THIS MONTH'S PLANETS

Venus once again takes pride of place in the summer evening skies for observers

Black hole jet origin seen for first time

New observations hint at causes of powerful jets

Double quasar shines brightly

The pair are close to merging into a single giant black hole

One step forward for Artemis...

The Moon mission’s latest triumph has been followed by a potential new setback

Dark skies champion Bob Mizon passes away

Dark-sky campaigner Bob Mizon, who spent many years fighting to protect the night from light pollution, passed away on 19 April.

Fighting for the dark side

Battles over a neighbour's floodlight led Stephen Kirkman to propose a new law

INSIDE THE SKY AT NIGHT

On last month's episode of The Sky at Night, Mary McIntyre explained how basic home CCTV cameras can play a big part in meteor science

Build your own EQ camera mount

This month's project is a manual equatorial mount that is enjoyable to use and helps to develop your knowledge of the night sky.

Solstices and equinoxes

Katrin Raynor explains how we get our seasons from Earth's orbit around the Sun

Fuss-free tools to process your DSLR astro images

Using freeware to stack, extract the background, calibrate colour and more

IS THE UNIVERSE DUE ANOTHER BIG BANG?

New theories and observations are shedding fresh light on the very beginnings of the cosmos, and the formation of the first stars and galaxies. But they're also revealing new and unexpected mysteries

Record the motion of NLCs

Capture the movement, structure and colours of summer's night-shining clouds

Our DISAPPEARING dark skies

Shaoni Bhattacharya looks at what is - and isn't - being done to help ensure everyone can see the stars

Noctilucent clouds on the rise

Night-shining clouds have fascinated skywatchers for almost 140 years. Rob Banino finds out what they tell us about our changing atmosphere

The FIRST WOMEN of space

Ezzy Pearson reveals how Valentina Tereshkova and Sally Ride blazed the trail for womankind

Unistellar eVscope eQuinox 2

Powerful, light pollution-busting smart scope for painless one-click imaging

INSTANT EXPERT HOW ARE COMETS CLASSIFIED?

There are more than 5,000 known 'dirty snowballs' knocking about the Solar System, all of which fit into a selection of categories

The brightest radiation flash on record

Gamma-ray burst declared a 1-in-10,000-year event

MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE WHAT CAUSES THE SPOKES IN SATURN'S RINGS?

Smudges around the gas giant have begun to appear again. Scientists have plenty of time to study them, but will they finally work out what's happening?

What happened BEFORE the Big Bang?

Govert Schilling answers your questions on cosmology’s most confusing concepts

Who invented the southern constellations?

Ian Ridpath uncovers how it took 150 years of exploration to fill the skies of the Southern Hemisphere with 26 new constellations.

FOCUS ON RELATIVISTIC JETS BUBBLING IN THE TEACUP GALAXY

Even low-power jets can help shape a galaxy, it just depends where they're headed

QHYCCD QHY5111462C colour camera

Impressively premium sensor sophistication in a pocket-sized package

FUTURE TECH SPACE FARMING

Future astronauts will need to grow their own plants in artificial environments if they are to survive missions far from Earth

Q&A WITH A GALAXY HUNTER

Researchers have been shocked to discover 'Universe breakers' in JWST images, massive galaxies that existed way before current theories predicted

Sneezes and wheezes of the Butterfly

New imagery shows the nebula puffing 'like a fire-breathing dragon'

Super-Earths wreak havoc

Simulations show the common planet type would cause chaos in our Solar System

JUICE begins its journey

The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) from the European Space Agency is on its way, following a successful launch at 12:14 UTC on 14 April from French Guiana.

ROLLS-ROYCE ON THE MOON

With the British car manufacturer shooting for the lunar surface, humankind could finally be ready to return by the 2030s

SCANDALS THAT SHOOK SPACE EXPLORATION

Stealing, sabotage and safety concerns - from the silly to the serious, here are some of the wrongdoings that rocked the world of space