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Neptune is the 8th planet from the sun. On average Neptune is 2.793 billion miles from the Sun. At this distance it takes light from the Sun about 249 minutes to reach Neptune.

Today Mars will be at its closest to Earth. Earth and Mars will be roughly 35 million miles apart. If you have a telescope tonight would be a good night to look at Mars.

The moon is covered in “lunar swirls”, which are light colored swirl features related to magnetic anomalies. The largest swirl is Reiner Gamma, which is located in Oceanus Procellarum and can be seen with a backyard telescope.

We are able to detect radiation left over from the Big Bang, known as the Cosmic Microwave Background. This radiation began travelling towards us approximately 13 billion years ago.

The constellation Libra the Scales used to be considered part of Scorpius the Scorpion. In fact, the brightest star in Libra is called Zubeneschamali, which means “the northern claw” in Arabic.

Tonight Mars will be at opposition making it the ideal time to observe Mars through a telescope. Mars oppositions occur every 26 months and this year’s will be the best for 15 years.

The oldest planet ever identified, sometimes called the Genesis Planet, is thought to be approximately 12.7 billion years old and is located in the constellation of Scorpius. The planet has a mass approximately 2.5 times larger than Jupiter.

Uranus is known as an ice giant planet. Much of the mass of ice giants is a hot, dense fluid of icy material such as ammonia, water and methane. This all sits above a rocky core.