Back Alley Astronomy

Figure 1. Exoplanets between Earth & Uranus in radius (R) and mass (M) The media market for Super Earths remains robust. Two mo...

Santa Maria Crater, Mars, by the Opportunity Rover. Image credit: NASA Sometime after my eighth birthday, a friend and I discovered a ...

Seekers after alien life tell us to follow the water For some years now, extrasolar headlines have heavily featured Super Earths – objec...

The three brightest stars in this view form an asterism known as the Summer Triangle. The Kepler field of view occupies the patch of sky ...