In slightly delayed news, I’m delighted to report that I successfully passed my short course in astronomy with Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU) a few months back!

I completed the ‘Planets of the Solar System’ course in May with an overall mark of 85%.

The five-month course covered the formation of the solar system and the interiors, surfaces and atmospheres of the planets and their moons. It was a useful introduction not only to our solar system, but also to geoscience, including plate tectonics, the carbon cycle and atmospheric circulation.

If you’re an amateur astronomer or simply curious about our universe, the Astrophysics Research Institute at LJMU offers a range of distance learning courses for people with a non-specialist background. Find out more at www.astronomy.ac.uk