Missed Mercury Again

Tonight after class I could see the Moon on the western horizon, but cloudy hazy conditions covered the spot where Mercury should have been.

Gemini

Using my handy Star Wheel, I was able to find the constellation Gemini tonight by looking northwest at around 10 pm. Pollux is the brightest star there. Gemini is often called the twins and is one of 12 constellations in the Zodiac.

Projects Revealed

Tonight the lab students who did an independent project each stood up and talked for a few minutes about what they did. I gave a PowerPoint lecture to the 4th grade class the Kohler Schools about the Milky Way Galaxy. The lecture lasted about 20 minutes and then I played a 6 minute video clip about perspective. During the lecture, if a student answered a question, I gave him/her a Milky Way candy bar.

I was impressed with the other students projects. Janette's Astronomy Day at her school was outstanding, and Travis' model of the Solar System looked great.

Looking For Mercury

According to www.astronomy.com, May is the best month to view Mercury. I indended on trying to look for it tonight after lab, but the cloud cover was still very low. It will be a magnitude -9, the brightest in the sky until May 8, so I will try again when it's clear.

Posters Part 2

I was able to finish my poster in lab tonight. I am happy to report that the entire board was filled, and I shouldn't have worried about having too much white space. It was very fun to see all the hard work that the other students have put into their topics.

GLOBE at night

I was excited to read this article this morning, and to learn that I was one of 6,838 people to take note of Orion at the end of March.

http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=6859

Strange Star Formations in M83

NASA has released a picture today that combines images from Galaxy Evolution Explorer (an ultra violet telescope) and VLA in New Mexico (a radio telescope). This image shows that stars are forming 140,000 light years outside of the galaxy proper, an area that was thought to be too far out to support star growth. The conditions that these stars have formed are thought to be much like during the immediate time after the Big Bang when metal was not widely disbursed throughout the universe. Scientists now feel that they are getting glimpses of what the universe was like then.


http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=6840