As NASA announces it’ll crash land the space station in eight years, astronomers reveal their discovery of a trojan asteroid orbiting in a Lagrange Point and for the first time more astronomers have discovered a lonely black hole…
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- sherpa.astro.ui.get_exposure(id=None, bkg_id=None)
Return the exposure time of a PHA data set.
The exposure time of a PHA data set is taken from the EXPTIME keyword in its header, but it can be changed once the file has been loaded.
id (int or str, optional) – The identifier for the data set to use. If not given then the default identifier is used, as returned by
bkg_id (int or str, optional) – Set to identify which background component to use. The default value (
None) means that the time is for the source component of the data set.
exposure – The exposure time, in seconds.
- Return type:
Return the fractional area factor of a PHA data set.
Return the area scaling of a PHA data set.
Change the exposure time of a PHA data set.
Return the exposure time for the default data set.
>>> t = get_exposure()
Return the exposure time for the data set with identifier 2:
>>> t2 = get_exposure(2)
Return the exposure time for the first background component of data set “core”:
>>> tbkg = get_exposure('core', bkg_id=1)


A functional block diagram of the system is shown in Figure 3. Table 1 provides a list of the system specifications. The imaging capability is obtained from a 16-element antenna array and a Butler matrix phasing system. Each of the 16 beam-forming outputs from the Butler matrix feeds an individual radio receiver tuned to 38.6 MHz. The receiver output voltage, which is proportional to the received power, is digitized for transmission to the data acquisition computer for display and recording. An RF switch assembly between the Butler matrix outputs and the receiver inputs permits calibrated noise levels to be input to the receivers so that the data can be calibrated against a reference.
The 16-port Butler matrix phasing system, the 16-receivers system, and the calibration system (consisting of a stable RF noise source, a precision programmable attenuator, and the RF switch assembly) are constructed as modular units. This will enable the full-scale HAARP imaging riometer diagnostic to be built up from multiple modular units.
The 16-element antenna has been installed as a 1x16 linear array oriented in approximately a north-south magnetic direction. Figure 4 shows the projection onto a flat ionosphere at 90-km altitude of the antenna beam pattern (-3 dB contours) and the orientation of the beams with respect to the north geographic and geomagnetic poles. The straight lines labeled 61 through 65 are segments of contours of constant magnetic invariant latitude. The range of latitudes covered by the array permits an investigation of the subauroral region of the polar ionosphere.
Because the antenna is phased in one dimension (north-south) only, the prototype instrument is not a true imager, but it does offer a meridional view of ionospheric disturbances, similar to that of a meridional scanning photometer. The proximity of the riometer to the HAARP RF transmitter (it is only a few hundred yards away) often results in significant interference to the riometer signal, making the data unusable during some modes of heater operation. It is likely that a more remote location, as well as the full imaging capability of the proposed instrument, will be needed in order to observe small-scale modifications of the ionosphere during heater operations. However, during off times of the heater, the riometer has provided high-quality data on naturally-occurring auroral activity, including some surprising observations. An example is presented below.


The radio-occultation observations taken by Tianwen-1 are aiming to study the properties of solar wind. A new method of frequency fluctuation (FF) estimation is presented for processing the down-link signals of Tianwen-1 during the occultation period to study the properties of the coronal plasma at the heliocentric distances of 4.48–19 R. Because of low S/N as well as the phase fluctuation phenomena caused by solar activity, a Kalman based on polynomial prediction methods is proposed to avoid the phase locked loop loss lock. A new detrend method based on multi-level iteration correction is proposed to estimate Doppler shift to get more accurate power density spectra of FF in the low frequency region. The data analyze procedure is used to get the properties of the solar corona during the occultation. The method was finally verified at the point when the solar offset is 5.7 R, frequency tracking was successfully performed on data with a carrier-to-noise ratio of about 28 dBHz. The density spectra obtained by the improved method are basically the same when the frequency is greater than 2 mHz, the uncertainty in the result of the rms of the FF obtained by removing the trend term with different order polynomials is less than 3.3%. The data without eliminating interference show a large error for different detrending orders, which justifies the need for an improved approach. Finally, the frequency fluctuation results combined with the information on intensity fluctuation obtained by the new method are compared with the results of the integrated Space Weather Analysis system and theoretical formula, which verifies that the processing results in this paper have a certain degree of credibility.
It accepts original submissions from all over the world and is internationally published and distributed by IOP


Two Mars-bound spacecraft are both in excellent health ahead of their September arrivals in orbit around the Red Planet, managers for both missions report.
India's Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) is more than 80 percent of the way to Mars and performing well, according to a Facebook update posted July 21 by the Indian Space Research Organization. MOM is expected to enter orbit on Sept. 14.
The second craft, NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN), is also performing well. MAVEN is scheduled to embark on its final approach to the Red Planet on Sept. 21, one week after MOM's arrival, principal investigator Bruce Jakosky said. After months of checkouts and tests, the spacecraft will now be left quiet until close to the big day. [See images of the MAVEN mission]
"We have eight science instruments, and they've all been turned off now," Jakosky, who is also the associate science director at the University of Colorado's laboratory for atmospheric and space physics, told Space.com. "We're trying to settle things down to focus on orbit insertion."
Both MOM and NASA's MAVEN probes launched toward Mars in November 2013.
With the MAVEN mission, NASA scientists are hoping to learn more about the history of Mars' upper atmosphere. For the past few months, controllers have done "operational readiness" tests, such as a mission-control-like simulation of the craft's approach to the Red Planet. These drills can help controllers get ready for any emergencies that might crop up.
One important feature of the spacecraft is its ability to maneuver six hours or 24 hours before entering orbit if controllers find out the vessel is on the wrong path, Jakosky said. This was a "lesson learned" from the 1998 Mars Climate Orbiter, which was destroyed in the planet's atmosphere because controllers could not correct a navigation error until too late.
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"The key thing about the orbit insertion burn is we have one shot at it, and it has to go right. If it doesn't go right, we just go right on past Mars and never get to go back," Jakosky said.
Meanwhile, the science team has been making sure MAVEN's hardware is ready to collect the data. One instrument has already gathered information on solar activity.
In India, MOM spacecraft controllers have been priming the probe for its arrival at the Red Planet. On Thursday (Aug. 7), flight controllers tested the MOM probe's antenna that will serve as its primary communications link to Earth.
"MOM successfully completed the characterization of its Medium Gain Antenna, which will be used for communicating with Earth during the critical Mars Orbit Insertion (MOI)," ISRO officials wrote in a MOM update on Facebook yesterday. "Only 14 percent of the journey remains in its heliocentric arc towards Mars Orbit Insertion."
Cosmic close encounter
The scientists monitoring the spacecraft will also find themselves with a rare opportunity just one month after arriving at the planet. Comet Siding Spring will make its closest approach to Mars on Oct. 19, while MAVEN is still being readied for full operations to start Nov. 8. But the team will pause this work to watch the comet, Jakosky said.
"We'll make observations for about two days before and two days after the comet's closest approach," Jakosky added. "We will make observations in spectroscopic imaging, which shows us a lot about the [comet's] composition, and then observe the upper atmosphere."
While scientists are excited to catch sight of the comet — and current predictions show that spacecraft orbiting Mars should be safe during the close pass — researchers also need to keep the health of the spacecraft in mind during the flyby. MAVEN controllers aren't taking any chances, Jakosky added.
They will have the spacecraft behind the planet for 20 minutes during the comet's closest approach, and will point the solar panels edge-on to the dust to minimize the chance of a strike. Ground controllers will also turn off nonessential instruments.
The mission is designed to last one Earth year, but NASA hopes it will stretch a lot longer as it will also serve as a communications relay for the Opportunity and Curiosity rovers on the Martian surface. MAVEN's science team would also prefer a longer mission so they can continue observations.
If funding is extended, there's enough fuel to last perhaps 10 years, Jakosky said. Many components "have a lot of heritage" from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, he added, which is still in good health after eight years of operations at the planet.
Elizabeth Howell (she/her), Ph.D., is a staff writer in the spaceflight channel since 2022 covering diversity, education and gaming as well. She was contributing writer for Space.com for 10 years before joining full-time. Elizabeth's reporting includes multiple exclusives with the White House and Office of the Vice-President of the United States, an exclusive conversation with aspiring space tourist (and NSYNC bassist) Lance Bass, speaking several times with the International Space Station, witnessing five human spaceflight launches on two continents, flying parabolic, working inside a spacesuit, and participating in a simulated Mars mission. Her latest book, "Why Am I Taller?", is co-written with astronaut Dave Williams. Elizabeth holds a Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Space Studies from the University of North Dakota, a Bachelor of Journalism from Canada's Carleton University and a Bachelor of History from Canada's Athabasca University. Elizabeth is also a post-secondary instructor in communications and science at several institutions since 2015; her experience includes developing and teaching an astronomy course at Canada's Algonquin College (with Indigenous content as well) to more than 1,000 students since 2020. Elizabeth first got interested in space after watching the movie Apollo 13 in 1996, and still wants to be an astronaut someday. Mastodon: https://qoto.org/@howellspace


Extremal Cosmological Black Holes in Horndeski Gravity and the Anti-Evaporation Regime
Extremal cosmological black holes are analysed in the framework of the most general second order scalar-tensor theory, the~so-called Horndeski gravity. Such~extremal black holes are a particular case of Schwarzschild-De Sitter black holes that arises when the black hole horizon and the cosmological one coincide. Such~metric is induced by a particular value of the effective cosmological constant and is known as Nariai spacetime. The~existence of this type of solutions is studied when considering the Horndeski Lagrangian and its stability is analysed, where the so-called anti-evaporation regime is studied. Contrary to other frameworks, the~radius of the horizon remains stable for some cases of the Horndeski Lagrangian when considering perturbations at linear order.
- Pub Date:
- November 2020
- General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology;
- High Energy Physics - Theory
- 15 pages, version published


The rise of the moon from Kalochori in Thessaloniki. Incredible place to watch the city lights or to take images as there are also many birds there.
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arnie (1805) 2014-04-17 3:01
Beautiful blue hour capture. The lights of the city dissecting the shot. Blue calm sea with a great reflection of the moon. A super moon peeping out of the clouds giving a great atmospheric mood to the shot.


Canes Venatici is a small constellation, consisting of only two stars. However, it is quite easy to find due to its location just south of the Big Dipper. Like many of the surrounding constellations, Canes Venatici holds quite a few galaxies.
M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy, is one of the most well-known galaxies in the sky. Although it is within the boundaries of Canes Venatici, the easiest way to find M51 is by looking 3½° southwest of Alkaid, the star at the end of the Big Dipper’s handle. M51 is a face-on spiral galaxy with a smaller companion galaxy connected to it by an extension of one of the spiral arms.
Like all galaxies, M51 is much easier to find and observe under a dark sky with little light pollution. From a dark site, M51 is faintly visible with binoculars as a small fuzzy spot of light. The unique shape of the two interacting galaxies is easily visible with most telescopes, although the spiral structure is a bit harder to observe. By carefully observing M51 using averted vision, the spiral structure can be seen with mid-sized telescopes.
M106 is another relatively bright spiral galaxy in Canes Venatici. M106 is tilted at an angle toward Earth, giving it an oblong shape. To find M106, imagine a line connecting the star Chara in Canes Venatici with Phad, the star on the southeast corner of the Big Dipper’s bowl. M106 is near the midpoint of this line, just to the west of it. M106 is similar in brightness to M51, but its spiral arms are less obvious and are not visible in smaller telescopes.
Cor Caroli, the brighter of the two stars making up Canes Venatici, is a beautiful double star. The component stars are separated by about 20 arcseconds, making them easy to split with low magnification (50x or less). The primary star is white, while the secondary is slightly yellow.
NGC 4631 (the Whale Galaxy) and NGC 4656 (the Hockey Stick Galaxy) are a fascinating pair of galaxies in the southern part of Canes Venatici. The two galaxies lie about ½° apart, so they are visible in the same telescopic field of view at moderate magnifications. This galaxy pair is located about 6° southwest of Cor Caroli.
Both galaxies are oriented edge-on to Earth, but they look fairly different from each other. NGC 4631 is the larger and brighter of the two galaxies, and it really does bear some resemblance to a whale. This galaxy is quite mottled with light and dark areas.
NGC 4656 is smaller and fainter, but one of its ends is bent at nearly a 90° angle, giving the galaxy the appearance of a hockey stick. Low magnification works well for finding these galaxies and comparing them in the same field of view. Higher magnifications will help reveal the details in each galaxy.
Nearly all of the deep sky objects in Canes Venatici are galaxies, but the constellation holds one beautiful globular star cluster, M3. This cluster is located between Cor Caroli and Arcturus, the brightest star in the nearby constellation Bootes. M3 lies straight between the two stars and slightly closer to Arcturus. The cluster looks like a small fuzzy spot with binoculars. An 8” telescope should resolve the cluster fairly well.


Supermoon - perigee-syzygy
Supermoon, scientifically known as perigee-syzygy, occurs when our only natural satellite, the Moon, in its orbit, moves closest to the Earth.
Since the orbit of the Moon is an elliptical in shape, rather than a perfect circle, there are two positions in its orbit around the Earth, when it is going to be at its closest position to the Earth. It is called, perigee position.
On Monday 14 in 2016, the Moon is going to be at the perigee position: hence, it is going to be brigher and bigger - very noticebly. In fact, it is going to be 30% brighter and 14% bigger, according to astronomers due to the fact that the Moon gets 30,000 miles closer to the Earth than it is at apogee.
It occurs after 70 years and we have to wait until 2034 to see the biggest supermoon in this century. So, it is not a good idea to miss it!
So, in order to get a good views of the supermoon, it is recommended that if you live in a city to head out of town to minimize the urban glow effect, owing to excessive street lighting. Anyplace where you can easily get minimum urban lights and the least cloud cover would provide an ideal environment for supermoon viewing.
Facts about the Moon
- The moon is not a planet, but a natural satellite of the Earth.
- The surface area of the moon is 14,658,000 square miles or almost 10 billion acres.
- The visible part of the Moon is just 59% with the dark side being 41%.
- The speed of rotation of the Moon is 10 miles per hour whereas that of the Earth is about 1000 miles per hour.
- When a month has two full moons, the second full moon is called a blue moon, which perhaps led to the English saying, once in a blue moon.
- You always see the same side of the moon from the Earth; the other side, the dark side, is always hidden.
- The moon is full of craters due to the impact of asteroids.
- The moon, the only extraterrestrial body that has ever been visited by man, is almost 384,000 km away for the Earth.
- Neil Armstrong is the first human being who landed on the moon; it took place in 1969..
- The moon has no magnetic field - so, a compass may not work.
- The moon's diameter is about 1/4 the diameter of the Earth. If the Earth is an empty container, about 50 moons will fill it up.
- The gravitational pull on the moon is about 17% of that of the Earth; so, you can jump much higher on the moon than on the Earth!
- The moon plays a major role in the formation of tides on the Earth.
- The moon is about 4.53 billion years old.
- The moon orbits the Earth every 27.3 days.
Resources at Fingertips
This is a vast collection of tutorials, covering the syllabuses of GCSE, iGCSE, A-level and even at undergraduate level.
They are organized according to these specific levels.
The most popular tutorial is the Book of Electricity, which comes at the top of Google search for electricity tutorials for GCSE / AS/ A-Level at present.
In addition, there are a few more which come at the top of Google search.They are all supported by an extensive collection of animations and interactive labs.
Stand Out - from the crowd
"There's no such thing as a free lunch."
The best things in nature are free with no strings attached - fresh air, breathtakingly warm sunshine, scene of meadow on the horizon...
Vivax Solutions, while mimicking nature, offers a huge set of tutorials along with interactive tools for free.
Please use them and excel in the sphere of science education.
Everything is free; not even registration is required.


How much further away is the Sun than the Moon? How much bigger is the Sun than the Moon? And how are you supposed to work out the answers if you are an ancient Greek who doesn't even have a telescope?
If you are Aristarchus of Samos, who lived around 2300 years ago, then you'll rely on your excellent geometrical expertise combined with an important insight: that the Moon shines at night because it is illuminated by the Sun. On the face of it, this latter fact is far from obvious, but then Aristarchus was a pioneer. Unlike many, many astronomers who came after him, he recognised that the Earth moved around the Sun, rather than the other way around.
Armed with the knowledge that the Sun illuminates the Moon, Aristarchus realised that at half Moon, the triangle formed by the Earth (E), the Moon (M) and the Sun (S) has a right angle at M.
Diagram not to scale.
You can convince yourself of this by imagining the Sun in different places in the diagram above and checking that the parallel rays of light emanating from it illuminate exactly half of the Moon (as seen from Earth) only when there is a right angle at M.
Aristarchus was after the relative distance to the Sun and the Moon, that is, he was after the ratio , where is the distance from the Earth to the Sun and is the distance from the Earth to the Moon. If you know your trigonometry you know that
where is the angle at the corner of the triangle. Therefore
Taking the estimate gives the answer
So the Sun is just short of 400 times further from Earth than the Moon. Aristarchus also noticed that during a solar eclipse the Moon completely covers the Sun. This gives us the following diagram:
Diagram not to scale.
Using the fact that the ratio between and is the same as the ratio between and (because we are looking at two similar triangles) we can deduce that the Sun’s diameter is about 400 times bigger than the Moon’s diameter.
The result Aristarchus came up with was very different. He estimated the Sun to be between 18 and 20 times further away than the Moon. This is partly because he didn’t have the means to measure accurately enough and took it to be equal to Using this value in the calculation above gives that the Sun is about 19 times further away than the Moon: a small variation in an angle close to leads to a large variation in .
The reason why Aristarchus could only come up with the range from 18 to 20, rather than a single number, is that trigonometry hadn’t been developed yet. He didn’t have the notion of a cosine, let alone any tables in which to look up the cosine of a given angle. Instead, he had to use a more complicated geometric argument to come up with his approximate answer. Which illustrates why trigonometry is so useful for astronomers.
About the author
Marianne Freiberger is Editor of Plus.
Please can you explain why you would estimate alpha to be almost 90 degrees? The angle at corner M is 90 degrees but the angle at corner E is much closer to 60 degrees.
The diagram is not drawn to scale, which is why the angle alpha in it doesn't reflect the angle you would observe in reality.
i mean how could we know it is 89.5? please explain the way to find 89.5
The value 89.5 degrees comes from observation.
Hello! Are you familiar with the Unit Circle? The unit circle is like the lifeblood of trigonometry. Look up an image right now. Learn about it. If you look at the circle E and notice the location of the line EM as it intercepts the circle E, and then you compare it to the unit circle, you will notice that the line intercepts at the location ~90 degrees on the unit circle (or pi/2 in radians).
That might not make sense right away, but study the unit circle and you'll get it!!
Hope that helps!
Since the sun is very far away, the rays from the sun will be almost parallel to both the earth and the sun. So this means the angle of rays between the sun and the moon will be very small. Given the moon is perpendicular to the earth, we have 90 deg on that angle. Since the angles of a triangle add up to 180 deg, the remaining angle is very close to 90 deg, so 89.5 is a good approximation. (It could be 89.8 or 89.7) The result will be similar.
In angles very close to 90 degrees, a small error can make a very large difference. If the angle was really 89.8 degrees, the result would be very far from the result with 89.5 degrees.
Triangle of sun and moon and earth
Since we have assumed that it is a situation at night thus the sun from you (observer) is very far away as compared to the moon (at night). Now about the angle -->
Angle ESM is the angle of elevation of the sun from earth and as already stated that sun is very far away thus angle of elevation is very less. Thus angle MES (α) is assumed to be 89.5


Anyone travelling to the far north this year – and in 2013 and the beginning of 2014, will be travelling when the sun is at a time of “solar maximum” – a peak in the cycle regulating output of solar storms. That means that displays of the Northern Lights, when they happen, will be more frequent, vivid and even more captivating than you can possibly imagine.
Atmospheric conditions just now are particularly good for seeing the Northern Lights – a giant bonus on top of enjoying an exhilarating cross country ski holiday somewhere suitably northern! Our Norwayand Finland destinations are as cosy as they are beautiful, with acres of snow, miles of trails along which to glide, and as soon as the sun goes down – which is relatively early at this time of year – the Northern Lights may just come up.
Although they are never guaranteed, this next few months will be a great time to get lucky, as they are becoming more and more visible further and further south.
Seeing them is a genuine fairytale, so why not swop our mediocre chilly winter with wet sleet and black ice and salt all over the windscreen for a proper Scandinavian adventure and who knows?
You may just be one of the lucky many who have ticked off this ‘Must Have’ travel experience.


The Chinese news agency Xinhua announced on July 31 that China will be sending its first unmanned lander to the Moon in the second half of 2013. Chang’e-3 will be the third lunar probe launched by the China National Space Administration (CNSA) and the first attempt at a landing. The lander/rover combination will launch from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in China’s Sichuan province as part of China’s continuing Lunar Exploration program.
October 29, 2007 The Chang’e-1 spacecraft successfully blasted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre, Sichuan, atop a Long March 3A rocket last week bound for lunar orbit. The launch by the Chinese National Space Administration (CNSA), is China’s first step in a program that aims to land robotic explorers on the Moon before 2020.


This unique book offers a new approach to the study of the large-scale structure of the Universe. Though considered to be governed by the same Newtonian gravitational interaction, the dynamics of galactic clusters differs drastically from that of stellar dynamics, and therefore a different mathematical approach is required. The theory of dynamical systems provides a powerful method for the study of the profound properties of multi-dimensional nonlinear systems. This monograph offers a consistent geometrical treatment of observational cosmology from the concepts of the theory of dynamical systems.
Since this mathematical technique is not yet a familiar tool in the field of astrophysics, a summary of the fundamental ideas of differential geometry, ergodic theory and catastrophe theory is presented. Such a unified approach facilitates the study of a wide range of, at first sight, very different phenomena within the same physical framework, thus revealing their universal underlying properties. This book will be of great value to astrophysicists and mathematicians for its pioneering approach to the study of the large-scale Universe.


|John Charles is a lead project scientist for the Space and Life Sciences
Directorate at Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas.|
Johnson Space Center,
John Charles has spent a career dedicated to realizing the potential
of space exploration and helping people to travel in space safely
June 2002 -
As a child, John Charles dreamed of being an astronaut and exploring space. Like many other children of the 1960s, he avidly followed
the "space race," especially John Glenn's journey into space. Although he never became an astronaut, he has fulfilled his
dream in other ways. From investigating crew health and supporting
research on the Russian Space Station Mir to training John Glenn for a return trip to orbit and overseeing the upcoming STS-107 science
mission, Charles has worked to discover and solve the challenges
that will arise as humans take the next step into space.
"At about age 10, I decided to quit dreaming and actually focus
on a career in the space business." Charles was interested
in physics but knew that he was not strong enough in math to be
successful in that course of study. He also had an interest in biology,
especially physiology, and realized that a career as a research
physiologist could combine with his desire to do space-related work.
To that end, he obtained a bachelor's degree in biophysics from
Ohio State University in 1977 and a Ph.D. in physiology and biophysics
from the University of Kentucky in 1983. Charles arrived at Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas, in 1983 as a postdoctoral
fellow in the medical research branch. He was hired as a full-time
employee in the cardiovascular laboratory in 1985.
later, he became the director of that lab. Charles spent a large
part of his lab career at JSC looking at the problem of orthostatic
intolerance, the feeling of faintness that astronauts experience
on their return to Earth from orbit. The condition is caused by
insufficient blood pressure in the brain resulting from the body.s
inability to adjust blood pressure after adapting to reduced gravity.
Charles. team helped to formalize a postflight test of orthostatic
function and developed the lower body negative pressure (LBNP) technique
to pull fluids out of the upper body and back into the lower body.
the cardiovascular lab in 1994 when he joined the shuttle/Mir program,
which encompassed a series of 11 U.S. space shuttle missions to
the Russian space station. He worked as a deputy to Peggy Whitson,
the project scientist for the program, and took over her position
when she was selected for the astronaut corps. After his tour with
the shuttle/Mir program, Charles was assigned to be the liaison
between the Human Space Life Sciences Programs Office (now the Office
of Bioastronautics) and the Mars Exploration Planning Office at
JSC. He also became the lead for the Bioastronautics Critical Path
Roadmap Project. Charles notes that this project, a collaborative
effort with the National Space Biomedical Research Institute that
was conceived in 1997, was originally designed to target physiological
problems that need to be solved to make a crewed mission to Mars
path roadmap is currently focused on the problems of the space station,"
says Charles, "and I view that as also providing a very strong
foundation for any subsequent decision to move beyond low Earth
orbit. Many of the problems that would confront humans going to
Mars are the same problems we would have on any long-duration space
station mission. It's really not apples and oranges; it's really
one size apple versus a different size apple."
to his planning work for NASA, Charles has continued to contribute
to the success of the shuttle program. He served as project scientist
for the experiments that John Glenn conducted during the flight of STS-95 in1998 and is the mission scientist for STS-107. He defines
his role as mission scientist as "being an advocate for the
mission experiments that come through the Office of Biological and
Physical Research." He believes that his years of lab work
at JSC provided him with a greater capacity for representing the
scientists in dealing with program offices, mission planners, and
management: "I.d like to make sure that the people who are
actually answering the questions are not forgotten in the big bureaucratic
shuffle that seems to surround huge programs like the space shuttle
or the space station."
a high point of his career with NASA: "I have to rate as one
of the highest the chance to work with John Glenn, because he inspired me way back in 1962 to be interested in spaceflight. Then 36 years
later, when he flew on the shuttle, I dealt with him on a fairly
regular basis to prepare our experiments for him to do in flight.
It was always a thrill for me to see and speak to him. It was sort
of a full circle, going from being inspired by him to working with
him and having him consider me a part of his team."
himself remaining part of the NASA team for the future and expects
to continue to be involved in strategic planning to help find the
answers to the problems of long-duration spaceflight.
is to have the answers ready. When they say, 'We want to send people
to Mars or the Moon. Are we ready to do that?' I would like to be
in the position to help the life sciences [people] say, 'Yes, and
here are the answers to the questions.'"
and photos for this story were provided by Marshall Space Flight


So far we’ve seen different views of Mars, but NASA decided to offer something new. Have you ever wondered what the Red Planet would look like when captured from the International Space Station orbiting this world? You don’t have to anymore, because the US agency was able to capture it with pictures from one of the orbiters.
NASA benefited The Odyssey orbiter and its THEMIS instrument (Thermal Emission Imaging System). Preparations took three months and the goal was achieved It shows the Red Planet from a perspective similar to Earth seen from the International Space Station. The images were taken from a height of about 400 kilometers above the Earth’s surface. The International Space Station orbits our universe in a similar way.
The task was difficult and therefore took several months to implement. This is primarily due to the fact that the THEMIS instrument is usually pointed downward at the Red Planet’s surface all the time because it is used for mapping. So, in order to get a different perspective, the entire Odyssey orbiter had to stay put Slanted 90 degreesWhich is made possible after a special sequence is sent to the ship.
Rotating the orbiter was one thing, but then Odyssey had to remain in that position for a long period of time. This was necessary to take a series of photos. Then it was processed and this is how it worked Get the whole panorama. Throughout the entire mission, the ship’s antenna was pointed away from Earth and therefore had no contact with it.
The final effect is stunning and was definitely worth the work. Below you can see the surface of Mars, and above its thin atmosphere, where there are, among other things, clouds of water ice. NASA intends to use these images and compare them with images taken from the International Space Station. In this way, it would be possible to compare the two planets more accurately from a similar perspective, which could be very important for science.
Echo Richards embodies a personality that is a delightful contradiction: a humble musicaholic who never brags about her expansive knowledge of both classic and contemporary tunes. Infuriatingly modest, one would never know from a mere conversation how deeply entrenched she is in the world of music. This passion seamlessly translates into her problem-solving skills, with Echo often drawing inspiration from melodies and rhythms. A voracious reader, she dives deep into literature, using stories to influence her own hardcore writing. Her spirited advocacy for alcohol isn’t about mere indulgence, but about celebrating life’s poignant moments.


NASA called the dates of the destruction of Phobos Mars
Scientists have named the deadlines for Mars to destroy one of its two satellites, Phobos. About this, as reported on the NASA website, planetologists told during the 47th annual meeting of the Planetary Division of the American Astronomical Society in Maryland.
According to the model proposed by the authors, after about 30–50 million years, the gravitational pull of Mars will lead to the destruction of Phobos into smaller fragments, some of which fall to the surface of the planet.
Planetologists came to such conclusions by analyzing the spread of cracks (grooves) in the vicinity of the Stickney crater (on the right-hand side of the CDPV). They, as the researchers found out, were formed not because of the collision of Phobos with an asteroid, but as a result of the occurrence of internal stresses in the celestial body.
The appearance of deformations scientists associate with two main factors. First, Phobos (with a radius of 11.1 kilometers) is located at a distance of six thousand kilometers from the surface of Mars.This makes him the closest satellite to his planet in the solar system.
According to the calculations of scientists, every hundred years, the satellite becomes closer two meters to its planet. Secondly, Phobos has inside a multitude of cavities, which make up about a quarter of its total volume, whereas outside the celestial body is covered with a hundred-meter layer of regolith.
For the first time cracks on the satellite of Mars discovered the station Viking. Similar structures are observed on Triton - the satellite of Neptune. According to scientists, over time, Triton, as well as Phobos, will break the gravitational pull of its planet.


Indrajit Das, Ph.D.
|2013||Physics||George Mason University, Washington, DC|
Mean distance: (not calculated yet)
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|Das I, Weingartner JC. (2016) Alignment of interstellar grains by mechanical torques: Suprathermally rotating Gaussian random spheres Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 457: 1958-1987|


In 2013, the May full moon presents the third full moon after the March equinox. In North America we often call this particular full moon the Flower Moon, Rose Moon or Strawberry Moon. That star by tonight’s full moon is Antares, the brightest star in the constellation Scorpius the Scorpion. Plus the moon is one day away from lunar perigee – the moon’s closest point to Earth for this month. By a newly coined popular definition, that makes this May 24-25 full moon a supermoon. And the moon will undergo an extremely minor penumbral lunar eclipse tonight. With a penumbral eclipse magnitude of 0.0158, just 0.5 arc-minutes of the moon’s southern limb will pass into Earth’s pale penumbral shadow. It’s such a shallow eclipse that it’ll be mainly of academic interest and very difficult to detect. For more about the May 2013 lunar eclipse, click here.
What will most of us actually see tonight? Nothing unusual. Just the same wonderful full moon we see every month. Enjoy it.
When exactly is the May 2013 full moon? The May 2013 full moon falls at the same instant all over the world: May 25 at 4:25 Universal Time.
Clock time and/or date for this full moon – and every full moon – will vary by time zone. For London, the moon turns will at 5:25 a.m. BST on the morning of May 25; that means the moon will appear more full on the night of May 24-25 than on the night of May 25-26. Likewise, for the U.S. East Coast, the moon turns full on May 25 at 12:25 a.m. EDT. Meanwhile, for all places to the west of the U.S. Eastern Daylight Time zone, the moon turns full not on May 25 … but on May 24 at 11:25 p.m. CDT, 10:25 p.m. MDT and 9:25 p.m. PDT.
Technically speaking, the moon turns full at the instant that the moon lies most opposite the sun for the month. For general reference, though, we can say the moon is full all night long. Because the May 24-25 moon stays more or less opposite the sun throughout the night, watch for the full moon to rise in the east around sunrise, climb highest up in the sky around midnight and to set in the west around sunrise.
Three planets close together in west this evening! Don’t spend all your time moon gazing this evening. Be sure to look toward the western sky as soon as the sun sets for three planets, Mercury, Venus and Jupiter. They are now forming a cool planetary trio – which some are, mistakenly, calling a triple conjunction. In other words, these three planets are located within a circle on the sky’s dome whose diameter is less than 5 degrees. Clouded out tonight and can’t see the planetary trio? Never fear. It’ll last through May 29. Read more about the planetary trio here.
Full moon mirrors sun’s path for six months hence Any full moon mirrors the sun’s path across the sky for six months hence. As seen from the Northern Hemisphere, tonight’s full moon will follow the low path of the late autumn sun; as viewed from southerly latitudes, the moon will follow the lofty path of the late springtime sun.
Bottom line: Full moon for May 2013 falls during the night of May 24-25. For most of us around the world, the moon will appear more full on the night of the 24th than on the 25th. This May 2013 full moon is one day away from perigee – its closest point to Earth – and so will be called a supermoon. There is a slight penumbral eclipse tonight that’s extremely difficult to detect and mainly of academic interest. We’ll all see a bright full-looking moon tonight near the bright red star Antares in the constellation Scorpius!


|Annu. Rev. Astron. Astrophys. 2009. 47:
Copyright © 2009 by Annual Reviews. All rights reserved
In this review we have provided an overview of the current understanding of the detailed properties of dwarf galaxies from studies of their resolved stellar populations. This includes CMD analysis, to determine accurate SFHs, as well as low and high resolution spectroscopy, to determine kinematic and chemical properties of stars over a range of ages.
Most dwarf galaxies in the Local Group have structural properties similar to each other and to larger late-type and spheroidal systems (section 1). Early-type dwarfs tend to extend to fainter magnitudes, with transition types being found at the faint end of the dI distribution. The fact that there exists a transition type, intermediate in properties between a dSph and a dI, supports the idea that there is an evolutionary pathway. The transition between early and late types may indicate the average mass at which galaxies will always loose their gas, especially if they spend time in the vicinity of a large galaxy. But of course this mass will be dependent on the environment that a galaxy has passed through, which could explain why this is not a sharp cut-off. Despite numerous caveats and regardless of size, luminosity and SFH all dSph and dI galaxies in the LG (and beyond) appear to overlap along a straight line in the MV - µV, plane (see top panel, Fig. 1), a relation which is unchanged over a range of 15 magnitudes in MV.
The continuity of structural properties from dwarf galaxies to larger spheroidal and late-type systems is most likely dominated by physical processes that scale with mass. For example, the efficiency with which gas and/or metals can be lost to a system during its evolution through supernova winds and/or interactions. Thus, early-type dwarf galaxies in the Local Group must have suffered the largest effect due to interactions with large galaxies, as has already been suggested from the morphology-density relation. Accurate SFHs have been determined for a range of dwarf galaxy types (see section 2), The different classes of dwarf galaxies have different rates of present day star formation activity and possibly also different degrees of past disruption. However the past SFHs of early and late-type systems bear strong similarities to each other (see Fig. 5). There is evidence for interruptions and enhancements in the SFHs of dwarf galaxies. This is especially true of early-types, a few of which have experienced star formation activity only at the earliest epochs, but most have had extended or recurrent star formation activity. No genuinely "young" galaxy (of any type) has ever been found; stars are always found at the oldest lookback times observed.
The SFHs of BCDs (i.e., comparing Fig. 5 with Fig. 8), are also broadly similar to dIs. However the recent SFRs in BCDs are usually much higher than in dIs. The SFRs in BCDs are more similar to those found in active star forming zones with HII regions in the SMC (Fig. 7) or in the MW, with the difference that the BCDs are forming stars globally, dominating the entire galaxy. All the BCDs which have been studied in detail (see section 2.3) have apparently had their strongest star formation episode recently, unlike dIs. This is most likely a selection effect due to the difficulty in finding distant low luminosity dwarf galaxies, unless they happen to be currently actively forming stars.
Spectroscopy of individual stars has helped to define the detailed chemical and kinematic properties of stellar populations of different ages in nearby dSph systems and in comparison to larger systems such as the MW and the LMC (sections 3 & 4). The chemical enrichment of dwarf galaxies seems to be dominated by effects that are most likely dominated by gas and metal loss. The least massive systems actually seem to loose such a large fraction of their metals during star formation episodes that star formation has a slow effect on the global chemical evolution (see section 5). This means that galaxies with the same mass but quite different SFHs end up with the same final metallicity, consistent with the well known mass/luminosity-metallicity relation for dwarf galaxies.
One clear mismatch in the physical properties between early and late type dwarfs is that the HI gas in the brighter late-types, such as SMC, NGC 6822 and IC 1613, is rotating with ~ 20-60 km s-1. Such high rotation values are never seen in the stars of early-type dwarfs. However, we really do not know if old and young stars in dwarf galaxies can have different kinematic properties, such as is seen in the MW. The kinematics of late-type galaxies has always been measured using HI gas, out of which their young populations are currently forming. Early-type galaxies, on the other hand, are of necessity probed using only their old or even ancient stellar populations. A careful comparison of the kinematics and metallicity distributions of equivalent tracers in early and late type galaxies has still to be made.
The abundance patterns of RGB stars for large samples of individual stars, typically in dSph galaxies (section 4), show that there are distinct differences in the chemical evolution paths between galaxies. The rate at which -enrichment occurs varies between systems. There are not yet large enough samples in a diversity of environments to really say how this may or may not relate to the mass of a system, its SFH or the rate of mass and/or metal loss. But stars do retain a clear abundance signature of the galactic environment in which they were born. These patterns also extend to younger stars in late-type systems, see Fig. 17.
The hierarchical theory of galaxy formation contains at its heart the concept of smaller systems continuously merging to form larger ones. This leads to the general expectation that the properties of the smaller systems will be reflected in the larger. Thus the relationship between the properties of individual stars in small dwarf galaxies around the MW, and stars in the MW is a recurrent theme (see section 4). From recent abundance studies of low metallicity stars in dSphs, see Fig. 16, it seems likely that there exist only narrow windows of opportunity when the merging of dwarf galaxies to form larger systems would not lead to inconsistencies. To properly understand the constraints that these kinds of data can put on the merger history of the MW requires more extensive abundance studies of metal poor stars in dwarf galaxies, as well as a better theoretical understanding of supernovae yields (including the r-process) and the mixing of ejecta into interstellar gas. It also remains an open question how the uFds may relate to the merger history of the MW, and if they can fully account for the deficiencies of the larger types of dwarf galaxies as building block of the MW.
The Dark Matter content of dwarf galaxies is also of importance for the verification of cosmological theories, as it indicates how galaxies we see today which may have lost a significant fraction of their initial baryons relate to structures in cosmological simulations. For an accurate determination of the dynamical properties it must be realised that dwarf galaxies are not the simple systems they were once thought to be. To make assessments of the total mass of small galaxies is complicated, not least because the dark matter halos are likely to extend beyond the baryonic tracers, but also because there are multiple components in the baryonic matter.
This review shows the inherent complexities that are involved in understanding even the smallest galaxies. These low metallicity systems show a wealth of variety in their properties, such as luminosity, surface brightness, star formation history (both past and present), kinematics and abundances. However, there is strong evidence that they are all part of a continuous distribution of galaxies from small to large.
... E quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle.
(Dante Alighieri, La Divina Commedia, Inferno XXXIV, 139
The authors are grateful to M. Cignoni, A. Frebel, C. Gallart, S. Hildago, M. Mateo & M. Monelli for providing us with data and analyses ahead of publication or as private communication.
We thank M. Cignoni, D. Romano, A. Cole, G. Battaglia, V. Belokurov & A. Helmi for useful comments and help in the preparation of figures and tables. We thank F. Matteucci, M. Irwin, R. Sancisi, F. Fraternali and P. Jablonka for useful conversations, and E. Skillman S. Salvadori, M. Breddels, E. Starkenburg, T. de Boer, P. van der Kruit & G. Clementini for careful comments on the text. Very detailed and useful comments from the Editor, J. Kormendy were also highly appreciated.
ET thanks Bologna Observatory for hospitality & Paris Observatory for hospitality and financial support. ET grateful acknowledges support from an NWO-VICI grant. VH acknowledges the financial support of Programme National Galaxies (PNG) of CNRS/INSU, France.
This research has made use of the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database (NED) which is operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.


Friday, 11th September 2015 at 3pm - 4pmMonday, 14th September
Location:Camp Iona, Herbert
This event is in the past.
The Herbert Star Gazer's Getaway will be a great celebration this year. If you are passionate about astronomy and you enjoy meeting other astronomers, both amateur and professional, then don't miss this event. If you love trying out a variety of astronomy gear, don't miss this event. If you want to learn more about the cosmos, don't miss this event! It will be held at Camp Iona, Herbert, between September 11 and 14.


Planetarium activities in September 2010
Moon and Venus Carnival A celebration of Astronomy at the Jantar Mantar - on the 11th of September from 2:00 PM to 8 PM. A daytime viewing of Moon and Venus using the Ram Yantra and night time telescopic views of Moon and planets. Activities to be conducted in collaboration with Science Popularisation Association of Communicators and Educators (SPACE).
Autumn Equinox Day Autumn Equinox will be celebrated through user-friendly observations of the Sun using the Jantar Mantar Observatory instruments, from sunrise to sunset on the 23rd of September 2010. Activities to be conducted in collaboration with Science Popularisation Association of Communicators and Educators (SPACE).
Planetarium activities in October 2010
Chandra - A stellar life - Inauguration of the new planetarium program, at 11:00 AM on the 1st of October 2010. Timings for the planetarium program on Chandrasekhar for the public shows English : 3:00 PM, 5:00 PM and 7:00 PM Hindi : 1:30 PM and 4:00 PM. Tickets Rs. 50/- Available at the bookshop/bank counter at the planetarium.
Universe at the Planetarium Live shows in the first week of October celebrating the Universe in the planetarium. Timings : 12:30 PM on the 5th, 7th and 9th of October.
From the First Indian in Space to budding space scientists? A meeting of Rakesh Sharma, first Indian in Space, with students and special invitees. 11:00 AM on the 26th of October.
Delhi : A celebration Live shows in the planetarium sky theatre in the second week of October, celebrating the city of Delhi. Timings : 12:30 PM on the 12th, 14th and 16th October.
Indian Astronomy : A celebration Exhibition on view from the 1st of October 2010. Public lectures following the inauguration of the exhibition celebrating Indian Astronomy, in the first and second week of October (Dates to be announced).


Volume 459, Number 3, December I 2006
|Page(s)||901 - 907|
|Section||Stellar structure and evolution|
|Published online||12 September 2006|
XMM-Newton observation of a spectral state transition in the peculiar radio/X-ray/γ-ray source LS I +61 303
Istituto di Astrofisica Spaziale e Fisica Cosmica, Sezione di Milano, INAF-IASF, Milano 20133, Italy e-mail: firstname.lastname@example.org
2 CIFS, Torino 10133, Italy
3 Istituto di Astrofisica Spaziale e Fisica Cosmica, Sezione di Roma, INAF-IASF, Roma 00133, Italy
4 Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Tor Vergata, Roma 00133, Italy
Accepted: 24 August 2006
We report the results of XMM-Newton and BeppoSAX observations of the radio and X-ray emitting star LS I +61 303, likely associated with the gamma-ray source 2CG 135+01 and recently detected also at TeV energies. The data include a long XMM-Newton pointing carried out in January 2005, which provides the deepest look ever obtained for this object in the 0.3–12 keV range. During this observation the source flux decreased from a high level of ~13 10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 to 4 10-12 erg cm-2 s-1 within 2–3 h. This flux range is the same seen in shorter and less sensitive observations carried out in the past, but the new data show for the first time that transitions between the two levels can occur on short time scales. The flux decrease was accompanied by a significant softening of the spectrum, which is well described by a power law with photon index changing from 1.62 ± 0.01 to 1.83 ± 0.01. A correlation between hardness and intensity is also found when comparing different short observations spanning almost 10 years and covering various orbital phases. LS I +61 303 was detected in the 15–70 keV range with the PDS instrument in one of the BeppoSAX observations, providing evidence for variability also in the hard X-ray range. The X-ray spectra, discussed in the context of multiwavelength observations, place some interesting constraints on the properties and location of the high-energy emitting region.
Key words: X-rays: binaries / X-rays: individuals: LS I +61 303 / X-rays: individuals: GT 0236+610
© ESO, 2006
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Ancient Structures Mark the Winter Solstice
Tomorrow, December 21, is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year in regards to the number of daylight hours. In the Northern Hemisphere, the Winter Solstice marks the turning point in the calendar…the day that the sun begins to stay around longer and longer, signaling the coming Spring. People in antiquity figured this out pretty quickly. So important was the Winter Solstice that they even erected huge stone structures to herald the Winter Solstice. England’s Stonehenge is probably the most well-known of these monuments, but it certainly isn’t the only one. Let’s examine how ancient cultures around the world noted the coming of the Winter Solstice.


The potentially hazardous asteroid 2012 TC4 made an Earth close approach at a distance of 0.11 lunar distance on 12 October 2017. Photometric observations were carried out between October 11 and October 12 at the Lulin Observatory at short cadence. Data analysis of the light curves shows that this PHA has a fast rotation period of 12.25 min, a light curve variation amplitude of 1.2±0.1 mag corresponding to an axial ratio of about 3.0. Our BVRI photometry also indicates that 2012 TC4 is a C-type asteroid. With the C-type albedo of 0.065 and an absolute magnitude of H = 26.613± 0.350, its effective diameter can be derived to be 24.8−8.0 +19.1 m.
- 2012 TC4
- Near earth asteroids


PI: Todd Hillwig, Valparaiso University, firstname.lastname@example.org
Address: Physics Department, 1610 Campus Drive, Valparaiso, IN 46383, USA
CoI: David Frew, Macquarie University
CoI: Orsola De Marco, Macquarie University
CoI: Sam Schaub, Valparaiso University
Title: Determining the Nature of EGB1 and its Central Star
Abstract: We have recently found the central star of the planetary nebula EGB 1 to be photometrically variable with a period of about 0.147 days. The variability suggests that the central star is a close binary system exhibiting either an irradiation effect due to a close cool companion, or an ellipsoidal effect due to one or both components filling a significant fraction of their Roche lobe. The central star (WD 0103+732) has been identified as a hot DA white dwarf. The nebula itself is clearly asymmetric, presumably due to interaction with the ISM. However, some studies suggest that EGB 1 may \it not be a planetary nebula but is instead ISM ionized by the hot WD. We request time resolved long-slit spectroscopic observations with the KPNO Mayall 4-meter. These observations will allow us to identify the nature of the photometric variability of the central star and provide a more certain classification of the surrounding nebulosity. In addition, if the variability is due to irradiation the spectra will also provide radial velocity measurements for both components in the binary system. If the variability is due to an ellipsoidal effect, then radial velocities for at least the white dwarf will be obtained. The spectroscopic observations will be supported by photometric observations using the 0.9m SARA telescope at KPNO.
National Optical Astronomy Observatory, 950 North Cherry Avenue, P.O. Box 26732, Tucson, Arizona 85726, Phone: (520) 318-8000, Fax: (520) 318-8360


posted on Sep, 23 2011 @ 07:43 PM
I've been watching it circle the globe on Heavens-Above, and this morning it was quite far away from North America. This evening, it is inching
closer (last orbit in the 7 CST hour), slicing over Central America and the Caribbean Islands. I can see its trajectory changing and slowing. There
is a chance it could fall in North America.
The last time I saw space debris was when I was living east of the DFW area when the shuttle exploded overhead in February 2003. I took a drive and
saw blackened debris off I-20 going east towards Louisiana. The pieces I saw fell in the grassy median of the highway. I was amazed that nobody was
hit. It was also a terrible tragedy which made me feel awful just to see the debris of the Columbia which was supposed to carry the astronauts home
safely but blew up instead.
Best case scenario for this event is that nobody gets hit ANYWHERE in the world, nobody's property is damaged, and perhaps a few people walk away
with a few little souvenirs.....In any case, I'll be out this evening watching the skies....


Humans have been journeying to space my entire life, although I was not quite old enough on July 20, 1969 to have clear memories of when astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon.
My memories of the big moments in space exploration that followed, including the six lunar missions that followed Apollo 11 and the 1975 Apollo – Soyuz joint orbit, are much more vivid.
I remember as a nerdy teen tracking the descent of Skylab in 1979 with pushpins on a map.
I remember as a first year university student in 1984 following the flight of the first Canadian in space, Marc Garneau, and two years later hearing in the cafeteria that Challenger had blown up – and watching the news coverage on the common room TV in our residence, which is what you did during a big event in the days before social media.
I remember holding down the weekend desk at a radio station on Feb. 1, 2003 and delivering the news that the shuttle Columbia had burned up on re-entry.
And, I remember thinking in 2018 that launching a car into space was pretty dumb, then coming around to acknowledge that SpaceX and its enigmatic founder Elon Musk are masters of the reality that in an age when space launches don’t get the wall-to-wall media coverage they used to, a little showmanship goes a long way.
I’ll confess to becoming a bit jaded about space launches over the years, but like a lot of us who remember the missions to the moon, I’ve been immersing myself in the history of NASA’s Apollo program in the run-up to the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11.
And I’m rediscovering how improbable, cool and awe-inspiring it all was.
My memories of those days come to me in grainy black and white TV transmissions and images of the models experts used as visual aids while explaining the mission to the audience.
Nick Proach of Sechelt got his start in professional model making building some of the models used for those TV broadcasts, and the company he and his wife Connie founded in 1994 has created replicas for museums, planetariums, collectors, and even an astronaut or two.
I first met Nick in the early 2000s when he was advocating for a better highway for the Sunshine Coast, and it wasn’t until some time later that I learned about his day job and the amazing local business that keeps the allure of spaceflight alive in miniature.
On July 17, Proach Models is opening its doors to the general public to help celebrate the Apollo 11 anniversary. Click here to read the story.
Seeing Proach’s recreation of Tranquility Base and a model Saturn V rocket that stands a head taller than Kawhi Leonard may just be enough to get the space enthusiast in you that’s become a little jaded since the “giant leap for mankind” in the summer of 1969, looking up and getting excited about Artemis, NASA’s program to send astronauts back to the moon by 2024.


Japanese billionaire to take private flight to the moon with guests
Tue, Sep 18, 2018, 02:19 PM
Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa( the founder of Japanese e-commerce giant Zozo) and a group of artists are going to become the first private citizens ever to fly beyond low-Earth orbit. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has announced the same at an event of the company's rocket factory in Hawthorne, California. They will visit the moon as early as 2023, it is said. Yusaku Maezawa said he will choose six to eight artists, from all across the World and added that after their return, they will contribute and share the experience with all.


This winter and spring, we are pairing our popular monthly sky tours with astronomy topic talks and full dome planetarium shows. We will take you on a tour of the current skies, highlighting visible planets, deep sky objects, and any upcoming special astronomical events. Once you've had your introductory tour, feel free to ask your astronomy questions! We'll use our state of the art planetarium visualization system to take you to see objects of curiosity and wonder. Each evening will conclude with an immersive planetarium presentation about a different astronomical topic.
Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity – an armada of robots from Earth have been exploring Mars, but the best is yet to come. In July of 2020, the latest and greatest rover is set to lift off and head for the Jezero Crater on the red planet. Come and learn about all the technology packed into this mechanical marvel and what we hope to learn as it conducts its explorations and science experiments on Mars.


Prophet of the day (according to Ibn 'Arabi): Joseph
Lunar phase: Last Quarter - Re-orientation (Phase names and keywords from Dane Rudhyar, The Lunation Cycle)
The Sun is in 15 Aquarius (in my 5th house): A big businessman at his desk. (Symbol for 16 Aquarius from Dane Rudhyar, An Astrological Mandala)
In a little less than two hours, the Moon will enter Capricorn (in my 4th house). At around 9:00 p.m., the Moon will enter its Balsamic phase, whose keyword is Release.
Moving on to another phase of my project. I finally got around to following up on some business-related things.


Iran has confirmed that it plans to launch a new scientific observation satellite in the "coming days," the head of the country's national space agency said in an interview with AFP.
Morteza Barari on February 1 did not give a specific date for the launch of the Zafar (“Victory” in Persian) satellite, but he said the 113-kilogram satellite will be launched by a Simorgh rocket 530 kilometers above the Earth, and that it will make 15 orbits a day.
His remarks came five days after satellite images suggested that Iran was preparing to launch a satellite into space after three recent failed rocket launches.
Iran’s telecommunications minister tweeted last month that two satellites, which completed their tests were sent to a space facility January 19, to soon start their launch process.
Some Western leaders, including those in the United States, have complained that Iran is using technology involved in the launch of satellites that could also be used to develop ballistic missiles.
Barari told AFP that Iran advocated for the "peaceful use of outer space. All our activities in the domain of outer space are transparent."
The preparations for a rocket launch follow two failed launches of the Payam and Doosti satellites in January and February last year and a launch-pad rocket explosion in August.
The U.S. pullout from Iran's 2015 nuclear deal with world powers last year and its reimposition of sanctions against the country has heightened tensions between Tehran and Washington.
The United States has placed crippling sanctions on the Iranian economy, while Iran has gradually reduced its commitments under the deal.
Barari, who is chief of the Iranian Space Agency, said manufacturing of the Zafar satellite "began three years ago with the participation of 80 Iranian scientists," adding that it was designed to remain operational for "more than 18 months."
He said the primary mission will be to collect imagery to study earthquakes, prevent natural disasters, and develop agricultural resources.
"It will be a new step for our country," Barari said, adding that Iran previously had been able to put a satellite into orbit 250 kilometers above the Earth.
The agency hopes to construct five more satellites by March 2021, Barari added.
In January 2019, Tehran acknowledged that its Payam satellite -- which it said was designed to collect environmental data -- had failed to reach orbit.
Washington called the launch a "provocation" and a violation of a 2015 UN Security Council resolution that had endorsed the international accord on curbing Tehran's nuclear program.
Iran’s last attempt to launch a satellite was on August 29, 2019 but the rocket exploded on the launch pad at the Imam Khomeini Space Center in Iran’s Semnan Province.
Less than a week after the explosion, on September 3, Washington imposed sanctions on Iran's space agency (ISA) for the first time, accusing it of developing ballistic missiles under the cover of a civilian program.
Tehran has insisted its space program is solely for non-military purposes. However, the program is directly under the control of Iran's defense ministry.


Our Meade Telescope Accessories Reviews are a very good way to obtain an impartial viewpoint on Meade Telescope Accessories. Consumer reviews are a terrific way to evaluate numerous Telescope Accessories from Meade quick and simple. These customer written testimonials consist of consumer ratings, recommendations and feedback. Check out the pluses and minuses from individuals who have experience and knowledge using each Meade Telescope Accessories. We have all the best Meade products here at OpticsPlanet which include, Meade Telescope Accessories. We know the significance of having the knowledge and an overall understanding of whatever you get, so take time to go through what individuals just like you are saying about our leading Meade Telescope Accessories in our on-line reviews. If you would like to be involved in a discussion about Meade Telescope Accessories, take a look at our OpticsPlanet discussion forum.


Rotational excitation of carbon monosulfide by collisions with helium
LERMA and UMR 8112 of CNRS, Observatoire de Paris-Meudon, 92195 Meudon Cedex, France e-mail: firstname.lastname@example.org
2 DAMIR. IEM-CSIC, c/ Serrano 121 28006 Madrid, Spain
Accepted: 15 January 2006
Context.Over the next few years, Alma and Herschel missions will open the universe to high spatial and spectral resolution studies at infrared and sub-millimeter wavelengths. Modeling of the observed spectra will require accurate radiative and collisional rates on species of astrophysical interest.
Aims.The present paper focuses on the calculation of new rate coefficients among the 31 first rotational levels of the CS molecule in collision with He for temperatures ranging from 10 K to 300 K.
Methods.A new 2D potential energy surface for the CS-He system, calculated at a CS r-distance frozen at its experimental equilibrium distance was obtained with accurate quantum chemistry methods. Quantum close-coupling calculations lead to collisional cross sections and rate coefficients.
Results.The new rate coefficients are calculated up to 300 K. These new coefficients differ significantly from previously published ones. The consequences for astrophysical models are evaluated.
Key words: molecular processes / molecular data
© ESO, 2006


[amsat-bb] New APRS Rocket Antenna concept needed
bruninga at usna.edu
Tue Mar 30 16:04:23 PDT 2010
I need someone interested in adding quadrature 2 meter antennas
to the outside of a 10" diameter sounding rocket by middle
This launch is going to space (100 miles up) from White Sands on
a sounding rocket to then come back down by parachute. Antennas
cannot stick out far (maybe an inch?) but can be bent back along
the surface. Temperatures will approach 800F during the 10
minute flight. G' forces will be huge.
The payload will be (what else) an APRS trackign system and
2-way APRS communications transponder.
So, if anyone wants to take on this antenna, lemme know.
All I need is the detail design and analysis. The machining is
paid-for. Oh, it also needs quadrature GPS antennas, but that
can just be a pair of 1.5" monopoles...
More information about the AMSAT-BB


In Northern Colorado on June 5 the shadow of Venus will begin creeping across the disk of the sun near sundown. This happened eight years ago in 2004, but won’t happen again until 2117. It didn’t happen at all in the twentieth century, but twice in the 19th. In the 18th century, this transit of Venus sparked the powerful countries of the day to launch ships and take measurements that forever changed our view of the size of the solar system. Today, the same event may help us discover Earth-like planets around other stars. Yet, as one 17-year old said while waiting to get a view of the event in Sydney in 2004, “It’s a pretty big turnout for a dot.”
A shadow dot is all an observer will see. The dot punctures one rim of the sun’s disk; then plows across the face of our mother star for nearly 7 hours before exiting at the other side. Venus is partially eclipsing the sun as it passes in front of the Earth’s orbit. If Earth and Venus orbited the sun in precisely the same plane, this event would occur five times every eight years. Because Venus’ orbit tilts 3.40 relative to Earth’s orbit, Venus only provides her shadow show in a 243-year repeating pattern that consists of two transits 8 years apart separated by 121.5-year gaps.
In the 18th century, precise measurements of transit times from widely separated spots on the globe allowed scientists to estimate planetary distances using some basic trigonometry. History buffs may recall that Captain James Cook upheld British scientific expertise and honor by taking measurements on June 3, 1769 in Tahiti. Last year, Andrea Wulf wrote Venus—the race to measure the heavens, a book that details the personal trials and triumphs of the men and women that risked lives and careers to chronicle Venus’ moving shadow.
Today, scientists using the Hubble telescope will watch light from the event bounce off the moon. 1/100,000th of that sunlight will filter through the atmosphere of Venus revealing the chemistry of its atmosphere in spectroscopic “bar codes.” Because scientists already know what that chemistry is from space probes, their measurements will test the resolution of their technique. Astronomers currently use similar methods to look for and measure the chemistries of planets orbiting other star systems. Venus, a near sister of Earth in size and mass, serves as a good proxy for Earth-like planets elsewhere in the universe.
Venus’ heft and dimensions mask serious differences with our own water world that scientists still fail to understand completely. Venus blazes in morning and evening skies near our neighborhood star, the brightest object other than sun and moon in the sky, partly because she is closer to the sun, but partly because her perpetually cloudy atmosphere reflects a lot of light. If Venus ever had oceans, they have long since evaporated. Her carbon rides in the sky as carbon dioxide rather than locked in carbonate rocks as on Earth. Venus represents a greenhouse planet set on “high pressure broil.” Surface temperatures melt lead. Surface pressures exceed Earth’s by 90 times. Volcanoes fill the atmosphere with sulfur compounds. Venus turns sluggishly, providing a day that’s longer than her year.
The Soaring Eagle Ecology Center (SEEC) will hold a viewing event for the transit of Venus at Red Feather Lakes beginning at 4 pm on June 5. Current plans call for the event to be held at either RFL elementary school or adjacent SEEC land. The Northern Colorado Astronomical Society (NCAS) will equip several telescopes with solar filters. The sun CANNOT be viewed directly without eye damage. Observers not looking through properly filtered telescopes will need solar eclipse glasses, welder’s goggles, or paper to make a pinhole projector and screen. Other stations will feature physics and weather-related activities. See more complete details at the SEEC website: http://www.isbn.org/standards/home/isbn/us/isbnqa.asp.
Find a complete listing of local viewing events featured by NCAS throughout the summer (sometimes in conjunction with the City of Fort Collins Master Naturalists) at http://ncastro.org/Admin/Volunteer.htm. Another useful website containing detailed information about the Venus transit is http://transitofvenus.nl/wp/. They also have a page detailing eye safety at http://transitofvenus.nl/wp/observing/eye-safety/.
June skies will feature a full moon on the 4th with a partial lunar eclipse visible in the Americas at moonset, just before dawn. The Lyrid meteor shower peaks over the weekend of June 15 and 16 with up to 9 meteors per hour visible. On the morning of June 17 Venus joins the moon and Jupiter just before sunrise. Summer solstice occurs June 20. By then, only the memory of Venus’ shadow on the sun will remain—along with moon-reflected bar codes that may help tag other suns containing planets with rare and beautiful planets like our own—or near misses, like the glowing jewel of incendiary Venus.


A true binary star is a double star system that consists of a pair of stars that are gravitationally linked such that both stars are in orbit around their common centre of mass. Over half the stars in the sky are part of a binary star system.
Other stars might appear to be binaries, due to a line of sight effect even though they are not gravitationally bound. These are known as visual or optical doubles and are not true binaries.
A system of three gravitationally bound stars is known as a trinary star, ternary star or a triple star. A quadruple star is a system of four gravitationally bound stars, while systems with more than four stars are generally known as multiple stars.
Mizar and Alcor in the constellation Ursa Major are an example of a double star that can be visually recognised as two separate stars if you have good eyesight.
Although Mizar and Alcor move together, as members of the Ursa Major Moving Group, it has yet to be demonstrated conclusively that they are gravitationally bound. However, through a small telescope, Mizar can also be resolved as a double. In fact, Mizar is actually a quadruple system and Alcor is a binary, making a six-star system.
Stars can also be gravitationally bound to neutron stars or black holes. Binary black holes also exist, which can sometimes coalesce to form a single black hole giving off huge amounts of energy as well as gravitational waves, which were detected for the first time in 2016. See starparty.com/gravitational-waves-detected/
Note that a type Ia supernova is a supernova that occurs when a white dwarf in a binary system accretes material from its companion star causing it to explode.
See also Star Clusters.


A theory of the Universe which postulates that we live in a five-dimensional spacetime, though we are confined to a four-dimensional Slice of it. This model is still being explored as an accurate description of the Universe in which we live.
Dark-heaving—boundless, endless, and sublime, The image of eternity— the Throne of the Invisible...
From Lord Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage Canto IV, Stanza 183
The SXS project is a collaborative research effort involving multiple institutions. Our goal is the simulation of black holes and other extreme spacetimes to gain a better understanding of Relativity, and the physics of exotic objects in the distant cosmos.
The SXS project is supported by Canada Research Chairs, CFI, CIfAR, Compute Canada, Max Planck Society, NASA, NSERC, the NSF, Ontario MEDI, the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, and XSEDE.


Video: Scientist Says the Dead will Rise from the Grave
The first half of this lecture looks at various Bible verses that speak into the reality of the resurrection. The 2nd half (starting at about 15 mins in) looks at our chemical make-up and how some of the objections to resurrection don’t follow logically.
DrJamesTour: UPDATE 10/12/21: We deleted a portion of the original video regarding the comments on the origin of the universe. Being a scientist, I am held to different strictures than some other social media posters. Hence, correction is warranted. While one cannot re-run the creation of the universe and take data on it several times, the Big Bang model of the universe’s origin has certainly been exquisitely verified through mathematical prediction followed by experiment. The Einstein Field Equations, Thermodynamics, and the current state of the universe as measured by astronomy are used to predict the cosmic background radiation. When one puts the current observed conditions of the universe into the EFE and uses the universe as a homogenous and isotropic material of the observed mass-density, momenta, temperatures, etc., and then applies thermodynamics to that gas in the EFE, the consequent prediction is today’s currently observed cosmic microwave background radiation distribution. The physics test is this: if the EFE is true, and if thermodynamics is true, then the Black Body Radiation law dictates that the universe should be filled with the remaining Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) temperature of 2.725 Kelvin and its associated distribution function. That radiation is suggested to represents the leftover echo of the Big Bang. That prediction results from the above laws when given the “initial” conditions of this observed universe, those conditions determined by measurement. When one plays the solved equations in reverse, as it were, they arrive at the Big Bang. So, the Big Bang is the consequence of the Einstein equations, thermodynamics, and the current measurements of our universe. This cosmology falls apart when the universe is extremely small and extremely hot, very near the beginning, because there is no successful union of quantum mechanics with general relativity at this time. But the Hot Big Bang model’s agreement with the measurement of the CMB, for which Arno Penzias and Wilson won the Nobel Prize, is regarded as strong scientific evidence for this being the correct model of cosmology. (It suggests that the entire universe has a beginning analogous to the Genesis 1:1 description. However, care must be taken in fitting biblical events to scientific data, especially regarding the early chapters of Genesis. Scientific facts remain, as do biblical claims. Scientific data interpretations and biblical interpretations are both subject to change.) As for dark matter, scientists have shown that a large, non-radiating, gravitational mass exists in our universe, but the source of that mass and its properties unknown and under intense scrutiny. Finally, most things are measured using electromagnetic (EM) tools, and the highest precision measurements in the world are made with EM-based measurements. But there are other measurement methods such as mechanical techniques. If you found this helpful and a blessing to you or learned something new, please share and give this a like or thumbs up.
And if you haven’t already, please follow/like/subscribe, so you can stayed tuned in. God bless you. ~ http://drjamestour.com


CELESTRON Astronomical Telescope 80EQ PRO Multi-layer Coating HD Zoom Refractive Astronomical Telescope 80mm Caliber Clear Image Phone Holder 3X Barlow Lens LED Red Spot GPS Positioning of Stars High Magnification Telescope
High strength stainless steel tripod.
With clear imaging and high light transmission.
Accurate scale window, can be recognized from a distance.
Mobile phone holder, you can use your mobile phone to take photos at any time.
LED Red Light Spot Finder, have a big field of view.
Item name: CELESTRON Telescope 80EQ PRO
Model: 80EQ PRO
Objective Lens: 80mm
Focal Length: 900mm
Focal ratio: F11
Barlow lens: 3X
Diag mirror: 90°Erecting Prism
Optical structure: Refraction
Coating: Multi-layer Coating
Bracket type: Equatorial telescope
Tripod Material: Stainless Steel
Package Size: 103.8*36.6*24.2cm
Produt Weight: 7.9kg
Please do not use this telescope to directly observe the sun, otherwise it will cause permanent damage to your eyes!
There is a little of difference according to manual measurement.
Item color displayed in photos may be showing slightly different on your computer monitor since monitors are not calibrated same.
1*Stainless steel tripod


A swarm of tiny spacecraft propelled by a powerful laser could enable us to more rapidly explore space, and they would work as a network to map out the properties of bodies in our solar system like the sun and distant planets.
One possible method for reaching other planets and stars is by using a light sail, a thin material that can be pushed through space by particles of light, or photons, at high speed. …
No commitment, cancel anytime*
Offer ends 14th March 2023. *Cancel anytime within 14 days of payment to receive a refund on unserved issues.
Existing subscribers, please log in with your email address to link your account access.
Inclusive of applicable taxes (VAT)


KSat Stuttgart e.V. has successfully participated with its sensor MICU (Mineral Investigation Camera using Ultra-violet) in the NASA competition “Honey, I Shrunk the NASA Payload”. The competitions task was to propose payloads for a future moon rover of NASA. The proposals were evaluated in several categories and a total of 14 prizes were awarded.
With our proposal KSat reached second place in the category “Lunar Resource Potential” and won a prize money of 15.000$.


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Michael Acierno (DTM), two loggers from the Iceland Geosurvey, Matthew Roberts (IMO), Brian Schleigh (DTM), Bergur Bergsson (IMO) at the borehole strainmeter installation site in Iceland. (Alan Linde/DTM)
On the duPont Telescope at Las Campanas, we have a specialized astrometric camera, designed to measure the positions of stars with great accuracy. Here is DTM Postdocs Jackie Faherty and Jessica Donaldson on the catwalk. (Alycia Weinberger/DTM)
Richard Carlson and Finland field trip participants, left to right: Arto Luttinen, Riina Puttonen, Matti Kurhila, Elina Lehtonen, Sanni Turunen, Rick Carlson with Jussi Heinonen kneeling. (Richard Carlson/DTM)
A DTM team installing an additional borehole strainmeter in the Campi Flegrei volcanic area. (Alan Linde/DTM)
View of the beach at sunset from a meeting at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. Richard Carlson, 2015.from a meeting at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography of the University of California, San Diego. Richard Carlson, 2014.
This image shows the Milky Way galaxy extending diagonally across the top of the image, with the galactic center near the top middle. Mars is just below the galactic center as the pale red bright object near the center of the image. Scott Sheppard, 2014.


I’ve mentioned in the past that the International Space Station is easily visible to the unaided eye when it passes through the sky. That means it’s not hard to get pictures of it. Unless you have pretty fancy equipment you’ll only see it as a bright dot of light, but that’s still pretty cool, and worth a try.
This shot of the ISS is from a webcam at the Tellus Museum of Science in Georgia, which is part of the All Sky Fireball Network. That’s a collection of four cameras in the US southeast looking for bright meteors; the idea being that if one is caught by more than one camera the path can be calculated in three dimensions, and a location of any potential meteorite found.
The webcam shot of the ISS was happenstance, but inevitable; when you have a camera that looks up all the time it’ll get a shot of the space station eventually! But you don’t have to guess; go Heavens Above, enter your latitude and longitude (which you can get from Google Earth) and it will tell you just when interesting things will pass overhead.
With that knowledge beforehand, you can plan where to position yourself to get a picture. I’ve done it myself, and good shots aren’t hard at all.
On March 19, 2011, Ala’a H. Jawad and his nephew were photographing Orion, and didn’t notice they had something unusual until they looked at the pictures on the computer. You an see the result here: a streak left by a satellite, seen by accident. Ala’a looked it up, and discovered it was an Atlas Centaur booster launched on November 27, 1963! This was just days after JFK’s assassination, and only a couple of years after the U.S. put a man in space. But that booster is still up there, along with hundreds of other pieces of orbiting stuff you can photograph.
The point is, it’s not too hard to get pictures like these; you don’t need a telescope. Just preparation, a camera, and a tripod. So why not give it a shot?
Images credit: Tellus Science Museum. Tip o’ the lens cap to Joe Schulman and Ala’a H. Jawad; both used by permission.


Meteors explode across Santa Monica, buckling lifeguard stands while sending the world-famous Ferris wheel whirling across the beach.
Monkeys then descend on bat wings to signal the Mayan-calendar apocalypse forecast for Dec. 21, 2012.
“Hold it, hold it!” barks a Griffith Observatory lecturer, suddenly freezing the planetarium pyrotechnics overhead. “Oh, it’s the end of the world.
“Actually, the Mayan calender makes no such prediction. … The world will not end in December.”
So begins “Time’s Up,” the provocative new Griffith Observatory planetarium spectacle that opens May 31 at Los Angeles’ most visible landmark.
But while doomsday soothsayers say disaster will strike the planet four days before Christmas at the end of the 5,125-year Mayan calender, Griffith astronomers say: Relax, you can still buy your friends and family gifts for the holidays. And New Year’s will still dawn across an intact globe.
And even 500 years from now, they predict, Griffith Observatory will still serve as a beacon of scientific truth above Los Angeles.
“Not only that,” said observatory Director Edwin C. Krupp, an expert on ancient and modern astronomy. “Griffith Observatory will be open till midnight on the 21st, just to get over this difficult time.
“I’m personally looking forward to many more years of negotiating the next false prediction.”
The dark interpretation of Mayan prophecy has gathered steam for decades, leading up to the forecast end times.
Hollywood cranked out “2012,” featuring John Cusack, depicting a global pole shift that ended in worldwide cataclysm.
Meanwhile, nearly one in seven people around the world believes the Earth will end in his or her lifetime, according to a recent poll commissioned by Reuters. One in 10 is convinced the Mayan calendar foretells pending apocalypse.
To counter any last wills and testaments, some New Age naysayers said 2012 signaled a global shift in consciousness instead.
Rather than be victim of calamity, they said womankind can choose Earth’s destiny.
“Feminine power is taking over,” said Freydoon Rassouli, 68, of Encino, a transformational artist who paints flowing earth goddesses, heavenly spirals and bright new worlds. “This is what we need, because feminine power can bring world peace.
“This is about the Immortal Feminine – it’ll save us from disaster.”
More recent archeological discoveries in Guatemala show Mayan calenders went well beyond 2012 – even after Year 3500.
The 35-minute Griffith Observatory show, 1 1/2 years in the making, goes further in debunking a December to end all Decembers.
It looks at the nature of time.
Visitors to the Samuel Oschin Planetarium can crane their necks at the Big Bang that launched the universe 14 billion years ago.
They can soar over 8th century Tikal, center of the time-obsessed Maya, and then watch it crumble into ruin.
And they can ogle the cycles of the sun, moon and the heavens. And ponder radiant starlight energy.
All soaring over a future Los Angeles – with dinosaur shaped skyscrapers over the La Brea Tar Pits. With giant, oval-shaped wind turbines. And with its everlasting Hollywood sign.
The “Time’s Up” show, one of four featured at the planetarium, will debut May 29 during a Friends of the Observatory fundraiser. The public is welcome.
“The year 2012 is acting like a badly behaved celebrity,” said Krupp, who has led the observatory 38 years and visited 1,900 ancient sites around the world. “Frightful rumors and gossip are spreading. Dozens of books are marketing fears and exaggerations about the 2012 end times.
“Most of what’s claimed for 2012 relies on wishful thinking, wild pseudoscientific folly, and a level of paranoia worthy of `Night of the living Dead.”‘


A file or printable companion for Boom Cards
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Description: ʕ•́ᴥ•̀ʔっ Greetings! Students will read and answer questions about The Declaration of Independence. Great for use in lesson introduction, supplement, review, and quiz in the topic. ♥♡This download includes♡ ♥ ✅ Our Solar and Interstellar Space ✅ Worksheets ✅ Key ✅Wordsearch ✅Wordsearch Key ✅Crossword ✅Crossword Key When they are done, they'll be able to have the answers to questions such as: What is the difference between a planet and a dwarf planet, and what are some examples of dwarf planets in our Solar System? What is the Kuiper Belt, and what types of objects are found within it? Check awesome listings featuring Worksheets, Decks and Clip Art by Harborsidebay. After download, You will get a zipped file.


Astronomers reveal youngest radio pulsar
NATIONAL RADIO ASTRONOMY OBSERVATORY NEWS RELEASE
Posted: April 21, 2002
Astronomers using the National Science Foundation's (NSF) newly commissioned Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT) have detected remarkably faint radio signals from an 820 year-old pulsar, making it the youngest radio-emitting pulsar known. This discovery pushes the boundaries of radio telescope sensitivity for discovering pulsars, and will enable scientists to conduct observations that could lead to a better understanding of how these stars evolve.
Scientists have long suspected that a pulsar - a rapidly spinning, superdense neutron star - was born when a giant star ended its life in a cataclysmic supernova explosion observed in late summer of 1181, as suggested by Japanese and Chinese historical records. For the past 20 years, astronomers have searched this supernova remnant (3C58), located 10,000 light-years away in the constellation Cassiopeia, for the telltale pulsations of a newly born pulsar. Late in 2001, data from NASA's Chandra X-ray satellite confirmed its existence, but it remained an elusive quarry for radio telescopes.
"We believed from historical records and certainly knew from recent X-ray observations that this star was there," Camilo remarked, "but despite many attempts, no one had been able to find any radio pulsations from it because the signals are, it turns out, incredibly weak." For comparison, this pulsar's radio emission is some 250 times weaker than that from the famous pulsar in the Crab Nebula (the remnant of an explosion in the year 1054 recorded by Chinese astronomers and possibly also by Native Americans of the Anasazi tribe in modern-day Arizona and New Mexico).
"Although we knew what we were looking for," said Camilo "it took the new Green Bank Telescope with its unmatched sensitivity - and, importantly, location in the National Radio Quiet Zone - to make this remarkable detection."
A pulsar is formed when a massive star runs out of nuclear fuel and dies in a cataclysmic explosion called a supernova. The outer layers of the star are blown off into space, and are often seen as an expanding remnant shell of hot gas. The core of the star, with 40 percent more mass than our Sun, collapses under its own gravity to a sphere only about 10 miles in diameter, composed mostly of neutrons. These densest objects known in the Universe typically are born spinning very rapidly; the newly detected pulsar, known as PSR J0205+6449, presently rotates 15 times every second.
The spinning neutron star has very powerful magnetic and electric fields that accelerate electrons and other subatomic particles, causing them to emit beams of radio waves, X-rays, and other forms of radiation. If these beams intersect the Earth as the star rotates, we can then detect the pulsar, as it appears to flash on-and-off, much like a lighthouse. As the pulsar ages, it gradually slows down and loses its rotational energy. After a few million years it is no longer powerful enough to generate radio emission and "turns-off."
By detecting this pulsar in the radio spectrum, astronomers may now follow its evolution with greater ease and flexibility than with X-ray telescopes on satellites, study the pulsar emission mechanisms, and also characterize the dynamic interstellar medium between the Earth and the pulsar.
"Finding a radio pulsar this young could be somewhat of a gold mine for years to come," noted Camilo. "We can very precisely measure how its rate of rotation changes over time, potentially inferring fundamental clues about what causes a magnetized neutron star to spin down. We also will make valuable comparisons to the X-ray data, which may help us determine exactly how these objects generate and emit radiation."
The researchers also point to the fact that this discovery bodes well for the GBT being able to study additional young pulsars that have previously escaped detection. "By using this magnificent new telescope, we should be able to discover other very young pulsars that we surmise are there, but are simply too weak to detect by any other means," said Camilo. "Measuring the luminosity and spectrum of a large sample of these stars will be crucial for making an accurate census of pulsars in our Galaxy."
The researchers used the new Berkeley-Caltech Pulsar Machine to process the signals from the GBT and record them for later analysis.
The group led by Camilo in this investigation consists also of: Ingrid H. Stairs (NRAO Green Bank, West Virginia); Duncan R. Lorimer, Michael Kramer, Maura A. McLaughlin (University of Manchester, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Cheshire, U.K.); Donald C. Backer (University of California, Berkeley); Scott M. Ransom (McGill University, Montreal, Canada); Bernd Klein, Richard Wielebinski, Peter Muller (Max-Planck-Institut fur Radioastronomie, Bonn, Germany); and Zaven Arzoumanian (Universities Space Research Association/NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland).
The GBT is the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope. It was dedicated on August 25, 2000.
The National Radio Astronomy Observatory is a facility of the National Science Foundation, operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc.