If you look due south around 10.30pm on Thursday 27th you can see the brightest star in the night sky, Sirius - the name being derived from the Greek word for "glowing".  It is the alpha star in the constellation of Canis Major.  Stars in a constellation are allocated letters of the Greek alphabet to identify them.  Particularly significant stars are also given names. 

Sirius is one of our closest neighbours outside the Solar System and is only 8.6 light years away from us.  The star is gradually moving closer to us and its brightness is expected to increase slightly over the next 60,000 years.

A little below Sirius is the open cluster of stars, identified by Charles Messier and given the designation M41.  The cluster contains around 100 stars including several red giants.  It has a magnitude of around +6.3 so cannot be seen with the naked eye, but a pair of binoculars will do fine.  M41 is 2300 light years away from us and is estimated to be around 190 million years old.  Further estimates give it a life expectancy of about 500 million years before it disintegrates, so there is plenty of time to observe it!

Alternatively, if you are up early around 6am on Friday 28th and look towards the south east, there will be a 21%-lit crescent Moon, with Venus to the left of it.  The Sun terminator, the border between light and dark on the Lunar surface, will be illuminating the crater Aristarchus which is the brightest feature on the nearside face of the Moon.

This pair of open clusters was first catalogued as a "patch of light" back in 130BC.  They are relatively young, only about 12 million years old and are gradually moving towards us at a speed of approximately 30km/s.

With a magnitude of around +3.8, it will be best to use binoculars or a small telescope.  On Monday 17th there is a full Moon, so that will create some light pollution.

While you are looking in that direction, take a moment to identify the star Algol in Perseus.  Algol, also known as the "Demon Star", is actually a three-star system and as the stars pass in front of each other, they cause eclipses.  This means that the overall magnitude of +2.2 drops to +3.4 every few days when viewed from Earth.

We'll start next week with an opportunity to observe another of the lunar "clair-obscur" visual effects.  This time it's the turn of the "Jewelled Handle" which is caused by the lunar dawn illuminating the peaks of the Jura Mountains.  It occurs during the evening of Wednesday 12th and is best viewed with binoculars or a small telescope. 

If you fancy a bit of a challenge, on Thursday 13th you could have a go a spotting the minor planet 7 Iris which will be at magnitude +7.7.  You will need those binoculars or a telescope again because it is a bit too faint to be seen with the naked eye.

7 Iris will be located roughly halfway between the stars Pollux in the constellation of Gemini and Procyon in Canis Minor.  Around 7pm on 13th, these constellations will be towards the east, to the left of Orion.

7 Iris is one of the larger objects in the main asteroid belt located between Mars and Jupiter.  It is the 4th brightest object in the asteroid belt due to its shiny surface and was first discovered by astronomer J R Hind in 1847.   Hind discovered and named several asteroids, including one called 12 Victoria which caused quite a controversy as at the time, asteroids were not supposed to be named after living persons, but Queen Victoria was still on the throne!

The evening of Monday 3rd into the morning of Tuesday 4th sees the peak of the Quadrantids meteor shower, so named because the radiant point where the meteors appear to originate from is near the constellation of Quadrans Muralis. 

Hang on......there is no constellation called that!  Well there used to be!  The constellation was named by the French astronomer Jerome Lalande back in 1795.  Over the years, the number of stars was reduced so that it didn't clash and cause confusion with the constellations of Bootes and Draco.  Then in 1922 the International Astronomical Union deleted Quadrans from its list of 88 officially recognised constellations.

So let's start again........the radiant point is located to the left of the constellation Bootes, slightly down and  left from the tail of Ursa Major. 

At midnight, you will need to be looking towards the north east.

The Quadrantids is famous for producing a high number of bright meteors and this year it coincides with an almost New Moon, so there will be minimal light pollution.

I should mention a very exciting piece of space news that took place over the Christmas holidays - the successful launch of the James Webb Space Telescope that is intended to be the replacement for Hubble.  It left Earth on Christmas Day and is currently heading towards its destination a million miles away from us - no cloud up there!