Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 25/09/2026Ouch!! arxiv.org/abs/2609.28612arxiv.orgThe shell around VY Canis Majoris in SPHEREx is likely an artifactRecently, the presence of a large shell around the bright hypergiant star VY Canis Majoris was reported in images from the SPHEREx mission. We report similar shells around other bright stars at simila... 170
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 23/09/2026Exercise for the reader. How do you revise a JWST proposal when in cycle 4 you got top quintile (but no time), so you just tried again in cycle 5 but got bottom quintile? 241
Reposted by Tod LauerMelina Thévenot🏳️⚧️ @melina-iras07572.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Proper Motion of stars in the galactic center with #JWST NIRCam F182M. programs: 1306, 4515 www.stsci.edu/jwst-program... 412343
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 14/09/2026And now, it's time to play "Find the Astronomer!" You can start by naming the conference. I'm in the photo, but with a full head of hair and not wearing glasses, so it was a while ago. 230
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 05/09/2026An Earth-mass BH has the size of this black marble. You couldn't get much closer than 100km without being ripped apart by tidal forces. It swallows a Rose Bowl of water in 1s to generate 0.1 solar luminosity (Eddington). 6565
Reposted by Tod LauerJen , the MT liberal bird lady @liberal-jen.bsky.social · 03/09/2026A murmuration of starlings above Sardinia, Italy. One of my favorite natural phenomena. 22280651665
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 26/08/2026Next up - demolition of the Kennedy Center. www.nytimes.com/2026/08/25/a...nytimes.comTrump Lawyers Warn That Kennedy Center Might Need Demolition if Not Fixed (Gift Article)In a court filing about honoring President Trump on the facade, the administration said that without a proper renovation the building might need to be “taken down.” 010
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 25/08/2026The Roman Space Telescope is due to launch this coming Sunday. In this wonderful graphic, Chris Hirata has captured the complex and tortured 26 years of history that it took to get to this mission. My part was to PI the Dark Energy Space Telescope (Destiny) study, and to serve on random committees. 0104
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 19/08/2026I discovered 24 objects in Rubin #SpaceSurveyors 🪨 - 2 ☄️ - 1 🌌 - 6 ⭐ - 12 💥 - 3 spacesurveyors.appspacesurveyors.appSpace SurveyorsSpace Surveyors game 050
Reposted by Tod LauerNSF–DOE Rubin Observatory @rubinobservatory.org · 18/08/2026Think you’ve got what it takes to survey the sky? Control NSF–DOE Rubin Observatory's telescope and try to detect the most objects with our interactive, 60s game: Space Surveyors! 🎮 How many can you catch before the sun rises? Drop your score below👇 spacesurveyors.app 0266
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 14/08/2026www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...theguardian.comTrump orders Pentagon to redesign US aircraft carrier to use steam catapults to launch jetsPresident has suggested steam catapults every year since 2017, saying digital systems are too ‘complicated’ 100
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 03/08/2026Had a visit in our den tonight from a giant hairy desert scorpion.This one was about the size of my palm. Ironically its not that venomous, unlike the vastly smaller bark scorpion, but your brain doesn’t process it that way. We showed it the door. 040
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 30/07/2026So what would be on a second Bingo card? I might so with "Milky Way Supernova," or "Erupting Main Belt Asteroids," as a couple of candidates. 030
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 30/07/2026This is so wonderful! The annual Rubin Community Workshop is going on this week, and so this has made a big splash. 2144
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 27/07/2026www.nytimes.com/2026/07/21/a...nytimes.comPlas Johnson, Saxophonist Behind ‘The Pink Panther,’ Dies at 94 (Gift Article)His recording for the theme song, written by Henry Mancini, included a solo improvised in the studio. He also backed Frank Sinatra and Barbra Streisand. 030
Reposted by Tod LauerPaul Byrne @theplanetaryguy.com · 24/07/2026This is really, really bad. This is one of the complexes we use to communicate with spacecraft in deep space. The effects of climate change are extending out into the Solar System. 421785
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 23/07/2026This! www.science.org/content/blog...science.orgThe Assault On Science Funding Continues 021
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 21/07/2026Take a little time today to honor Plas Johnson, who just passed away at age 94. Don't know the name? But you've certainly heard him play the saxophone. If not listen to the attached video - that's him. www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyZi...youtube.comThe Pink Panther ThemeYouTube video by Henry Mancini - Topic 010
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 19/07/2026A great day for signs around Tucson, starting with finally getting an answer to an old question: 060
Reposted by Tod LauerDaniel Pomarède @pomarede.bsky.social · 10/07/2026NASA’s Dragonfly Clears Key Tests as Titan Rotorcraft Takes Shape Dragonfly is starting to look less like a collection of spacecraft parts and more like the rotorcraft that will fly across the surface of Titan, Saturn’s hazy moon. science.nasa.gov/blogs/dragon... #Dragonfly 🧪🔭science.nasa.govNASA’s Dragonfly Clears Key Tests as Titan Rotorcraft Takes Shape - NASA ScienceNASA’s Dragonfly is starting to look less like a collection of spacecraft parts and more like the rotorcraft that will fly across the surface of Titan, 02713
Reposted by Tod LauerLee Billings @leebillings.bsky.social · 09/07/2026Now on @sciam.bsky.social: A recent paper in the high-profile journal Nature claimed what would've been an epochal revision to our understanding of the cosmos. Instead, independent follow-up work suggests the claim is wrong via a subtle-but-basic mistake. www.scientificamerican.com/article/phys...scientificamerican.comPhysicist says splashy new cosmology study made ‘elemental’ mistakeA recent study in the journal Nature carries cosmos-quaking implications for our understanding of the universe—except a new preprint says that it’s wrong 27016
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 09/07/2026OK, it's one thing to see a science abstract that is far beyond my expertise, but not an abstract in astrophysics that doesn't even seem to be about any science. And who would read this abstract and say, "Oh, yeah! I'm really gonna have to drop what I'm doing and read this one!" 100
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 30/06/2026I haven't seen any video of the Rubin control during the full-power activation of the LSST, but I suspect that it was something like this: www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-cO...youtube.comStar Trek: The Motion Picture - 'Warp 7' scene (fan-edit with slightly unused score)YouTube video by Donny P with a Y: That Power Rangers Guy⚡ 094
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 30/06/2026Open our carport door to go get the paper and hear a loud rattle from this guy only five feet away. 060
Reposted by Tod LauerTits McGee @scientits.bsky.social · 28/06/2026‘Say yes and never do it’ Mel Brooks knew how to deal with the studios 141180995573
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 28/06/2026A great wonderful tribute to Mel Brooks: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...nytimes.com100 Reasons to Love Mel Brooks on His 100th Birthday (Gift Article)Here are 100 reasons to love the comedy writer, director and star who’s celebrating a milestone on Sunday and who’s changed our culture in surprising ways. 182
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 28/06/2026Mel Brooks turned 100 today! I can't think of a better tribute than this scene from Blazing Saddles. When I saw it in the mid-70s, part of my brain refused to believe it was seeing what it was seeing, while the other part was laughing so hard that I nearly blacked out www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPIP...youtube.comThe Campfire - Blazing Saddles (5/10) Movie CLIP (1974) HDYouTube video by Movieclips 070
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 25/06/2026Pretty thin night on arXiv just now, or at least the astro-ph part: 150
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 24/06/2026What did the early Universe *sound* like. With nice work by Stephane Pigeon who runs mynoise.net, we now have this nice "sonification" of the acoustic noise at the time of recombination. Have a listen! (and use headphone with the "wide" stereo setting. mynoise.net/NoiseMachine...mynoise.netSound Horizon — A Sonification of the Early UniverseListen to the echoes of the early Universe. Explore a sonification of Planck satellite data and the primordial acoustic peaks frozen in the Cosmic Microwave Background. 2123
Reposted by Tod LauerEdwin Heathcote @edwinheathcote.bsky.social · 23/06/2026I saw this referred to as the Strait of Warm Ooze. Very good. 8666661357
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 22/06/2026And with the start of summer, one of my favorite versions of my favorite song: www.youtube.com/watch?v=C08W...youtube.comSummertime - Jazz piano 🎹YouTube video by PianistaItaliano 020
Reposted by Tod LauerRiding With Robots @ridingrobots.bsky.social · 21/06/2026My grandfather was a baker. Late in life he went to college. These are from his astronomy class notes, 1962. 810217
Reposted by Tod LauerPhil Lewis @phillewis.bsky.social · 18/06/2026After spending $14 million in taxpayer funds, Trump's renovations to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool are peeling off and floating to the surfacehuffpost.comTrump's $14M Reflecting Pool Paint Job Is Now Peeling Off And Floating To The SurfaceJust in time for America's birthday. 2353021901
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 17/06/2026Just a little autocorrect mayhem to enliven the day. Trying to text a collaborator about large galaxies without central cores as "coreless," but it was sent as "careless," so I sent an addendum to correct that, which was sent as "cordless." So what would careless or cordless galaxies be exactly? 461
Reposted by Tod LauerA Man Called Keith @angryduck78.bsky.social · 05/06/2026This is important. 15563281468
Tod Lauer @todlauer.bsky.social · 28/05/2026A decade ago, I put together a collection of HST images with trails that I discovered while working on the M31 PHAT survey. They were all over the place even back then. It's a fantasy that going to space solves the problem, unless we now go all the way to L2. 021