Posts by

Deborah Byrd

International Space Station over Tenerife

Plus a tajinaste rojo, a strange and very large plant endemic to the island of Tenerife.

Deborah Byrd

June 1, 2016

Watch ISS’s newest module expand

Astronauts in orbit aboard ISS spent more than 7 hours on Saturday filling the new BEAM module with air. Check out this 25-second timelapse.

Deborah Byrd

June 1, 2016

SDO peers into huge coronal hole

A NASA animation from May 17-19, 2016 shows a coronal hole in our sun's hot outer atmosphere, or corona. Should we be scared?

Deborah Byrd

Eleanor Imster

May 31, 2016

Best Mars photos, May 2016

These past weeks have been a fabulous time to view Mars, which swept closest to Earth on May 30. Best photos from the EarthSky community!

Deborah Byrd

May 31, 2016

Four mini-Neptunes orbiting in lock step

For every three orbits of the outermost planet orbiting the star Kepler-223, the second planet orbits four times, the third six and the innermost eight.

Deborah Byrd

May 30, 2016

Supernova erupts in M66

M66 is a galaxy 36 million light-years away in the direction to our constellation Leo. A star exploded there 36 million years ago ... and came into view in Earth's sky this weekend.

Deborah Byrd

May 30, 2016

Life ingredients in Rosetta’s comet

It's "the first unambiguous detection of glycine at a comet" and supports the theory that the building blocks for life came to Earth from outer space.

Deborah Byrd

May 28, 2016

Is dark matter made of black holes?

What if if dark matter consisted of a population of black holes similar to those detected by LIGO last year? A new study analyzes this possibility.

Deborah Byrd

Eleanor Imster

May 28, 2016

Saturn’s south polar vortex

A monstrous vortex sits at Saturn's south pole. It's not just beautiful. It also lets astronomers peer deep into Saturn's dense atmosphere.

Deborah Byrd

Eleanor Imster

May 28, 2016

Cloud-free Africa

The European Space Agency used 7,000 satellite images - acquired from late 2015 through early 2016 - to make this mosaic of Africa.

Deborah Byrd

May 27, 2016

Deborah Byrd

Deborah Byrd (asteroid 3505 Byrd) helps edit EarthSky.org and is a frequent host of EarthSky videos. Deborah created the EarthSky radio series in 1991 and founded EarthSky.org in 1994. Prior to that, she had worked for the University of Texas McDonald Observatory since 1976, and created and produced their Star Date radio series. She has won a galaxy of awards from the broadcasting and science communities, including having an asteroid named in her honor in 1990, a Public Service Award from the National Science Board in 2003, and the Education Prize from the American Astronomical Society in 2020. A science communicator and educator since 1976, Byrd believes in science as a force for good in the world and a vital tool for the 21st century. "Being an EarthSky editor is like hosting a big global party for cool nature-lovers," she says.