Uranus

Hubble Reveals Curious Auroras on Uranus

April 13, 2012

Astronomers have finally succeeded in capturing the first Earth-based images of the curious and fleeting auroras of Uranus using the Hubble Space Telescope, careful planning… and no small amount of luck.

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Uranus

March 12, 2012

Uranus is the 7th planet from the Sun, and the 3rd largest planet in the Solar System. Uranus cannot be seen with the naked eye and therefore was not found until after telescopes were created. There is some debate regarding who discovered the planet because more than one astronomer worked on calculating its position and [...]

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Weekly SkyWatcher’s Forecast – March 12-18, 2012

March 11, 2012

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! What an awesome display of planets! Please take the time to walk outdoors just after skydark – regardless of where you live – and enjoy the bright display of Venus and Jupiter! However, this isn’t the only planetary action going on this week… Mars and M96 pair up, as well as Uranus [...]

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Night Sky Guide: February 2012

February 1, 2012

Special thanks to Ninian Boyle astronomyknowhow.com for information in parts of this guide This month, the Solar System gives us a lot to observe and we’ll even start to see the ‘spring’ constellations appear later in the evenings. But February still has the grand constellations of winter, with mighty Orion as a centrepiece to long [...]

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Night Sky Guide: January 2012

December 30, 2011

January brings us striking views of the night skies! You’ll be able to see well known constellations during the long hours of darkness in the Northern hemisphere, with crisp cold skies. This is an ideal time to get out and look at the wonders of the night sky as there is so much to see [...]

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Observing Alert: Bright Spot On Uranus Reported

October 28, 2011

There’s nothing like a dynamic solar system… and right now another planet is being heard from. According to various sources, a bright spot – possibly a developing storm – has been spotted on Uranus.

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Planetary Pinball – Uranus Gets The “Tilt”

October 6, 2011

Popular theory on how Uranus ended up with a highly eccentric axis has always been pretty standard – one giant blow. However, at today’s (October 6) EPSC-DPS Joint Meeting in Nantes, astronomers are thinking things may have occurred slightly differently. Instead of a singular impact, the glowing blue-green gas giant may have been the victim [...]

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Looking at Uranus

August 26, 2011

Go ahead, take a second for your mind to empty of all the bad puns about the title of this story. Then, watch this great video from YouTuber Thunderf00t. It’s an amazing timelapse video of the night sky, including images of Uranus and its moons.

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New Horizons Flies by Uranus

March 18, 2011

The Pluto-bound New Horizons spacecraft will fly by another planet today (March 18, 2011). However, the robotic craft won’t be taking any images as it zooms past Uranus’ orbit at about 6 p.m. EDT, 3.8 billion kilometers (2.4 billion miles) away from the gas giant (and 2.0 billion km (1.8 billion miles) from Earth). New [...]

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First-Time Solar System Mosaic From the Inside Out

February 18, 2011

Say cheese! The MESSENGER spacecraft has captured the first portrait of our Solar System from the inside looking out. The images, captured Nov. 3 and 16, 2010, were snapped with the Wide Angle Camera (WAC) and Narrow Angle Camera (NAC) of MESSENGER’s Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS).

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Voyager 2 at Uranus, 25 Years Ago Today

January 24, 2011

Voyager 2 is the only spacecraft that has flown close by one of the more enigmatic planets in our solar system (and the butt of many one-liners): Uranus. It was 25 years ago today (Jan. 24) that Voyager made the close pass, and scientists from JPL have been reminiscing about how they pored over the [...]

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Pluto Spacecraft Gets Brain Transplant

September 12, 2008

Still seven years away from its rendezvous with Pluto, the New Horizons spacecraft was awoken from hibernation for the second annual checkout of all systems. The spacecraft and its team back on Earth will also undergo three months of operations as the New Horizons will make observations of Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. But the first [...]

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Podcast: Uranus

November 13, 2007

This week, we’re on to the next planet in the solar system. Having only visited it up close once with Voyager 1, we don’t know much about this sideways-spinning ice giant. But today we’ll cover what we do know, including its faint rings, sideways axis of rotation and rocky core – a first in the [...]

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Uranus’ Rings Seen Edge On

August 23, 2007

Once every 42 years, the angle between Uranus and the Earth is perfectly lined up so that the planet’s rings are seen edge on. Since the rings were only discovered back in 1977, this is the first opportunity astronomers will have to view the planet without the glare and dust from the rings. It doesn’t [...]

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Dark Spot in Uranus’ Clouds

October 2, 2006

The Hubble Space Telescope has discovered a giant cloud vortex in the upper atmosphere of Uranus. This cloudy feature measures 1,700 kilometers by 3,000 kilometers (1,100 miles by 1,900 miles) – large enough to engulf 2/3rd of the US. Although rare on Uranus, these cloud spots are actually quite common on Neptune, since the ice [...]

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Hubble Sees a Rare Transit on Uranus

September 5, 2006

The Hubble Space Telescope recently captured a very rare event: the transit of its moon Ariel across the surface of Uranus. On Earth we call this an eclipse, when the Moon’s shadow falls upon the surface of our planet. This situation is rare on Uranus; however, because the blue-green planet is tilted over on its [...]

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