The trophy was presented to the Manchester team by the Astronomer Royal Professor Martin Rees.

BBC: Manchester retains University Challenge crown

Rees is a big-government guy, even if his Astronomer Royal gig doesn't pay.

FORBES: Magazine Article

Astronomer Royal, William Herschel, noticed a correlation between sunspots and the price of wheat in England two centuries ago.

FORBES: Sorry, But With Global Warming It's The Sun, Stupid

Miss it, by gosh, since Sir Martin--he's also Britain's Astronomer Royal--figures our collective odds of survival are now dropping like a shot pheasant.

FORBES: Magazine Article

John Flamsteed became the first Astronomer Royal.

CNN: Sunday,

The first Astronomer Royal, John Flamsteed, compiled the most accurate star catalogue of his day as part of this attempt (though the solution was eventually provided by John Harrison, a clock maker who designed a timepiece that was robust enough to withstand the rigours of sea travel, and was thus able to substitute for the stars in the relevant calculations).

ECONOMIST: Save the Royal Observatory!

Dr Robin Catchpole, senior astronomer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, said the red coloration was a brilliant effect.

BBC: You are in: Sci/Tech

Marek Kukula, Public Astronomer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, said that beyond that, the planet's very existence makes a tantalising suggestion.

BBC: Exoplanet around Alpha Centauri is nearest-ever

After Hubble published his findings in 1929, he, Einstein, British astronomer Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington, and Dutch astronomer Willem de Sitter, all gathered at a special meeting of the Royal Astronomical Society and pondered how they could account for such developments based on static universe models that Einstein and de Sitter had derived with General Relativity.

FORBES: Why Hubble's Law ... Wasn't Really Hubble's