some particles from these collisions go down the throat of the black hole and disappear forever," Silk said. "But because of their energy and momentum, some also come out, and it's those that come out which are accelerated to unprecedentedly high energies."It's very hard to say what the limit is, but they certainly are up to the energy of the newest supercollider that we plan to build, so they could definitely give us complementary results," Silk said. Related Stories: — Black hole announces itself to astronomers by violently ripping apart a star — Massive star's gory 'death by black hole' is the biggest and brightest event of its kind — Star escapes ravenous supermassive black hole, leaving behind its stellar partner Of course, catching these high-energy particles from supermassive supercolliders many light-years away will be tricky even if the team's theory is correct. Key to this detection could be observatories already tracking supernovas, black hole eruptions and other high-energy cosmic events."The difference between a supercollider and a black hole is that black holes are far away," Silk concluded. "But nevertheless, these particles will get to us." The team's research was published on Tuesday (June 3) in the journal Physical Review Letters.
