The Yeast All Around Us

The Yeast All Around Us

With people confined to their homes, there is more interest in home-baked bread than ever before. And that means a lot of people are making friends with yeast for the first time. I am a professor of hospitality management and a former chef, and I teach in my university’s fermentation science program.

As friends and colleagues struggle for success in using yeast in their baking – and occasionally brewing – I’m getting bombarded with questions about this interesting little microorganism.

A little cell with a lot of power

Yeasts are single-celled organisms in the fungus family. There are more than 1,500 species of them on Earth. While each individual yeast is only one cell, they are surprisingly complex and contain a nucleus, DNA and many other cellular parts found in more complicated organisms.

Yeasts break down complex molecules into simpler molecules to produce the energy they live on. They can be found on most plants, floating around in the air and in soils across the globe. There are 250 or so of these yeast species that can convert sugar into carbon dioxide and alcohol – valuable skills that humans have used for millennia. Twenty-four of these make foods that actually taste good.

Among these 24 species is one called Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which means “sugar-eating fungus.” This is bread yeast, the yeast we humans know and love most dearly for the food and drinks it helps us make.

An invisible organism with worldwide influence. KATERYNA KON/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY via Getty Images via The Conversation

The process starts out the same whether you are making bread or beer. Enzymes in the yeast convert sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide. With bread, a baker wants to capture the carbon dioxide to leaven the bread and make it rise. With beer, a brewer wants to capture the alcohol.

Bread has been “the staff of life” for thousands of years. The first loaf of bread was probably a happy accident that occurred when some yeast living on grains began to ferment while some dough for flatbreads – think matzo or crackers – was being made. The first purposely made leavened bread was likely made by Egyptians about 3,000 years ago. Leavened bread is now a staple in almost every culture on Earth. Bread is inexpensive, nutritious, delicious, portable and easy to share. Anywhere wheat, rye or barley could be grown in sufficient quantities, bread became the basic food in most people’s diet.

 

Yeast makes bread fluffy and flavorful. Poh Kim Yeoh/EyeEm via Getty Images via The Conversation

 

No yeast, no bread

 

When you mix yeast with a bit of water and flour, the yeast begins to eat the long chains of carbohydrates found in the flour called starches. This does two important things for baking: It changes the chemical structure of the carbohydrates, and it makes bread rise.

When yeast breaks down starch, it produces carbon dioxide gas and ethyl alcohol. This CO2 is trapped in the dough by stringy protein strands called gluten and causes the dough to rise. After baking, those little air pockets are locked into place and result in airy, fluffy bread.

But soft bread is not the only result. When yeast break down the starches in flour, it turns them into flavorful sugars. The longer you let the dough rise, the stronger these good flavors will be, and some of the most popular bread recipes use this to their advantage.

 

The supermarket’s out of yeast; now what?

 

Baking bread at home is fun and easy, but what if your store doesn’t have any yeast? Then it’s sourdough to the rescue!

Yeast is everywhere, and it’s really easy to collect yeast at home that you can use for baking. These wild yeast collections tend to gather yeasts as well as bacteria – usually Lactobacillus brevis that is used in cheese and yogurt production – that add the complex sour flavors of sourdough. Sourdough starters have been made from fruits, vegetables or even dead wasps. Pliny the Elder, the Roman naturalist and philosopher, was the first to suggest the dead wasp recipe, and it works because wasps get coated in yeasts as they eat fruit. But please don’t do this at home! You don’t need a wasp or a murder hornet to make bread. All you really need to make sourdough starter is wheat or rye flour and water; the yeast and bacteria floating around your home will do the rest.

To make your own sourdough starter, mix a half-cup of distilled water with a half-cup of whole wheat flour or rye flour. Cover the top of your jar or bowl loosely with a cloth, and let it sit somewhere warm for 24 hours. After 24 hours, stir in another quarter-cup of distilled water and a half-cup of all-purpose flour. Let it sit another 24 hours. Throw out about half of your doughy mass and stir in another quarter-cup of water and another half-cup of all-purpose flour.

Keep doing this every day until your mixture begins to bubble and smells like rising bread dough. Once you have your starter going, you can use it to make bread, pancakes, even pizza crust, and you will never have to buy yeast again.

 

Yeast is used in laboratories and factories as well as kitchens. borzywoj/iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images via The Conversation

 

More than just bread and booze

 

Because of their similarity to complicated organisms, large size and ease of use, yeasts have been central to scientific progress for hundreds of years. Study of yeasts played a huge role in kick-starting the field of microbiology in the early 1800s. More than 150 years later, one species of yeast was the first organism with a nucleus to have its entire genome sequenced. Today, scientists use yeast in drug discovery and as tools to study cell growth in mammals and are exploring ways to use yeast to make biofuel from waste products like cornstalks.

Yeast is a remarkable little creature. It has provided delicious food and beverages for millennia, and to this day is a huge part of human life around the world. So the next time you have a glass of beer, toast our little friends that make these foods part of our enjoyment of life.

By Jeffrey Miller, Associate Professor, Hospitality Management, Colorado State University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

sb admin Mon, 05/11/2020 - 11:54

Categories

Life Sciences

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The Yeast All Around Us

With people confined to their homes, there is more interest in home-baked bread than ever before. And that means a lot of people are making friends with yeast for the first time. I am a professor of hospitality management and a former chef, and I teach in my university’s fermentation science program.

As friends and colleagues struggle for success in using yeast in their baking – and occasionally brewing – I’m getting bombarded with questions about this interesting little microorganism.

A little cell with a lot of power

Yeasts are single-celled organisms in the fungus family. There are more than 1,500 species of them on Earth. While each individual yeast is only one cell, they are surprisingly complex and contain a nucleus, DNA and many other cellular parts found in more complicated organisms.

Yeasts break down complex molecules into simpler molecules to produce the energy they live on. They can be found on most plants, floating around in the air and in soils across the globe. There are 250 or so of these yeast species that can convert sugar into carbon dioxide and alcohol – valuable skills that humans have used for millennia. Twenty-four of these make foods that actually taste good.

Among these 24 species is one called Saccharomyces cerevisiae, which means “sugar-eating fungus.” This is bread yeast, the yeast we humans know and love most dearly for the food and drinks it helps us make.

An invisible organism with worldwide influence. KATERYNA KON/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY via Getty Images via The Conversation

The process starts out the same whether you are making bread or beer. Enzymes in the yeast convert sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide. With bread, a baker wants to capture the carbon dioxide to leaven the bread and make it rise. With beer, a brewer wants to capture the alcohol.

Bread has been “the staff of life” for thousands of years. The first loaf of bread was probably a happy accident that occurred when some yeast living on grains began to ferment while some dough for flatbreads – think matzo or crackers – was being made. The first purposely made leavened bread was likely made by Egyptians about 3,000 years ago. Leavened bread is now a staple in almost every culture on Earth. Bread is inexpensive, nutritious, delicious, portable and easy to share. Anywhere wheat, rye or barley could be grown in sufficient quantities, bread became the basic food in most people’s diet.

 

Yeast makes bread fluffy and flavorful. Poh Kim Yeoh/EyeEm via Getty Images via The Conversation

 

No yeast, no bread

 

When you mix yeast with a bit of water and flour, the yeast begins to eat the long chains of carbohydrates found in the flour called starches. This does two important things for baking: It changes the chemical structure of the carbohydrates, and it makes bread rise.

When yeast breaks down starch, it produces carbon dioxide gas and ethyl alcohol. This CO2 is trapped in the dough by stringy protein strands called gluten and causes the dough to rise. After baking, those little air pockets are locked into place and result in airy, fluffy bread.

But soft bread is not the only result. When yeast break down the starches in flour, it turns them into flavorful sugars. The longer you let the dough rise, the stronger these good flavors will be, and some of the most popular bread recipes use this to their advantage.

 

The supermarket’s out of yeast; now what?

 

Baking bread at home is fun and easy, but what if your store doesn’t have any yeast? Then it’s sourdough to the rescue!

Yeast is everywhere, and it’s really easy to collect yeast at home that you can use for baking. These wild yeast collections tend to gather yeasts as well as bacteria – usually Lactobacillus brevis that is used in cheese and yogurt production – that add the complex sour flavors of sourdough. Sourdough starters have been made from fruits, vegetables or even dead wasps. Pliny the Elder, the Roman naturalist and philosopher, was the first to suggest the dead wasp recipe, and it works because wasps get coated in yeasts as they eat fruit. But please don’t do this at home! You don’t need a wasp or a murder hornet to make bread. All you really need to make sourdough starter is wheat or rye flour and water; the yeast and bacteria floating around your home will do the rest.

To make your own sourdough starter, mix a half-cup of distilled water with a half-cup of whole wheat flour or rye flour. Cover the top of your jar or bowl loosely with a cloth, and let it sit somewhere warm for 24 hours. After 24 hours, stir in another quarter-cup of distilled water and a half-cup of all-purpose flour. Let it sit another 24 hours. Throw out about half of your doughy mass and stir in another quarter-cup of water and another half-cup of all-purpose flour.

Keep doing this every day until your mixture begins to bubble and smells like rising bread dough. Once you have your starter going, you can use it to make bread, pancakes, even pizza crust, and you will never have to buy yeast again.

 

Yeast is used in laboratories and factories as well as kitchens. borzywoj/iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images via The Conversation

 

More than just bread and booze

 

Because of their similarity to complicated organisms, large size and ease of use, yeasts have been central to scientific progress for hundreds of years. Study of yeasts played a huge role in kick-starting the field of microbiology in the early 1800s. More than 150 years later, one species of yeast was the first organism with a nucleus to have its entire genome sequenced. Today, scientists use yeast in drug discovery and as tools to study cell growth in mammals and are exploring ways to use yeast to make biofuel from waste products like cornstalks.

Yeast is a remarkable little creature. It has provided delicious food and beverages for millennia, and to this day is a huge part of human life around the world. So the next time you have a glass of beer, toast our little friends that make these foods part of our enjoyment of life.

By Jeffrey Miller, Associate Professor, Hospitality Management, Colorado State University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

sb admin Mon, 05/11/2020 - 11:54

Categories

Life Sciences

from ScienceBlogs - Where the world discusses science https://ift.tt/2SUDZ7U

Jupiter gives us Pluto in 2020

Mosaic image of Pluto and its largest moon Charon, captured around the time the New Horizons spacecraft swept closest to them on July 14, 2015. Image via NASA/ JHUAPL/ SwRI.

The king planet Jupiter is as hard to miss with the eye alone as the dwarf planet Pluto is difficult to find with the telescope. Jupiter is bright! It ranks as the fourth-brightest celestial object to light up the heavens, after the sun, moon and planet Venus. Pluto, on the other hand, is faint. It’s about 1,600 times dimmer than the faintest star visible to the unaided eye. It’s true that the best time of year to see Pluto through a small telescope is around the planet’s yearly opposition, when Earth is going between Pluto and the sun. That’ll happen this year on July 15-16, 2020.

However, this year – 2020 – is exceptional for Jupiter and Pluto. These two worlds are having a triple conjunction. They’ll come together, move apart, and come together again three times in 2020. The first conjunction took place on April 5. The second one will come on June 30, and the final one on November 12. Because all of these Jupiter-Pluto conjunctions happen when these two planets are actually visible in our night sky (as opposed to being lost in the sun’s glare), this year’s Jupiter-Pluto alignment may be the best for centuries to come.

This year, very bright Jupiter and very faint Pluto will remain near each other throughout the year, closely aligned in front of the constellation Sagittarius. Pluto requires a telescope to be seen. No telescope? Try NASA’s Night Sky Network to find star parties and/or astronomy clubs near you. And you don’t need a telescope to use your imagination. Throughout 2020, dazzling Jupiter will enable us to envision Pluto with the mind’s eye on the sky’s dome. First find Jupiter and – presto – you’ve nearly stumbled upon Pluto. Just remember, Jupiter outshines Pluto by several million times.

Where are these worlds now? Both Pluto and Jupiter came out from behind the sun in January 2020, and then hovered low in the east before sunrise. Now – in May 2020 – these two worlds come up around midnight (midway between sunset and sunrise) at mid-northern latitudes, and at late evening for the Southern Hemisphere. Jupiter and Pluto climb upward throughout the nighttime morning hours, to reach the meridian at or near dawn on these May 2020 mornings.

View larger. | Use the waning moon to catch the morning planets – Jupiter, Saturn and Mars – from May 11 to 14, 2020. Pluto is up there, too, near Jupiter, but it’s much too faint to view with the eye alone and very tough to catch in the moon’s glare, even with a telescope. On May 12, the moon sweeps to the south of Pluto around 6 UTC, and then some four hours later, swings south of Jupiter around 10 UTC. The 2nd of 3 Jupiter/Pluto conjunctions will occur on June 30. Read more about the view on May 12 from Guy Ottewell or from EarthSky’s Bruce McClure.

Of course, although Jupiter and Pluto nearly align along the same line of sight throughout 2020, these two worlds aren’t close together in space. Jupiter is a bit more than 5 astronomical units (AU) from the sun, while Pluto lodges way beyond Jupiter, in the Kuiper Belt, at about 34 AU from the sun. One astronomical unit (AU) = one sun/Earth distance.

Jupiter’s and Pluto’s present distance in AU via Heavens-Above

Here’s some observational data about Pluto for 2020, from In-the-Sky.org

Steven Bellavia in Mattituck, New York, captured Pluto on 2 separate nights, June 24 and June 27, 2019. In this animated gif, you can see that Pluto moved in front of the stars between those 2 nights. Steven wrote: “Most of the motion you see is actually from the Earth, not Pluto, since our motion changes our perspective of the much-closer Pluto against the backdrop of the much-farther stars.” Thanks, Steven!

Two planets are said to be in conjunction whenever they reside north and south of one another on the sky’s dome. Conjunctions of Jupiter and Pluto recur in periods of 12 to 13 years. The previous Jupiter-Pluto conjunction happened on December 11, 2007, and the one before that on December 2, 1994. After 2020, the next Jupiter-Pluto conjunction will occur on February 4, 2033, and the one following that on April 12, 2045. But the gap between Jupiter and Pluto at each one of these conjunctions is quite far apart, and the conjunctions of 1994, 2007, and 2033 happen so close to the sun that even Jupiter is lost in the sun’s glare.

Far and away, 2020 presents the best alignment of Jupiter and Pluto in the 21st century (2001 to 2100). What’s more, Jupiter and Pluto stage three conjunctions this year, as Jupiter passes less than one degree north of Pluto at each conjunction on April 5, June 30 and November 12, 2020. (For reference, the moon’s angular diameter spans about 1/2 degree of sky.) All of these conjunctions in 2020 take place in front of the constellation Sagittarius, with Jupiter first passing Pluto on April 5 in prograde (going eastward in front of the backdrop stars), then sweeping past Pluto on June 30 in retrograde (going westward relative to the background stars), and then for the final Jupiter-Pluto conjunction on November 12 in prograde (eastward).

All three Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions on April 5, June 30 and November 12, 2020 take pace place in front of the constellation Sagittarius, not far from the 5th-magnitude star 56 Sagittarii. Constellation chart via International Astronomical Union (IAU).

Most of the time, a Jupiter-Pluto conjunction in any year is a solitary event, as Jupiter laps Pluto going eastward, and never looks back. Triple conjunctions of Jupiter and Pluto – which occur over a period of about 7.4 months – are rare because Jupiter has to first catch Pluto going prograde (eastward), then in retrograde (westward) and then in prograde (eastward) again. The three-peat performance last happened in 1955-56 (November 2, 1955; February 8 and June 16, 1956), and will next occur in 2106-07 (July 13 and November 2, 2106; February 19, 2107). Yet, all three conjunctions in 1955-56 were widely spaced, and all three conjunctions in 2106-07 will be widely spaced, too.

Illustration showing why a superior planet appears to go in retrograde (westward in front of the backdrop stars of the zodiac). As seen from the north side of the solar system, all the planets orbit counter-clockwise. When the faster-moving Earth goes by a slower-moving superior planet, that planet appears to go backward (in retrograde). In 2020, Mars is in retrograde from September 9 to November 15, Jupiter from May 14 to September 13, and Saturn from May 11 to September 29. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

In other words, as we said above, 2020 may well showcase the best Jupiter-Pluto alignment for centuries to come. Most excitingly, both Jupiter and Pluto will reach opposition in mid-July 2020. At opposition, a superior planet – any planet revolving around the sun outside of Earth’s orbit – resides opposite the sun in Earth’s sky.

Opposition happens when Earth flies between a superior planet, like Mars, and the sun. This happens yearly for most of the outer planets (and every other year for Mars). Illustration via Heavens-Above.

At opposition, a superior planet (or superior dwarf planet) rises at sunset and sets at sunrise, and is out all night long. It’s at opposition that a planet shines at its brightest best in Earth’s sky, and it’s at or near opposition that a planet comes closest to Earth for the year.

Jupiter reaches opposition on July 14, 2020, at about 8:00 UTC, and comes closest to Earth on July 15, 2020, at about 10:00 UTC.

Pluto reaches opposition on July 15, 2020, at about 19:00 UTC, and comes closest to Earth on July 13, 2020, at about 9:00 UTC.

In an uncanny bit of timing, the oppositions of Jupiter and Pluto happen almost concurrently in mid-July 2020. A planet reaches opposition midway through a retrograde. However, since Pluto resides so much farther from the sun than Jupiter does, Pluto’s retrograde lasts nearly 1 1/2 months (six weeks) longer than Jupiter’s four-month retrograde. So for near-unison oppositions, Pluto’s retrograde has to start – and end – approximately three weeks before – and after – Jupiter’s retrograde.

Jupiter and Pluto retrograde/opposition in 2020

Jupiter begins retrograde: May 14, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Jupiter at opposition: July 14, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Jupiter ends retrograde: September 13, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius

Pluto begins retrograde: April 25, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Pluto at opposition: July 15, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Pluto ends retrograde: October 4, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius

Jupiter-Pluto conjunction tables via Richard Nolle

Call it serendipity or synergy – or whatever – but the spectacular alignment of the king planet Jupiter with the dwarf planet Pluto doesn’t get much better than in 2020. A similarly good Jupiter-Pluto rendezvous might not happen again for a number of centuries to come.

Pluto as seen with a 12″ S/C telescope (14.3 mag.) on July 10, 2015. Photo by Efrain Morales of Sociedad de Astronomia del Caribe. More information about Pluto’s current location.

Bottom line: Jupiter can help you find – or at least envision – Pluto in 2020. That’s because these two worlds are having a triple conjunction this year; they’ll be near each other 3 times in 2020.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2XkisVG

Mosaic image of Pluto and its largest moon Charon, captured around the time the New Horizons spacecraft swept closest to them on July 14, 2015. Image via NASA/ JHUAPL/ SwRI.

The king planet Jupiter is as hard to miss with the eye alone as the dwarf planet Pluto is difficult to find with the telescope. Jupiter is bright! It ranks as the fourth-brightest celestial object to light up the heavens, after the sun, moon and planet Venus. Pluto, on the other hand, is faint. It’s about 1,600 times dimmer than the faintest star visible to the unaided eye. It’s true that the best time of year to see Pluto through a small telescope is around the planet’s yearly opposition, when Earth is going between Pluto and the sun. That’ll happen this year on July 15-16, 2020.

However, this year – 2020 – is exceptional for Jupiter and Pluto. These two worlds are having a triple conjunction. They’ll come together, move apart, and come together again three times in 2020. The first conjunction took place on April 5. The second one will come on June 30, and the final one on November 12. Because all of these Jupiter-Pluto conjunctions happen when these two planets are actually visible in our night sky (as opposed to being lost in the sun’s glare), this year’s Jupiter-Pluto alignment may be the best for centuries to come.

This year, very bright Jupiter and very faint Pluto will remain near each other throughout the year, closely aligned in front of the constellation Sagittarius. Pluto requires a telescope to be seen. No telescope? Try NASA’s Night Sky Network to find star parties and/or astronomy clubs near you. And you don’t need a telescope to use your imagination. Throughout 2020, dazzling Jupiter will enable us to envision Pluto with the mind’s eye on the sky’s dome. First find Jupiter and – presto – you’ve nearly stumbled upon Pluto. Just remember, Jupiter outshines Pluto by several million times.

Where are these worlds now? Both Pluto and Jupiter came out from behind the sun in January 2020, and then hovered low in the east before sunrise. Now – in May 2020 – these two worlds come up around midnight (midway between sunset and sunrise) at mid-northern latitudes, and at late evening for the Southern Hemisphere. Jupiter and Pluto climb upward throughout the nighttime morning hours, to reach the meridian at or near dawn on these May 2020 mornings.

View larger. | Use the waning moon to catch the morning planets – Jupiter, Saturn and Mars – from May 11 to 14, 2020. Pluto is up there, too, near Jupiter, but it’s much too faint to view with the eye alone and very tough to catch in the moon’s glare, even with a telescope. On May 12, the moon sweeps to the south of Pluto around 6 UTC, and then some four hours later, swings south of Jupiter around 10 UTC. The 2nd of 3 Jupiter/Pluto conjunctions will occur on June 30. Read more about the view on May 12 from Guy Ottewell or from EarthSky’s Bruce McClure.

Of course, although Jupiter and Pluto nearly align along the same line of sight throughout 2020, these two worlds aren’t close together in space. Jupiter is a bit more than 5 astronomical units (AU) from the sun, while Pluto lodges way beyond Jupiter, in the Kuiper Belt, at about 34 AU from the sun. One astronomical unit (AU) = one sun/Earth distance.

Jupiter’s and Pluto’s present distance in AU via Heavens-Above

Here’s some observational data about Pluto for 2020, from In-the-Sky.org

Steven Bellavia in Mattituck, New York, captured Pluto on 2 separate nights, June 24 and June 27, 2019. In this animated gif, you can see that Pluto moved in front of the stars between those 2 nights. Steven wrote: “Most of the motion you see is actually from the Earth, not Pluto, since our motion changes our perspective of the much-closer Pluto against the backdrop of the much-farther stars.” Thanks, Steven!

Two planets are said to be in conjunction whenever they reside north and south of one another on the sky’s dome. Conjunctions of Jupiter and Pluto recur in periods of 12 to 13 years. The previous Jupiter-Pluto conjunction happened on December 11, 2007, and the one before that on December 2, 1994. After 2020, the next Jupiter-Pluto conjunction will occur on February 4, 2033, and the one following that on April 12, 2045. But the gap between Jupiter and Pluto at each one of these conjunctions is quite far apart, and the conjunctions of 1994, 2007, and 2033 happen so close to the sun that even Jupiter is lost in the sun’s glare.

Far and away, 2020 presents the best alignment of Jupiter and Pluto in the 21st century (2001 to 2100). What’s more, Jupiter and Pluto stage three conjunctions this year, as Jupiter passes less than one degree north of Pluto at each conjunction on April 5, June 30 and November 12, 2020. (For reference, the moon’s angular diameter spans about 1/2 degree of sky.) All of these conjunctions in 2020 take place in front of the constellation Sagittarius, with Jupiter first passing Pluto on April 5 in prograde (going eastward in front of the backdrop stars), then sweeping past Pluto on June 30 in retrograde (going westward relative to the background stars), and then for the final Jupiter-Pluto conjunction on November 12 in prograde (eastward).

All three Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions on April 5, June 30 and November 12, 2020 take pace place in front of the constellation Sagittarius, not far from the 5th-magnitude star 56 Sagittarii. Constellation chart via International Astronomical Union (IAU).

Most of the time, a Jupiter-Pluto conjunction in any year is a solitary event, as Jupiter laps Pluto going eastward, and never looks back. Triple conjunctions of Jupiter and Pluto – which occur over a period of about 7.4 months – are rare because Jupiter has to first catch Pluto going prograde (eastward), then in retrograde (westward) and then in prograde (eastward) again. The three-peat performance last happened in 1955-56 (November 2, 1955; February 8 and June 16, 1956), and will next occur in 2106-07 (July 13 and November 2, 2106; February 19, 2107). Yet, all three conjunctions in 1955-56 were widely spaced, and all three conjunctions in 2106-07 will be widely spaced, too.

Illustration showing why a superior planet appears to go in retrograde (westward in front of the backdrop stars of the zodiac). As seen from the north side of the solar system, all the planets orbit counter-clockwise. When the faster-moving Earth goes by a slower-moving superior planet, that planet appears to go backward (in retrograde). In 2020, Mars is in retrograde from September 9 to November 15, Jupiter from May 14 to September 13, and Saturn from May 11 to September 29. Image via Wikimedia Commons.

In other words, as we said above, 2020 may well showcase the best Jupiter-Pluto alignment for centuries to come. Most excitingly, both Jupiter and Pluto will reach opposition in mid-July 2020. At opposition, a superior planet – any planet revolving around the sun outside of Earth’s orbit – resides opposite the sun in Earth’s sky.

Opposition happens when Earth flies between a superior planet, like Mars, and the sun. This happens yearly for most of the outer planets (and every other year for Mars). Illustration via Heavens-Above.

At opposition, a superior planet (or superior dwarf planet) rises at sunset and sets at sunrise, and is out all night long. It’s at opposition that a planet shines at its brightest best in Earth’s sky, and it’s at or near opposition that a planet comes closest to Earth for the year.

Jupiter reaches opposition on July 14, 2020, at about 8:00 UTC, and comes closest to Earth on July 15, 2020, at about 10:00 UTC.

Pluto reaches opposition on July 15, 2020, at about 19:00 UTC, and comes closest to Earth on July 13, 2020, at about 9:00 UTC.

In an uncanny bit of timing, the oppositions of Jupiter and Pluto happen almost concurrently in mid-July 2020. A planet reaches opposition midway through a retrograde. However, since Pluto resides so much farther from the sun than Jupiter does, Pluto’s retrograde lasts nearly 1 1/2 months (six weeks) longer than Jupiter’s four-month retrograde. So for near-unison oppositions, Pluto’s retrograde has to start – and end – approximately three weeks before – and after – Jupiter’s retrograde.

Jupiter and Pluto retrograde/opposition in 2020

Jupiter begins retrograde: May 14, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Jupiter at opposition: July 14, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Jupiter ends retrograde: September 13, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius

Pluto begins retrograde: April 25, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Pluto at opposition: July 15, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius
Pluto ends retrograde: October 4, 2020, in front of the constellation Sagittarius

Jupiter-Pluto conjunction tables via Richard Nolle

Call it serendipity or synergy – or whatever – but the spectacular alignment of the king planet Jupiter with the dwarf planet Pluto doesn’t get much better than in 2020. A similarly good Jupiter-Pluto rendezvous might not happen again for a number of centuries to come.

Pluto as seen with a 12″ S/C telescope (14.3 mag.) on July 10, 2015. Photo by Efrain Morales of Sociedad de Astronomia del Caribe. More information about Pluto’s current location.

Bottom line: Jupiter can help you find – or at least envision – Pluto in 2020. That’s because these two worlds are having a triple conjunction this year; they’ll be near each other 3 times in 2020.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2XkisVG

Don’t miss this week’s moon-Jupiter-Saturn trio

View larger. | Illustration via Guy Ottewell’s blog.

Originally published at Guy Ottewell’s blog. Reprinted here with permission.

On the morning of Tuesday, May 12, 2020, comes a concentration of three bright bodies within a circle less than 5 degrees wide.

Jupiter has been catching up with Saturn, and now, when the moon pays its monthly visit, they are close enough to form this trio. It is at its tightest on May 12 at 14:00 UTC, which is four or more hours earlier by American clocks. Translate UTC to your time zone. So, for Europe, Africa and the Americas, the nearest time for viewing the trio is the morning of May 12.

The centers of the three will fit within a circle of diameter 4.7 degrees. This is as seen from the center of the Earth; from my northern latitude in the U.K., the moon, which descended through the ecliptic on May 10, will appear farther south, so that the gathering appears less tight. In the picture at the top of this post, the moon is drawn – at twice its real size – in the positions where it is seen from the location, but the arrows between moon dates are where the moon would be seen from Earth’s center.

Illustration via Guy Ottewell’s blog.

This space view is from 15 degrees north of the ecliptic plane, and shows the paths of Earth, Jupiter, and Saturn in May 2020, with sightlines from Earth to those planets at May 12 at 14:00 UTC. The dashed line indicates the vernal equinox direction.

After this trio event, the moon will reach its last quarter position on May 14 (14:00 UTC), near the spot marked “Earth’s direction of travel” in the top diagram. The last quarter moon, 90 degrees west of the sun, is crossing our orbit ahead of us.

And, because Earth is starting to overtake the two planets on the inside, both go into apparent retrograde motion, Saturn on May 11, Jupiter on May 14. One result is that there comes a quasi-conjunction, a moment when the angular distance between them is at a minimum before opening back out: this will be on May 18, when Jupiter will be 4.7 degrees west of Saturn.

To add to the complexity, little Pluto appears close by but in the farther background. Read more: Jupiter gives us Pluto in 2020

Quite a geometric tangle. To clarify it to myself, I had to trace the to-and-fro movements of Jupiter and Saturn from month to month down my Zodiac Wavy Chart for 2020:

Illustration via Guy Ottewell’s blog. Read more about the Zodiac Wavy Chart.

The two giants will continue to retrograde, through their oppositions on July 14 (Jupiter) and 20 (Saturn); will resume forward motion on Sep. 12 (Jupiter) and 29 (Saturn).

Their 20-year conjunction will come on May 12, 2020, as seen from Earth.

Bottom line: The planets Jupiter and Saturn are exceedingly near each other now on the sky’s dome, heading for a 20-year conjunction later this year. See them with the moon on May 12!

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View larger. | Illustration via Guy Ottewell’s blog.

Originally published at Guy Ottewell’s blog. Reprinted here with permission.

On the morning of Tuesday, May 12, 2020, comes a concentration of three bright bodies within a circle less than 5 degrees wide.

Jupiter has been catching up with Saturn, and now, when the moon pays its monthly visit, they are close enough to form this trio. It is at its tightest on May 12 at 14:00 UTC, which is four or more hours earlier by American clocks. Translate UTC to your time zone. So, for Europe, Africa and the Americas, the nearest time for viewing the trio is the morning of May 12.

The centers of the three will fit within a circle of diameter 4.7 degrees. This is as seen from the center of the Earth; from my northern latitude in the U.K., the moon, which descended through the ecliptic on May 10, will appear farther south, so that the gathering appears less tight. In the picture at the top of this post, the moon is drawn – at twice its real size – in the positions where it is seen from the location, but the arrows between moon dates are where the moon would be seen from Earth’s center.

Illustration via Guy Ottewell’s blog.

This space view is from 15 degrees north of the ecliptic plane, and shows the paths of Earth, Jupiter, and Saturn in May 2020, with sightlines from Earth to those planets at May 12 at 14:00 UTC. The dashed line indicates the vernal equinox direction.

After this trio event, the moon will reach its last quarter position on May 14 (14:00 UTC), near the spot marked “Earth’s direction of travel” in the top diagram. The last quarter moon, 90 degrees west of the sun, is crossing our orbit ahead of us.

And, because Earth is starting to overtake the two planets on the inside, both go into apparent retrograde motion, Saturn on May 11, Jupiter on May 14. One result is that there comes a quasi-conjunction, a moment when the angular distance between them is at a minimum before opening back out: this will be on May 18, when Jupiter will be 4.7 degrees west of Saturn.

To add to the complexity, little Pluto appears close by but in the farther background. Read more: Jupiter gives us Pluto in 2020

Quite a geometric tangle. To clarify it to myself, I had to trace the to-and-fro movements of Jupiter and Saturn from month to month down my Zodiac Wavy Chart for 2020:

Illustration via Guy Ottewell’s blog. Read more about the Zodiac Wavy Chart.

The two giants will continue to retrograde, through their oppositions on July 14 (Jupiter) and 20 (Saturn); will resume forward motion on Sep. 12 (Jupiter) and 29 (Saturn).

Their 20-year conjunction will come on May 12, 2020, as seen from Earth.

Bottom line: The planets Jupiter and Saturn are exceedingly near each other now on the sky’s dome, heading for a 20-year conjunction later this year. See them with the moon on May 12!

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Cool! A Hubble photo translated to music

We stumbled on this video via a May 3, 2020, re-post at ScienceAlert. Matt Russo and Andrew Santaguida of System Sounds in Toronto – which calls itself “a sci-art outreach project” – created the video. It’s part of NASA’s Astrophysics Visualizations series. NASA explained the video this way:

Space becomes sonified in this visualization of a cluster of galaxies imaged by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Time flows left to right, and the frequency of sound changes from bottom to top, ranging from 30 to 1,000 hertz. Objects near the bottom of the image produce lower notes, while those near the top produce higher ones. Most of the visible specks are galaxies housing countless stars. A few individual stars shine brightly in the foreground. Stars and compact galaxies create short, clear tones, while sprawling spiral galaxies emit longer notes that change pitch. The higher density of galaxies near the center of the image – the heart of this galaxy cluster, known as RXC J0142.9+4438 – results in a swell of mid-range tones halfway through the video. Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3 acquired this image on August 13, 2018.

Cool!

Here’s the original Hubble image of galaxy cluster RXC J0142.9+4438, later “sonified” by Russo and Santaguida. NASA wrote: “Galaxies abound in this spectacular Hubble image; spiral arms swirl in all colors and orientations, and fuzzy ellipticals can be seen speckled across the frame as softly glowing smudges on the sky. Each visible speck of a galaxy is home to countless stars. A few stars closer to home shine brightly in the foreground, while a massive galaxy cluster nestles at the very center of the image; an immense collection of maybe thousands of galaxies, all held together by the relentless force of gravity.” Read more about this image, which is via ESA/ Hubble & NASA, RELICS.

Bottom line: Musicians and scientists turned a Hubble Space Telescope image – of galaxy cluster RXC J0142.9+4438 – into music.

Via ScienceAlert

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We stumbled on this video via a May 3, 2020, re-post at ScienceAlert. Matt Russo and Andrew Santaguida of System Sounds in Toronto – which calls itself “a sci-art outreach project” – created the video. It’s part of NASA’s Astrophysics Visualizations series. NASA explained the video this way:

Space becomes sonified in this visualization of a cluster of galaxies imaged by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Time flows left to right, and the frequency of sound changes from bottom to top, ranging from 30 to 1,000 hertz. Objects near the bottom of the image produce lower notes, while those near the top produce higher ones. Most of the visible specks are galaxies housing countless stars. A few individual stars shine brightly in the foreground. Stars and compact galaxies create short, clear tones, while sprawling spiral galaxies emit longer notes that change pitch. The higher density of galaxies near the center of the image – the heart of this galaxy cluster, known as RXC J0142.9+4438 – results in a swell of mid-range tones halfway through the video. Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide Field Camera 3 acquired this image on August 13, 2018.

Cool!

Here’s the original Hubble image of galaxy cluster RXC J0142.9+4438, later “sonified” by Russo and Santaguida. NASA wrote: “Galaxies abound in this spectacular Hubble image; spiral arms swirl in all colors and orientations, and fuzzy ellipticals can be seen speckled across the frame as softly glowing smudges on the sky. Each visible speck of a galaxy is home to countless stars. A few stars closer to home shine brightly in the foreground, while a massive galaxy cluster nestles at the very center of the image; an immense collection of maybe thousands of galaxies, all held together by the relentless force of gravity.” Read more about this image, which is via ESA/ Hubble & NASA, RELICS.

Bottom line: Musicians and scientists turned a Hubble Space Telescope image – of galaxy cluster RXC J0142.9+4438 – into music.

Via ScienceAlert

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Moon and 3 morning planets May 11 to 14

These next several mornings – May 11, 12, 13 and 14, 2020 – let the waning moon introduce you to three bright morning planets. Jupiter is by far the brightest of the threesome, beaming some seven times more brilliantly than either Saturn or Mars. Jupiter also outshines all the stars. You’ll have no trouble identifying Jupiter. Mars and Saturn are fainter, but – like Jupiter, and like the moon – follow the approximate path of the ecliptic (sun’s path) across our sky. Thus the three planets, and the moon, make a small, graceful arc across our predawn sky. Mars and Saturn are almost equally bright (Mars is a tad brighter), and there are other ways of distinguishing Saturn from Mars. First of all, Saturn shines in close vicinity to Jupiter, and these two worlds will remain close together on the sky’s dome for the rest of 2020. Find dazzling Jupiter first, and that nearby bright world will be the ringed planet Saturn any time this year. Remember … you need a telescope to see Saturn’s rings.

Now use Jupiter and Saturn as pointers, to find Mars. Look along the approximate path traveled by the sun and moon, in the direction toward the sunrise. Mars will be the next-brightest object along this path. Also, you can distinguish Mars from Saturn by color. Mars glowers red while Saturn appears golden. If you can’t tell the color difference with your eyes alone, try using binoculars.

By the way, there’s a dwarf planet, Pluto, up there, too. Pluto is some 1,000 times too faint to be viewed with the eye alone, however. Pluto and Jupiter are having a triple conjunction in 2020. Read more: Jupiter gives us Pluto in 2020

View at EarthSky Community Photos. | Frank Lu in Arlington, Texas caught this image of the 3 planets on May 4, 2020. He wrote: “Constellation Capricornus flanked by Mars on the left and Saturn and Jupiter to the right. Mars is rapidly moving further away.” The planets are bright and can be seen from inside most cities, but you need a relatively dark sky to see Capricornus. If you have one, note that Capricornus looks like an arrowhead. Thanks, Frank!

Right now, our planet Earth is heading around on the inside track in its smaller and faster orbit around the sun, so that the distance between us and the slower-moving planets – Jupiter, Saturn and Mars – is decreasing as we speak. These planets, in turn, are slowly but surely brightening in Earth’s sky day by day.

Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are superior planets (planets that orbit the sun outside of Earth’s orbit). Any superior planet is at its brightest in Earth’s sky whenever the Earth swings in between the sun and that superior planet. When that happens, the superior planet is said to be at opposition, because it’s opposite the sun in our sky (rising at sunset, highest up in the sky at midnight and setting at sunrise).

Opposition happens when Earth flies between an outer planet, like Mars, and the sun. This happens yearly for most of the outer planets (except Mars – which reaches opposition every other year). Illustration via Heavens Above.

Opposition is an extra special time to view planets in our sky. Not only is the planet at its brightest for the year for some weeks around then, but it’s up all night long, beaming from dusk until dawn. The brightness change of Jupiter and Saturn will be relatively subtle. On the other hand, the change in the brightness of Mars will be profound and dramatic in 2020. We explain why in this post about Mars and the moon.

Opposition dates in 2020:

Jupiter: July 14, 2020
Saturn: July 20, 2020
Mars: October 13, 2020

Note how closely in time Jupiter and Saturn reach opposition. That’s because, as mentioned above, they are near each other on our sky’s dome. Jupiter and Saturn will remain close companions all year long, and these twin beacons will be out first thing at dusk/nightfall, starting late July 2020.

Now note how much farther away in time Mars’ opposition will be. Mars doesn’t reach opposition until October 2020. That’s because – as a planet whose orbit lies just outside Earth’s orbit around the sun – Mars not only undergoes a dramatic brightness change at opposition, but, also, around the time of its opposition, we see it move rapidly in front of the stars.

Thus, in the coming weeks and months, you can watch as Mars makes a beeline in front of many constellations.

The planets of the solar system to scale by size (but not distance). In their order going outward from the sun: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. To know the planetary distances in astronomical units, click on Heavens-Above: Solar system.

Bottom line: Before sunrise these next several mornings – May 11, 12, 13 and 14, 2020 – use the moon to locate the king planet Jupiter, the ringed planet Saturn, and the red planet Mars.

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These next several mornings – May 11, 12, 13 and 14, 2020 – let the waning moon introduce you to three bright morning planets. Jupiter is by far the brightest of the threesome, beaming some seven times more brilliantly than either Saturn or Mars. Jupiter also outshines all the stars. You’ll have no trouble identifying Jupiter. Mars and Saturn are fainter, but – like Jupiter, and like the moon – follow the approximate path of the ecliptic (sun’s path) across our sky. Thus the three planets, and the moon, make a small, graceful arc across our predawn sky. Mars and Saturn are almost equally bright (Mars is a tad brighter), and there are other ways of distinguishing Saturn from Mars. First of all, Saturn shines in close vicinity to Jupiter, and these two worlds will remain close together on the sky’s dome for the rest of 2020. Find dazzling Jupiter first, and that nearby bright world will be the ringed planet Saturn any time this year. Remember … you need a telescope to see Saturn’s rings.

Now use Jupiter and Saturn as pointers, to find Mars. Look along the approximate path traveled by the sun and moon, in the direction toward the sunrise. Mars will be the next-brightest object along this path. Also, you can distinguish Mars from Saturn by color. Mars glowers red while Saturn appears golden. If you can’t tell the color difference with your eyes alone, try using binoculars.

By the way, there’s a dwarf planet, Pluto, up there, too. Pluto is some 1,000 times too faint to be viewed with the eye alone, however. Pluto and Jupiter are having a triple conjunction in 2020. Read more: Jupiter gives us Pluto in 2020

View at EarthSky Community Photos. | Frank Lu in Arlington, Texas caught this image of the 3 planets on May 4, 2020. He wrote: “Constellation Capricornus flanked by Mars on the left and Saturn and Jupiter to the right. Mars is rapidly moving further away.” The planets are bright and can be seen from inside most cities, but you need a relatively dark sky to see Capricornus. If you have one, note that Capricornus looks like an arrowhead. Thanks, Frank!

Right now, our planet Earth is heading around on the inside track in its smaller and faster orbit around the sun, so that the distance between us and the slower-moving planets – Jupiter, Saturn and Mars – is decreasing as we speak. These planets, in turn, are slowly but surely brightening in Earth’s sky day by day.

Mars, Jupiter and Saturn are superior planets (planets that orbit the sun outside of Earth’s orbit). Any superior planet is at its brightest in Earth’s sky whenever the Earth swings in between the sun and that superior planet. When that happens, the superior planet is said to be at opposition, because it’s opposite the sun in our sky (rising at sunset, highest up in the sky at midnight and setting at sunrise).

Opposition happens when Earth flies between an outer planet, like Mars, and the sun. This happens yearly for most of the outer planets (except Mars – which reaches opposition every other year). Illustration via Heavens Above.

Opposition is an extra special time to view planets in our sky. Not only is the planet at its brightest for the year for some weeks around then, but it’s up all night long, beaming from dusk until dawn. The brightness change of Jupiter and Saturn will be relatively subtle. On the other hand, the change in the brightness of Mars will be profound and dramatic in 2020. We explain why in this post about Mars and the moon.

Opposition dates in 2020:

Jupiter: July 14, 2020
Saturn: July 20, 2020
Mars: October 13, 2020

Note how closely in time Jupiter and Saturn reach opposition. That’s because, as mentioned above, they are near each other on our sky’s dome. Jupiter and Saturn will remain close companions all year long, and these twin beacons will be out first thing at dusk/nightfall, starting late July 2020.

Now note how much farther away in time Mars’ opposition will be. Mars doesn’t reach opposition until October 2020. That’s because – as a planet whose orbit lies just outside Earth’s orbit around the sun – Mars not only undergoes a dramatic brightness change at opposition, but, also, around the time of its opposition, we see it move rapidly in front of the stars.

Thus, in the coming weeks and months, you can watch as Mars makes a beeline in front of many constellations.

The planets of the solar system to scale by size (but not distance). In their order going outward from the sun: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. To know the planetary distances in astronomical units, click on Heavens-Above: Solar system.

Bottom line: Before sunrise these next several mornings – May 11, 12, 13 and 14, 2020 – use the moon to locate the king planet Jupiter, the ringed planet Saturn, and the red planet Mars.

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Arc to Arcturus, spike to Spica

Tonight, look outside in the evening and learn a phrase useful to sky watchers. The phrase is: follow the arc to Arcturus, and drive a spike (or speed on) to Spica. You can use this phrase in any year.

First locate the Big Dipper asterism in the northeastern sky. Then draw an imaginary line following the curve in the Dipper’s handle until you come to a bright orange star. This star is Arcturus in the constellation Bootes, known in skylore as the bear guard.

Arcturus is a giant star with an estimated distance of 37 light-years. It’s special because it’s not moving with the general stream of stars, in the flat disk of the Milky Way galaxy. Instead, Arcturus is cutting perpendicularly through the galaxy’s disk at a tremendous rate of speed … some 100 miles (150 km) per second. Millions of years from now this star will be lost from the view of any future inhabitants of Earth, or at least those who are earthbound and looking with the eye alone.

Now drive a spike or, as some say, speed on to Spica in the constellation Virgo.

Spica in the constellation Virgo looks like one star, but this single point of light is really a multiple star system – with two hot stars orbiting very close together – located an estimated distance of 262 light-years away from Earth.

Here’s another way to verify that you’re looking at Spica, the brightest star in the constellation Virgo.

Bottom line: Follow the arc to Arcturus, and drive a spike to Spica.

Big and Little Dippers: Noticeable in northern sky

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Tonight, look outside in the evening and learn a phrase useful to sky watchers. The phrase is: follow the arc to Arcturus, and drive a spike (or speed on) to Spica. You can use this phrase in any year.

First locate the Big Dipper asterism in the northeastern sky. Then draw an imaginary line following the curve in the Dipper’s handle until you come to a bright orange star. This star is Arcturus in the constellation Bootes, known in skylore as the bear guard.

Arcturus is a giant star with an estimated distance of 37 light-years. It’s special because it’s not moving with the general stream of stars, in the flat disk of the Milky Way galaxy. Instead, Arcturus is cutting perpendicularly through the galaxy’s disk at a tremendous rate of speed … some 100 miles (150 km) per second. Millions of years from now this star will be lost from the view of any future inhabitants of Earth, or at least those who are earthbound and looking with the eye alone.

Now drive a spike or, as some say, speed on to Spica in the constellation Virgo.

Spica in the constellation Virgo looks like one star, but this single point of light is really a multiple star system – with two hot stars orbiting very close together – located an estimated distance of 262 light-years away from Earth.

Here’s another way to verify that you’re looking at Spica, the brightest star in the constellation Virgo.

Bottom line: Follow the arc to Arcturus, and drive a spike to Spica.

Big and Little Dippers: Noticeable in northern sky

Enjoying EarthSky so far? Sign up for our free daily newsletter today!

EarthSky astronomy kits are perfect for beginners. Order today from the EarthSky store

Donate: Your support means the world to us

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Whoa! Comet ATLAS got brighter this week

Comet ATLAS – the comet that doesn’t want to die – via Terry Lovejoy (@TerryLovejoy66 on Twitter).

Earlier this year, comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) seemed to be brightening steadily. Many hoped it would become bright enough to see with the eye alone. Then suddenly the comet appeared to disintegrate, breaking our hearts. Widely distributed Hubble Space Telescope images showed the comet in multiple pieces. Now there’s news about the comet again. Veteran comet observer Terry Lovejoy reported on Twitter earlier today (May 9, 2020) that he observed the comet brightening over the past several nights:

Just when we thought it was all over for Comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) the comet starts to brighten again. Here I document a steady increase in the brightness of the central condensation over 4 nights. Images come courtesy @iTelescope_Net T11 scope at Mayhill, NM. pic.twitter.com/0vd9OKsVoY

— Terry Lovejoy (@TerryLovejoy66) May 9, 2020

That’s all we know so far. It’s likely just a temporary surge. By the way, in case you’re wondering, we trust Terry Lovejoy to provide an accurate report on the comet’s changing brightness. He’s discovered six comets himself and taken countless wonderful images of comets. Thank you, Terry!

As astronomers know … comets are unpredictable. We’ll keep you updated if we hear more.

Bottom line: Images from veteran comet observer Terry Lovejoy show Comet ATLAS brightening from May 5 to May 9, 2020.

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Comet ATLAS – the comet that doesn’t want to die – via Terry Lovejoy (@TerryLovejoy66 on Twitter).

Earlier this year, comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) seemed to be brightening steadily. Many hoped it would become bright enough to see with the eye alone. Then suddenly the comet appeared to disintegrate, breaking our hearts. Widely distributed Hubble Space Telescope images showed the comet in multiple pieces. Now there’s news about the comet again. Veteran comet observer Terry Lovejoy reported on Twitter earlier today (May 9, 2020) that he observed the comet brightening over the past several nights:

Just when we thought it was all over for Comet C/2019 Y4 (ATLAS) the comet starts to brighten again. Here I document a steady increase in the brightness of the central condensation over 4 nights. Images come courtesy @iTelescope_Net T11 scope at Mayhill, NM. pic.twitter.com/0vd9OKsVoY

— Terry Lovejoy (@TerryLovejoy66) May 9, 2020

That’s all we know so far. It’s likely just a temporary surge. By the way, in case you’re wondering, we trust Terry Lovejoy to provide an accurate report on the comet’s changing brightness. He’s discovered six comets himself and taken countless wonderful images of comets. Thank you, Terry!

As astronomers know … comets are unpredictable. We’ll keep you updated if we hear more.

Bottom line: Images from veteran comet observer Terry Lovejoy show Comet ATLAS brightening from May 5 to May 9, 2020.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2WEK1Lc