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Paul: Yes! To quote from the AAVSO visual observing manual: "Another technique that is strongly recommended for making magnitude estimates of red stars is called the “out-of-focus method.” That is, the eyepiece must be drawn out of focus so far that the stars become visible as colorless disks. ...

There's a pretty cool variable star that needs visual observations: R Aqr (Aquarius). This star is actually a binary pair, separated by about the distance between Saturn and our sun. The two stars started life with somewhat different masses. The more massive one (now called star "B"), reac...

..Pluto's odd orbit. I'm sure there are many theories of how this came to be. Can any of you mention some of them??? Jerry - Thanks for your comments. I'm finding this conversation kind of fun. (The one course in college that I received the lowest final grade on was Dynamical Astrophysics: the stud...

Wikipedia has some interesting information on the stability of the solar system, including Pluto and Neptune, which are currently locked in an orbital resonance that prevents collisions for some time into the future (10-20 million years). Beyond that, we can't predict. By the way, one of the things...

Beautiful, Andy.

As I look across your images, it looks like the diffraction spikes aren't always at the same angle relative to the CCD. Are you able to rotate the camera remotely? Or is that something that requires hands-on adjustment?

- Mark Munkacsy