Astronomy blog

This month, make sure you catch Venus while the planet is still bright in the evening sky.

February will be a good month for Moon viewing including a Penumbral Lunar Eclipse. 

January’s highlights include the Quadrantid meteor shower and several planets. (Details given are for London and will vary for other parts of the UK.)

December’s highlights include this year’s final Supermoon and the Geminid meteor shower. (All times given are for London and will vary for other parts of the UK.)

In these podcasts Royal Observatory Greenwich astronomer Radmila asks our visiting astrophysicists and space scientists about their career background, why they became an astrophysicist, why we should care about science and which unsolved mystery keeps them up at night. 

September’s Item of the Month takes a look at a key astronomical work from the 17th century: Giovanni Riccioli’s 1660 publication Almagestum novum (RMG Item ID: PBG0909/1-2).

As well as being objects of beauty, the astrolabe was the instrument favoured for instruction and observation in celestial astronomy for more than a millennium. We hear more from Christopher Parkin, Museum of the History of Science, University of Oxford.