Author Archives: Alex R. Howe

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About Alex R. Howe

I'm a full-time astrophysicist and a part-time science fiction writer.

Trading stars

Posted on October 6, 2012 by Alex R. Howe

Astronomers have discovered a handful of planets orbiting the collapsed stars known as pulsars. Almost all of these confirmed or purported pulsar planets are small, only a few times the mass of Earth, and are thought to have formed out … Continue reading →

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Planets on the move

Posted on October 1, 2012 by Alex R. Howe

It was easy to detect planets around pulsars because of their incredibly steady rotation period, but that didn’t work for normal stars, like the Sun, and the astrometric method of watching a star’s position on the sky was not sensitive … Continue reading →

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Book review: Existence by David Brin

Posted on September 29, 2012 by Alex R. Howe

Science fiction author David Brin, perhaps best known for his novels, Startide Rising, and The Postman, delivers a cornucopia of big ideas in his latest epic, Existence, published by Tor Books. The story begins sometime around 2050, when astronaut Gerald … Continue reading →

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Comet watch

Posted on September 26, 2012 by Alex R. Howe

This is Comet C/2012 S1 (ISON), currently out past the orbit of Jupiter. Believe it or not, all of those letters and numbers actually mean something. The C/ means that it is a long-period comet, originating in the very distant … Continue reading →

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The weirdest planets

Posted on September 23, 2012 by Alex R. Howe

At this writing, 838 planets outside our Solar System—exoplanets—have been discovered, with thousands more possible planets waiting to be investigated. Yet the study of exoplanets is one of the youngest fields in astronomy and in all of science. In fact, … Continue reading →

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Welcome to my world

Posted on September 23, 2012 by Alex R. Howe

I’m a full-time astrophysics graduate student, a part-time science fiction writer, and now a blogger. In my day job, I study everything from planets to clusters of galaxies, but when I’m not probing the mysteries of the cosmos or imagining … Continue reading →

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