AWESOME ASTRONOMY

Download Episode!

What to look out, and up, for in July.

July is here and the summer solstice is just behind us, meaning we're on the glide slope to every lengthening nights. So the team's here to pick their highlights for this month's skies; starting with the planets on offer to observers and imagers:

• Ralph – Saturn shows off its moons and favourably tilted rings
• Jeni – Mercury is low in the sky but nicely placed to observe this July
• Paul – Comets C/2015 er61 Panstarrs and C/2015 V2 Johnson

Next up, we take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Ralph – The Eagle Nebula in the constellation Serpens
• Jeni - Colourful binary star Albireo in Cygnus
• Paul – Messier 8, The Lagoon Nebula in Sagittarius

And we finish this sky guide with July's moon phases.

Download Episode!

The Interview: On the discovery of only humanity's third black hole merger by the incredible Laser Interferometry Gravitational wave Observatory (LIGO), Jeni's speaks with Professor Patrick Sutton, Head of Cardiff University's Gravitational Physics Group and member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration who develops new strategies to detect gravitational wave bursts and creates techniques for locating these sources on the sky for modelling and simulations.

In this interview Jeni asks Patrick about:

• The latest gravitational wave detection
• What we can know about these events and the objects that created them
• The strength and weakness of these signals

The Announcement: For a physics deep dive into the analysis, the data and the modelling of the new black hole merger detected by LIGO this month, LIGO Governing Council member Professor Sathyaprakash (Sathya to his friends) delivers the first lecture on this discovery.

Return to the Interview: In this segment we return to Professor Patrick Sutton who tells Jen about:

• The possibilities for future gravitational wave detections
• The most expensive thing he's ever broken
• And… personal grooming tips??

The Discussion: Jeni's returns from her South African research using the Infrared Survey Facility telescope, Paul calls time on the Principia Mission and we go through a couple of readers emails to discuss Caroline Herschel, the Woomera Test Range and Australian space funding.

The News: Rounding up the space and astronomy news this month we have:

• Is there any evidence for other universes in the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation?
• An update on Tabby's Star (It's NOT an alien megastructure).
• Are we already creating our own defence against Coronal Mass Ejections by chance?
• A run through NASA's 2018 budget proposal

The Interview: This month we speak to former test pilot and astronaut - and one of only 6 remaining people to have walked on the moon - General Charlie Duke.

Practical Astronomy: The Hat of Woo takes a rest this month as we introduce an occasional look into areas of interest to the practical amateur astronomer with topics requested by you. This month we take a look at an essential piece of kit suggested by Sean Smith from Dublin: eyepieces.

What to look out, and up, for in June.

Jeni returns from astronomy research in South Africa so the gang's back together to pick their highlights for this month's skies; starting with the planets on offer to observers and imagers:

• Ralph – Saturn reaches opposition this month and coincides with a nearby meteor shower
• Jeni – Jupiter in prime viewing conditions with some lovely Galilean transits
• Paul – We still have comet C/2015 V2 Johnson in the skies for a nice alternative distraction

Next up, we take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Ralph – The Double Double binary Alpha Lyrae
• Jeni - The Whirlpool Galaxy Messier 51
• Paul – Globular Clusters Messiers 10 & 12 in Ophiuchus

And we finish this sky guide with June's moon phases.

This podcast extra episode comes from this year's Big Bang Fair and Jeni & Paul grabbed an interview with a Gaia mission data scientist to talk data and the efforts taken in the less-glamorous, but absolutely critical, background to provide us with the discoveries and refinements we crave from the European Space Agency's latest space-based astrometry mission.

So while Paul and Jeni were there as the Sirius Space Agency explaining the science behind a mission into space on the Star Stage, they spoke to a post-doctoral researcher at Cambridge University's Data Processing Centre for the Gaia Mission.

In this interview we bring you:

• the timelines to data capture, recovery, capture and analysis
• the rapid pulication of results from Gaia data
• a surprising discovery about the Milky Way's satellite galaxies - the Magellanic Clouds
• a new star cluster found hiding behind a star

The Discussion: Jeni's missing this month as she collects transiting exoplanet data in South Africa using the SIRIUS camera on the Japanese 1.4 metre Infrared Survey Facility telescope.

So Paul & Ralph take the helm and record from the AstroCamp starparty in the Welsh Brecon Beacons, discussing light pollution, the wonder of starparties and take a look at the countries which only have a solitary Awesome Astronomy downloader.

The News: Rounding up the space and astronomy news this month we have:

• Astronomers use gravitational lensing to calculate intergalactic distances
• The Event Horizon Telescope gathers its data for an image of our supermassive black hole
• Space X demonstrates the first relaunch of previously used rocket
• Cassini begins its swan song in glorious style

The Interview: This month we speak to Dr Dave Abergel at the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics to discuss the merit (or otherwise) of the recent creation of a substance with negative mass.

Q&A: Listeners' questions via email, Facebook & Twitter take us on a journey into the astronomy issues that have always plagued our understanding or stretched our credulity. This month we take a look at radio telescopes:

I'd like to know how a radio telescope comes up with an image Samuel Wertz, Pennsylvania, USA.

Download Episode!

What to look out, and up, for in May.

Jeni's abandoned us this month in favour of research-grade instrumentation so only Paul and Ralph pick their highlights for this month's skies; starting with the planets on offer to observers and imagers:

• The planets Jupiter in the evening and Saturn in the morning
• Three meteor showers peaking this month
• A pair of comets to observe with amateur telescopes or binoculars

Next up, we take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Ralph – The Great Globular Cluster in Hercules
• Paul – The Globular Cluster Messier 5 in the constellation Serpens

And we finish this sky guide with May's moon phases.

A teaser for the weekend stargazing under the über dark skies of the Brecon Beacons International Dark Sky Reserve at this spring's AstroCamp.

We'll take you through the events and activities which turn beginners into experts and fill up the eyepiece of those who are already experts – and, of course, whet your appetite for this friendliest of starparties!

Whether you're joining us in the Welsh village of Cwmdu on the weekend of 22-25th April or not, we've included a seasonal sky guide of our favourite night sky objects to dazzle and amaze you visually or astrophotographically:

Ralph

• The Leo Triplet of galaxies
• The Needle Galaxy in Come Berenices
• The Great Globular Cluster in Hercules

Paul

• Spiral Galaxy, Messier 94 in Canes Venatici
• Double star Cor Caroli in Canes Venatici
• Globular Cluster M3 in Canes Venatici
• The Coma Star Cluster in Coma Berenices
• Messier 53 Globular Cluster in Coma Berenices

Damien

• The King of Planets, Jupiter
• 2 rare AstroCamp comets in Hercules, Tuttle-Giacobini-Kresak and C/2015 V2 Johnson
• As if comets weren't enough we also have the naked-eye Lyrid meteor shower

John

• The Whirlpool Galaxy in Canes Venatici
• Markarian's Chain of galaxies between Leo and Virgo
• The Veil Nebula supernova remnants in Cygnus
• The Blackeye Galaxy in Coma Berenices

The Discussion: Paul and Jen packed out the Star Stage at this year's Big Bang Fair in Birmingham as Sirius Astronomy ran experiments to explain how rockets and space suits work and how space capsules protect astronauts from the heat of re-entry. Jen updates us on her astronomy research trip to South Africa next month and Ralph reviews the latest space-based sci-fi thriller, Life.

The News: Rounding up the space and astronomy news this month we have:

• A schoolboy who spotted an error in NASA data
• Are the Van Allen radiation belts weaker than always thought?
• Was Earth's atmosphere like Titan's 2.4 billion years ago?
• Using the sun as a gravitational lens
• NASA's heading for Mars & evidence of an ancient Mars tsunami

The Interview: This month we have a couple of interviews with the children taking part in science challenges at the Big Bang Fair and clips of Paul & Jen creating fire hazards and projectiles around an undefended audience…

Hat of Woo: Following your comments by email and online, we're bringing back the vile and rancid Hat of Woo this month. And we're back with a festering sore of a conspiracy theory in the form of Immanuel Velikovsky's laws of physics defying Worlds in Collision 'theory'.

What to look out, and up, for in April.

Our highlights of this month's skies with the planets on offer to observers and imagers:

• A pair of comets to observe with amateur telescopes or binoculars
• The planets Mercury and Jupiter in the evening
• The Lyrid meteor shower

Next up, we each take a deep sky pick from our list of favourites for this time of year:

• Ralph – Pinwheel Galaxy in Ursa Major
• Paul – The Black Eye Galaxy in Coma Berenices
• Jen – The Ring Nebula in Lyra

And we finish this sky guide with April's moon phases.