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"If you send in a sample of something and a form, they'll run it through their scanning electron microscope for free, and post the images online. Their site explaining the process outlines the 5 steps to make it happen: find a sample, fill out a form, send them to ASPEX, wait for them to scan it (usually about 2 weeks), and look at it online."

Newly discovered Alcor B orbits its larger sibling and was caught in the act with an innovative technique called "common parallactic motion" by members of Project 1640, an international collaborative team that includes astrophysicists at the American Museum of Natural History, the University of Cambridge's Institute of Astronomy, the California Institute of Technology, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

"Most massive galaxies, including our own Milky Way, are thought to harbour supermassive black holes at their centres. But these newly discovered black holes are much bigger than would be predicted by extrapolating from observations from their host galaxies. This suggests that the factors influencing the growth of the largest galaxies and their black holes differ from those influencing smaller galaxies. The findings come from observations of two nearby galaxies: NGC 3842 and NGC 4889."

COSMOS is a literary science magazine with a global following. Australia's #1 science media brand, it reaches 400,000 people every month via a print magazine, a daily online news website and a weekly e-newsletter. Our COSMOS Teacher's Notes reach 65% of Australian high schools, and we produce a wide range of quality editorial products (such as websites, booklets, posters and DVDs) for a range of clients. COSMOS internationally respected for its literary writing, excellence in design and engaging breadth of content. It's the winner of 44 awards, including the Magazine of the Year trophy in both 2009 and 2006, and twice Editor of the Year, at the annual Publishers Australia Excellence Awards. COSMOS has also won the American Institute of Physics Science Writing Award, the Reuters/IUCN Award for Excellence in Environmental Journalism, the City of Sydney Lord Mayor's Sustainability Award and an Earth Journalism Award.

"Harps employs an indirect method of detection that infers the existence of orbiting planets from the way their gravity makes a parent star appear to twitch in its motion across the sky. "Our new observations with Harps mean that about 40% of all red dwarf stars have a super-Earth orbiting in the habitable zone where liquid water can exist on the surface of the planet," said team leader Xavier Bonfils from the Observatoire des Sciences de l'Univers de Grenoble, France. "Because red dwarfs are so common - there are about 160 billion of them in the Milky Way - this leads us to the astonishing result that there are tens of billions of these planets in our galaxy alone.""

"ESA's Planck mission has delivered its first all-sky image. It not only provides new insight into the way stars and galaxies form but also tells us how the Universe itself came to life after the Big Bang."

Bill Nye and the Discovery Channel give you the greatest discoveries in science. In this episode, Nye covers Einstein's theory of general relativity, demonstrates how Hubble determined that the universe is expanding, and discusses the 20th-century advancements that help us understand gamma ray bursts, black holes, pulsars, and quasars. Highlights include Edmond Halley, whose discovery of comets orbiting the sun proved that gravity works in space, and Alexander and Caroline Herschel, whose map of the sky brought new understanding of the universe.

The Stages of collapse of a star, neutron star formation and black hole formation.

We will teach you to identify 3 constellations, 2 stars, and 1 planet. Betelgeuse will also teach you how to navigate at night using the stars.

The lifecycle of a G-type star, like the Sun. All original videos are copyrighted to NASA, NASA JPL/Caltech, and ESA.

Saturn's tiny, icy moon Enceladus has recently been visited by NASA's Cassini orbiter on several very close approaches - once coming within a mere 25 kilometers (15 miles) of the surface. Scientists are learning a great deal about this curious little moon. Only about 500 kilometers wide (310 miles), it is very active, emitting internal heat, churning its surface, and - through cryovolcanism - ejecting masses of microscopic ice particles into Saturnian orbit.

"One transport truck-sized asteroid passed the Earth Wednesday morning and another will soar by in the afternoon, with both far closer to the planet than the moon. There is no danger of the Earth being hit and both should be visible with moderate-sized amateur telescopes, NASA reported."

"View of the solar system showing the locations of all the asteroids starting in 1980, as asteroids are discovered they are added to the map and highlighted white so you can pick out the new ones. The final colour of an asteroids indicates how closely it comes to the inner solar system. Earth Crossers are Red Earth Approachers (Perihelion less than 1.3AU) are Yellow All Others are Green Notice now the pattern of discovery follows the Earth around its orbit, most discoveries are made in the region directly opposite the Sun. You'll also notice some clusters of discoveries on the line between Earth and Jupiter, these are the result of surveys looking for Jovian moons. Similar clusters of discoveries can be tied to the other outer planets, but those are not visible in this video. As the video moves into the mid 1990's we see much higher discovery rates as automated sky scanning systems come online. Most of the surveys are imaging the sky directly opposite the sun and you'll see a region of high discovery rates aligned in this manner. At the beginning of 2010 a new discovery pattern becomes evident, with discovery zones in a line perpendicular to the Sun-Earth vector. These new observations are the result of the WISE (Widefield Infrared Survey Explorer) which is a space mission that's tasked with imaging the entire sky in infrared wavelengths. Currently we have observed over half a million minor planets, and the discovery rates snow no sign that we're running out of undiscovered objects. Orbital elements were taken from the 'astorb.dat' data created by Ted Bowell and associates at http://www.naic.edu/~nolan/astorb.html"

Canadian author Watts (Starfish) explores the nature of consciousness in this stimulating hard SF novel, which combines riveting action with a fascinating alien environment. In the late 21st century, when something alien is discovered beyond the edge of the solar system, the spaceship Theseus sets out to make contact. Led by an enigmatic AI and a genetically engineered vampire, the crew includes a biologist who's more machine than human, a linguist with surgically induced multiple personality disorder, a professional soldier who's a pacifist, and Siri Keeton, a man with only half a brain. Keeton is virtually incapable of empathy, but he has a savant's ability to model and predict the actions of others without understanding them. Once the Theseus arrives at the gigantic and hideously dangerous alien artifact (which has tellingly self-named itself Rorschach), the crew must deal with beings who speak English fluently but who may, paradoxically, not even be sentient, at least as we understand the term. Watts puts a terrifying and original spin on the familiar alien contact story. (Oct.)\nCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Amateur solar photography

Several decades ago scientists discovered that the Moon, long thought to have no atmosphere, actually does have an extremely thin exosphere.

European Space Agency's Space Telescope Herschel

"The Symphony of Science is a musical project headed by John Boswell designed to deliver scientific knowledge and philosophy in musical form. Here you can watch music videos, download songs, read lyrics and find links relating to the messages conveyed by the music."

Curious about planets on other stars?

"The stereo movie has been adapted to human binocular vision. The movie does not represent what you would actually see with your two eyes if you visited a real black hole. In reality, the curved spacetime would distort wavefronts of light away from spherical, confusing your binocular perception. The conflicting visual cues might make you feel queasy. But the failure of binocular vision is merely a limitation of beings who have evolved in flat spacetime. Trinocular vision would work fine."