Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543) would bring us from a geocentric universe to the heliocentric one, offering a very familiar, if incomplete, picture of our solar system.

But it is the diagram that he draws at the beginning of the book that captures in a simple image his revolutionary new idea: it is the Sun that is at the centre of the Solar System, not the Earth.

An accidental discovery in an astronomy show offers researchers a new clue about the mysterious Oort Cloud, a large expanse of icy bodies revolving around the sun.

An accidental discovery in an astronomy show offers researchers a new clue about the mysterious Oort Cloud, a large expanse of icy bodies revolving around the sun.