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Sky Candy in Context

Charlie Martin | 12:00 PM on December 12, 2025
Photo by NASA Hubble Space Telescope on Unsplash

Just relax, I got this.

I spent most of the week fussing with T-Mobile (TL;DR: when they tell you "on us," they mean "after you upgrade your account and pay $300 for a down payment. Oh, you don't want that? No problem, we'll break our own systems.") So I decided, let's just take it easy this week.

This is an APOD picture. It's real. Honest.

So is this one. I know I've done pictures like this before, but it's cool.

This one's not real, don't sweat it.

How it's done (…done done).

It's not the camera, it's the photographer.

Answer: really old. Well, 106. Not that old.

One of the most important tools in astronomy is spectroscopy. Here's a little bit about him.

Joseph von Fraunhofer (1787–1826) was a German physicist and optical engineer who rose from humble beginnings as an apprentice glassmaker to become one of the most important figures in 19th-century science. Largely self-taught after surviving a workshop collapse that brought him to the attention of Bavarian royalty, he perfected the production of high-quality optical glass and developed the spectroscope in 1814. By passing sunlight through a prism and viewing it through a telescope, Fraunhofer discovered and meticulously mapped over 570 dark absorption lines in the solar spectrum—lines now known as Fraunhofer lines. These lines, caused by elements in the Sun’s atmosphere absorbing specific wavelengths, laid the foundation for astrophysics and spectroscopy. His precision instruments and discoveries enabled later scientists, including Kirchhoff, Bunsen, and Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin, to decode the chemical composition of stars, transforming our understanding of the universe. Despite dying of tuberculosis at only 39, Fraunhofer’s work remains a cornerstone of modern astronomy.

Making galaxies while you wait.

Raw materials.

Not quite the solstice, but getting close. Everyone knows the Summer Solstice, when the sunrise aligns with Stonehenge. Not as many realize that at the Winder Solstice, it's the sunset that aligns. Grok has lots of details (including that it's usually really cold and wet), but —

In short: Stonehenge at winter solstice is the moment the ancient builders apparently wanted to mark the death and rebirth of the sun, and today it remains one of the most atmospheric and spiritually significant events at the site.

So that does it for this week. Not much Sturm und Drang, which, frankly, is what I needed.

Related: Sky Candy: To Infinity and Beyond

As always, I love comments, and come back for what will inevitably be a Christmas edition next Friday.

Charlie Martin

Charlie Martin writes on science, health, culture, and technology for PJ Media. For media inquiries, please contact [email protected]

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