George's Random Astronomical Object

18/08/2025

Podcast episode 156 about the variable star Z Ursae Minoris is online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0156.html . Here is an artistic depiction of the star surrounded by a haze of dust (credit: ESO).

04/08/2025

Podcast episode 155 about the spiral galaxy M101 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0155.html . Here is an ultraviolet / infrared image of the galaxy that I made a few years ago based on data that I've used in my research.

22/07/2025

Podcast episode 154 featuring the complex binary star system A 0535+26 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0154.html . I don't have a good schematical picture of what this system looks like in detail, so here's an image of the star system from the 2MASS survey.

07/07/2025

Podcast episode 153 about the planetary nebula Hen 2-113 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0153.html . I don't have a good image of the nebula I can share, so I decided to share this image of the constellation Lupus (from Johann Bode's Uranographia; credit: Jacopo Montano) in which the object is located.

25/06/2025

Podcast episode 152 about the quasar PKS 2126-158 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0152.html . Here is an image from the PanSTARRS survey. (It's more interesting than this image makes it look.)

09/06/2025

Podcast episode 151 about the evolved star Beta Ceti is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0151.html . Here is an image from the Digitized Sky Survey. (It's hard to find a better creative commons image.)

01/05/2025

I nearly completely forgot to post that the latest podcast episode of the globular cluster Messier 54 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0149.html . Here is a Hubble Space Telescope image of the cluster (credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA).

14/04/2025

Podcast episode 148 about the Algol-type star system DI Pegasi is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0148.html . Here is an animated gif of what the stars at the center of this system look like (credit: Merikanto).

31/03/2025

Podcast episode 147 about the cluster of galaxies Abell 1142 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0147.html . Here is an image from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

17/03/2025

Podcast episode 146 about the peculiar supernova SN 2002cx is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0146.html . Here is an image of what the system may have looked like before the explosion (credit: Christine Pulliam (CfA)).

Also, if anyone was having download issues related to security certificates, those have hopefully been fixed.

03/03/2025

George's Random Astronomical Object podcast episode 145 about the double neutron star system PSR J1518+4904 is now online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0145.html . Unfortunately, I don't have a good image to show. I even tried to use AI to generate an image, but that created something where the stars were way to close together.

This episode's object is the star system PSR J1518+4904 located at a distance of 2635 light years (808 pc) in the constellation Boötes [1]. The PSR in this star system's name indicates that it contains a pulsar, which is a rapidly rotating neutron star that was once the core of a very large hydroge...

17/02/2025

Podcast episode 144 of George's Random Astronomical Object, which features the open cluster NGC 6253, is online at https://www.randomastronomicalobject.com/object0144.html . Here is an image from Wikimedia (credit: Legacy Surveys / D.Lang (Perimeter Institute) & Meli thev), which is one of the very few creative commons images on the internet.