Howdy Star Gazers, and welcome to this episode
of Star Trails. I'm Drew, and I'll be your guide
to the night sky for the week starting March
the 23rd through the 29th. This week we have
a waning crescent moon, a lineup of bright planets,
and an upcoming partial solar eclipse, though
it won't be visible from many places. We'll tour
through the spring constellations Virgo and Cancer,
and we'll examine how the first image of a black
hole was created using a planet -sized telescope.
So, grab a comfortable spot under the night sky
and let's get started. The moon starts this week
in its waning crescent phase, meaning it's getting
smaller each night as it approaches the new moon
on March 29th. If you're up before dawn, look
for a thin sliver of moonlight in the eastern
sky, especially earlier in the week. With less
moonlight washing out the sky, this is the perfect
time to catch a glimpse of faint galaxies, nebula,
and star clusters. On March 29th, the new moon
means the moon will be completely invisible,
offering an ideal night for stargazing. Venus,
now the morning star, is beginning to rise in
the pre -dawn eastern sky. If you're an early
riser, watch for Venus low on the horizon just
before sunrise. Mars will be visible after sunset,
hanging in the sky for more than nine hours into
the late evening. With its reddish hue, it's
easy to spot in Gemini, near the twin stars Castor
and Pollux. Jupiter is still one of the brightest
objects in the night sky, best seen just after
sunset. It's fairly high in the western sky,
hanging out in Taurus. As we look towards April,
let's take a moment to spotlight two constellations
that signal the arrival of spring, Virgo and
Cancer. Both have unique characteristics and
house some stunning deep sky objects that are
worth exploring. Virgo, the maiden of the skies,
is one of the largest constellations and plays
a major role in spring stargazing. It's also
one of the 12 zodiac constellations and is often
associated with harvest and fertility myths across
different cultures. Virgo is best identified
by its brightest star, Spica, a brilliant blue
-white star that sits about 260 light years away
from Earth. Spica is a binary star system, two
stars locked in a close dance around each other.
To locate Virgo, draw an imaginary arc from the
handle of the Big Dipper to Arcturus in Boötes,
and then extend it downward to Spica. This is
the famous stargazing guide, arc to Arcturus,
then speed on to Spica. Virgo is home to some
of the richest galaxy fields in the night sky.
Some of the most famous objects include the Virgo
Cluster of Galaxies. This enormous collection
of galaxies is about 50 million light years away
and can be found between Leo and Virgo. The cluster
contains more than 1 ,300 spiral, elliptical,
and irregular galaxies, many of which can be
seen with a medium -sized telescope. Messier
87 is one of the brightest galaxies in the Virgo
cluster. M87 is a giant elliptical galaxy and
is famous for being the home of the first black
hole ever imaged back in 2019. We'll talk about
how that image was created in the second half
of the show. If you have a telescope, you might
just catch a glimpse of its faint glowing core.
The Sombrero Galaxy M104 is an edge -on spiral
galaxy that looks like a Sombrero hat, with a
bright central bulge and a dust lane cutting
across it. Located just outside the Virgo cluster,
M104 is 28 million light -years away, and shines
at a magnitude of 8, making it a great target
for small telescopes. Now let's shift to a constellation
that doesn't always get as much love, Cancer
the Crab. Cancer is one of the faintest zodiac
constellations, but it holds some amazing deep
sky objects. Cancer sits between Gemini and Leo.
Since it lacks bright stars, the best way to
locate it is by looking between the bright twin
stars of Castor and Pollux, and the star Regulus
in Leo. Once you find this faint region, you're
looking at Cancer. Cancer is home to one of the
best open star clusters in the entire night sky,
the Beehive cluster M44. This swarm of stars
is one of the brightest and closest open star
clusters to Earth, just 577 light -years away.
It contains more than a thousand stars, many
of which are similar to our Sun, making it one
of the most rewarding sites for backyard astronomers.
In dark skies, it's visible to the naked eye,
appearing as a hazy patch. A pair of binoculars
will reveal dozens of bright stars swarming together,
just like bees in a hive. Telescope owners may
want to chase down M67, one of the oldest open
clusters. Perhaps even more intriguing than the
beehive cluster, M67 is estimated to be 4 billion
years old, meaning some of its stars are nearly
as old as our Sun. It contains around 500 stars
and lies about 2 ,700 light years away. Astronomers
study it to understand how sun -like stars evolve
over time. M67 is visible in binoculars, although
a telescope will reveal more individual stars
packed into its core. A partial sunrise solar
eclipse is happening on March the 29th, but sadly
it's not visible for most of us here in the States.
A partial solar eclipse happens when the Moon
passes between the Earth and the Sun, but they
don't align perfectly. This results in the Moon
covering only a portion of the Sun's disk, taking
a characteristic bite out of the Sun. In the
northeastern United States and eastern Canada,
the eclipse will be visible at sunrise. For example,
in Hartford, Connecticut, the event starts around
6 .38 a .m. Eastern Daylight Time, reaches its
maximum at 6 .41, and concludes by 7 .07 a .m.
The best views in the U .S. will be in northeastern
Maine, where up to 85 % of the sun will be obscured
at sunrise. This eclipse will be observable across
much of Europe during the late morning. In London,
approximately 30 % of the Sun will be obscured
with the event occurring between 10 a .m. and
noon GMT, peaking around 11 a .m. On April 10,
2019, history was made when scientists released
the first -ever image of a black hole, located
in the center of the galaxy M87 in the Virgo
Cluster. This groundbreaking achievement was
the result of an international collaboration
known as the Event Horizon Telescope Project,
a network of radio telescopes around the world
working together to capture an object that by
its very nature, is invisible. A black hole is
a region of space where gravity is so intense
that nothing, not even light, can escape it.
Black holes form when massive stars reach the
end of their life cycles and collapse under their
own gravity. This collapse can result in a stellar
mass black hole, typically a few times the mass
of our sun. or over billions of years grow into
a supermassive black hole, such as that at the
center of a galaxy. Supermassive black holes,
like the one in M87, are millions or even billions
of times the mass of our sun. Scientists believe
they form over time, possibly from the merging
of smaller black holes and the accumulation of
vast amounts of matter. These cosmic giants exert
tremendous gravitational influence, shaping the
orbits of stars and affecting entire galaxies.
One of the defining features of a black hole
is the event horizon, the boundary beyond which
nothing can return. Any matter or light that
crosses this threshold is permanently lost to
the singularity, a point where gravity is thought
to become infinitely strong. Surrounding the
event horizon is an accretion disk, a swirling
superheated ring of gas and dust falling toward
the black hole. This glowing material is what
allows astronomers to detect and study black
holes, even though the black holes themselves
are invisible. The black hole that was imaged
lies at the heart of M87. a giant elliptical
galaxy in the Virgo cluster about 55 million
light -years away from Earth. This black hole
is a monster with a mass of 6 .5 billion times
that of our Sun. It was chosen as the target
of the Event Horizon telescope project because
it's relatively close, cosmically speaking, making
it one of the easiest supermassive black holes
to observe. Also, it has an enormous event horizon,
meaning it would cast a large shadow that could
be detected. It's surrounded by a bright accretion
disk, providing the perfect contrast to capture
the black hole's silhouette. The Event Horizon
Telescope isn't a single telescope, but a network
of eight radio telescopes positioned around the
world, from Chile to Hawaii, the U .S., Spain,
and Antarctica. By linking these telescopes together,
astronomers effectively created a planet -sized
telescope using a technique called very -long
baseline interferometry. The final image, assembled
from petabytes of data, revealed the now famous
fiery ring, a circular glow of superheated gas
surrounding a dark central shadow, which is the
event horizon of the black hole. The image provided
direct evidence that black holes exist and behave
as predicted by Einstein's relativity. It confirmed
that black holes can be imaged and it gave scientists
insight into how matter behaves in extreme gravitational
environments. This image was only the beginning.
The EHT has since produced a similar image of
Sagittarius A, the black hole at the center of
our Milky Way. and continues refining its methods
to uncover even more secrets of the universe.
While you can't see this black hole from your
backyard, you can definitely see M87. And knowing
that a supermassive black hole is right in the
middle of it is a powerful idea to ponder. If
you found this episode helpful, let me know,
and feel free to send in your questions and observations.
The easiest way to do that is by visiting our
website, StarTrails .Show. This is also a great
way to share the show with friends. Until next
time, keep looking up and exploring the night
sky. Clear skies everyone!