Look Up!

Christmas will feature a full moon this year, for the first time since 1977 and the last time until 2034. Of course, traditionally a slightly different astronomical phenomenon is associated with that date.

Not quite as old are these long-lost glass plate images taken through a telescope built at the tail end of the 19th century. Retired astronomer Holger Pedersen headed down to the basement kitchen of the Niels Bohr Insitute to brew a cup of tea and found more than 300 plates from the earliest days of a telescope at the University of Copenhagen Observatory.

Staffers at the observatory are being surveyed to see what the next move is; the front-runner at this point is to send Pedersen out for pizza to see what he digs up then.