WWW.ASTRONOMY.COM 9
A WISPY
TREASURE
This small, faint
galaxy sparkles
with stars.
The irregular galaxy IC 10
doesn’t need stunning spiral
arms to show off. IC 10 is part
of our Local Group of galax-
ies, of which the Andromeda
Galaxy and the Milky Way
are the largest members. And
at only 2.2 million light-years
away, this nearby neighbor is
lighting up with a flurry of star
formation, thanks to its ample
reservoirs of cool hydrogen gas
that collapse to form new suns.
But despite its internal fire-
works, IC 10 is faint, and wasn’t
identified by astronomers until- Even with modern instru-
ments, it is challenging for
astronomers to study because of
its location in our sky, behind
the dust and stars of our own
galaxy. — ALISON KLESMAN
REWRITING HISTORY
A Texas State University
astronomer determined
that on June 5, 1944,
the Moon rose before
sunset and was visible
all night. The finding
corrects an oft-repeated
but erroneous account
that the Moon rose late
the night before the
D-Day invasion.DOUBLE VISION
The European Southern
Observatory’s SPHERE
instrument caught a
stunning glimpse of
the double asteroid
1999 KW 4 on May 25,
2019, when the pair
passed Earth at a mere
14 times the distance
of the Moon.HOT
BYTESSNAPSHOT
QUANTUM GRAVITY
EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE UNIVERSE THIS MONTH
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RECENT ACTIVITY
Researchers found
signs of ammonia —
which can’t last long
on Pluto — in the red-
colored, ditchlike Virgil
Fossae, indicating
cryovolcanoes erupted
there within the last
few million years.