The Voyager 2 spacecraft made the definitive discovery of the Neptunian rings during its fly-by of Neptune in 1989. It confirmed that occasional occultation events observed before were indeed caused by the arcs within the Adams ring Read more
Neptune is at Opposition on the 11th August, 2011. Neptune is at its closest approach to Earth and this will be the best time to view Neptune this year.
Neptune Completes Its First Circuit Around The Sun Since Its Discovery
These four images of Neptune were taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope during the planet's 16-hour rotation. The snapshots were taken at roughly four-hour intervals, offering a full view of the blue-green planet. Today marks Neptune's first orbit around the Sun since it was discovered nearly 165 years ago. These images were taken to commemorate the event. Read more
Neptune is about to celebrate its first birthday. On 12 July it will be exactly one Neptunian year - or 164.79 Earth years - since its discovery on 24 September 1846. But why do we still know so little about the distant planet? Read more
The blue planet, the farthest out in the Solar System, remains one of Earth's most mysterious neighbours, but scientists now know one thing that they hadn't for the past 165 years: the precise length of its day. Earlier estimates had set that figure at about 16 hours and 6 minutes. But, in a paper in Icarus, Erich Karkoschka, a planetary scientist at the University of Arizona in Tucson, now pegs it at 15 hours, 57 minutes and 59 seconds. Read more
Yes, the heliocentric R.A. is the same on 12th July as on the date of discovery; but Neptune orbits the Solar System barycentre, not the Sun.
These two graphs here and here make this very clear, I think. This is why we should use barycentric longitude, not heliocentric.
The Sun also moves around the Solar System barycentre, and is in a different position this July to where it was in 1846, by 300,000 miles. By taking your coordinates from the Sun, you would be making the same mistake as taking them from Earth (albeit a lot subtler).
Ed ~ Ahh, yes, barycentric longitude would be better
Yes, there is a bit of confusion with the dates. It seems that Neptune will not appear at its exact discovery position in our sky because the Earth will be in a different location in its 365.25-day orbit.
On the evening of July 12 in this month's Colorado sky, Neptune, the second planet to be discovered in historic times, will finally complete only its first 165-year orbit about the sun since its discovery in 1846. Neptune currently rises about midnight and is located in the constellation of Aquarius just inside the Aquarius/Capricornus border. It is visible as a bluish eighth magnitude binocular object. Read more
In this image, the colours and contrasts were modified to emphasize the planet's atmospheric features. The winds in Neptune's atmosphere can reach the speed of sound or more. Neptune's Great Dark Spot stands out as the most prominent feature on the left. Several features, including the fainter Dark Spot 2 and the South Polar Feature, are locked to the planet's rotation, which allowed Karkoschka to precisely determine how long a day lasts on Neptune. (Image: Erich Karkoschka)