... Bad Astronomy . ... Bitesize Astronomy . ... Last week's Snack talked about how black holes can affect the environment around them in such a way as to be very bright . ... It's a common misconception that black holes always have matter swirling into them. ... As this matter gets closer and closer to the black hole it piles up and a large, fairly flat disk forms. This is called the accretion disk , because matter from this disk accretes (that is, falls in) on the black hole. ... 2008 Phil Plait. ...

... Tonight's Sky . ... Sky this Month . ... Star Atlas . ... stars . ... The Sky This Week: April 1 - 10 . ... Observing springtime deep-sky objects with a large telescope . ... Why do some stars appear to flash a variety of different colors when you look at them through a telescope? ... So, Earthт??s atmosphere will bend some colors from especially bright stars more so than others, which makes the source look like itт??s flashing colors. Get instant access to subscriber content on Astronomy.com! ...

... Inside the Eagle Nebula . ... A closer look of the Eagle Nebula, however, shows the bright region is actually a window into the center of a larger dark shell of dust. ... Annular Eclipse: The Ring of Fire . ... A photogenic group of nebulae can be found toward Chamaeleon, a constellation visible predominantly in skies south of the Earth's equator. ... A Fleeting Eclipse . ... Galaxy NGC 4388 Expels Huge Gas Cloud . ... NGC 4388 has a bright energetic nucleus and so is classified as an active galaxy....

If you go out tonight and look up at the full Moon, and you're like most people, you'll probably see the face of a man, or, alternatively, a rabbit superimposed on the bright disk of the Moon. ... When people look at the full Moon, they often see either a Man in the Moon (left) or a rabbit in the Moon (right). ... The Face on Mars is a naturally occurring rock outcropping that just happens to look like a face when lit from the side. ... The Face on Mars,'' Odyssey , October 1991, page 12. ...

... In temperate latitudes, this is a good time to see halos formed by clouds of ice crystals high in the atmosphere where the temperature is always well down below -30 deg. ... The most prominent halos, however, appear quite close to the sun where it can be uncomfortably bright to look. ... In a sense, halos are like rainbows, glories and coronae in that they require the presence of a bright source of light, the Sun or the Moon, and water floating in the air. ...

Yesterday I got a fragment (first 12 disks of 43 total) of Merlin beta 9.014 (string appeared in kernel and drivers; cmd.exe reports 9.012). ... Those 12 disks appeared to be sufficient to pass 1st phase of installation and run Merlin off Maintenance Desktop. ... 1) HPFS 2MB cache limit is still there. ... InfoPM shows about the same graphics performance as on Warp 3.0 (slightly worse on some operations). ... Looks like at least keyboard layout will be easily customizable in Merlin. ...

... 2014 January 29 . Jelly Donut Shaped Rock Appears on Mars . Image Credit: Mars Exploration Rover Mission , Cornell , JPL , NASA . Explanation: What if a rock that looked like a jelly donut suddenly appeared on Mars? ... Even so, the rock's unusual light tones surrounding a red interior created interest in its composition -- as well as causing it to be nicknamed Jelly Donut . ... About APOD | ... NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply . ... A service of: ASD at NASA / GSFC . ...

... Opening times 7 pm - 9 pm Digital Theatre Show 7.30 pm (Suitable for family groups) Booking is Essential Tel: 028 3752 3689 Armagh Planetarium is open from Mon 29th Oct Sat 3rd Nov 2007 Daily opening hours: 11.30am-5.00pm For further information and a list of show times visit www.armaghplanet.com Booking is Essential Tel: 028 3752 3689 Prices Adults 6.00 per show Children (under 16) / Senior Citizens (65 yrs +) 5.00 per Last Revised: 2007 October 29th . ...

... Archives . ... All models are wrong, but some are useful. ... One of the most frequently cited quotes appeared in an article, titled The End of Theory: The Data Deluge Makes the Scientific Method Obsolete which I liked it very much because it cited the updated maxim by Peter Norvig, Google?s research director, . ... The article addressed perspectives of the new Petabyte data analysis era, where the traditional modeling and testing are not likely feasible. ... Chandra Blog . ... SAMSI AstroStat Prog....

I like a lot astronomical pictures: so I start collecting some appeared in Internet, from various sources as ESO, Nasa, JPL, and many other astronomical sites. ... Some images are copyrighted, so look and enjoy, but do not use for profit. ... Mars and NASA Pathfinder site. Jupiter . ... Shoemaker-Levi impact on Jupiter . Comets and associated images . ... Messier catalog full set of images. ... Ready to print postscript version of some images . My Home Page . Arcetri IR Home Page ...

Astronotes Armagh Planetarium's Stellar Blog! ... This image combines orbital imagery with 3-D modelling to show flows that appear in spring and summer on a slope inside Mars' Newton crater. ... Warm season flows on a slope in Newton Crater, possible evidence of salty liquid water active on Mars today. Image credit: NASA) . ... Frozen water is common on a