Yeah, what is that thing, anyway?neufer wrote: I know. And Boötes doesn't look all that much like a cat either.
My mother's nickname was Boots. I spent a good part of today going through stuff at her house and came across an August 30, 1980 Science News; the cover reads Ground-based Astronomy's Future: Uphill?, and the related article's title is Will Astronomy Go into Orbit?, which starts:
Also in today's tonnage was a clipping from the March 5, 1987 Washington Post: Supernova Stabilizes Puzzlingly: Birth of Black Hole Seen as Possibility."Astronomy has been very exciting in the last two decades," Joseph Wampler of the Lick Observatory reminded the recent meeting in Tucson of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. "If you think the '60s and '70s were exciting, you ain't seen nothing yet."
The supernova discovered Feb. 24, the closest seen from Earth in 383 years, has stabilized mysteriously in the last few days and is not increasing in brightness as fast as predicted, astronomers at several Southern Hemisphere observatories have reported.
As a result, astronomers are not sure whether the explosion of the dying star has peaked and will fade or wil flare to even greater brilliance.
Astronomers also say that if the star is big enough, they could be witnessing the birth of a black hole.