#105 - March 2021 Part 1

AWESOME ASTRONOMY

The Discussion:

• Paul becomes the new Vice President of Wycombe Astronomical Society
• Jen gets a date for her PhD viva
• Jen promoting NASA’s Perseverance rover on the BBC
• Get ready for Teentech Live on 5th March
• Emails from listeners highlighting the good and bad in Awesome Astronomy

The News: Rounding up the astronomy news in February, we have:

• The Cygnus X-1 black hole must be much bigger than we thought
• A single neutrino detection reveals a super-supermassive blackhole
• Was the impact that killed the dinosaurs an asteroid or comet?
• Earth’s regular magnetic pole reversals may be catastrophic to life

Main News story: A return to the mythical Planet 9 and a new paper casting further doubt on the evidence in favour of an undiscovered massive object in the outer solar system.

The Sky Guide: This month we’re taking a look at the constellation of Gemini with a guide to its history, how to find it, a couple of deep sky objects and a round-up of the solar system views on offer in March.

Q&A: Wouldn’t it be awesome if there was some sort of collective effort to digitise and share the historic astronomical records held in observatories’ glass plates? From our good friend Tony Horton in the UK.