Awesome Astronomy

The Discussion: Jeni gets her name in lights – well, bold print, as she contributes (what else but graphs) to a published research paper and Ralph takes a look at Ben Cacase’s very own new asterism in the heart of Auriga and reads a defiant message from Michelle of ‘ze resistonce’. The News: It’s a very rocky month as we round up the following space and astronomy news stories: Earth’s moon had an atmosphere thicker than Mars’ for more than 70 million years Observations suggest Proxima Centauri has a Kuiper Belt and maybe a Oort Cloud A sci-fi like asteroid from another star system is now passing through the inner solar system Hat of Woo/Astronomy Concept mash-up: This month Paul’s festering Hat of Woo is a little less fetid as we discuss a plausible but untested concept that has just a faint whiff of woo about it. This month we look at The Nemesis ‘Theory’ which suggests the sun has a brown dwarf companion which causes periodic extinction events – and, of course, we’re long overdue an extinction and