Inside the October 2015 issue

Making Massive Stars, Imaging Alien Earths & More

As Orion once more enters the night skies of Northern Hemisphere observers, it's a fitting time to ponder the conundrum of massive star formation — astronomers are just starting to piece together how some of the brightest stars in our night sky came to be. But dwarf stars deserve attention too, and they're getting it from exoplanet searchers. Even as next-gen exoplanet-imaging instruments are coming online to image gas giants in nearby systems, astronomers are hard at work developing the next step: technology to image alien Earths around nearby M and K dwarfs. Take your own venture into astro-imaging with the simplest of equipment when you image nightscapes — Alan Dyer has some tips to help you take some beautiful shots (and don't miss his video showing some sample results for time-lapse techniques). Plus, make sure to see some beautiful dawn conjunctions, venture into the Dolphin and the Swan, and try your hand at catching some Draconid meteors.