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

Posters for Astronomy Day!

Tonight we had time to begin our posters for Astronomy Day. My assigned topic is Hipparchus the ancient Greek astronomer. While he's an exciting guy, I haven't found a whole lot of information on him, so I decided to fill my poster with lots of visual aids and bright colors.

Young Moon

Tonight on the way home from class I was lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the Young Moon through the clouds. The moon was in the west sky just below the Pleiades, but through the clouds, I wasn't able to get very long glimpses of those stars.

I wish I had a camera with me, but instead I found this picture, taken last night from Canada.

DRACO

Tonight I found the constellation Draco in the North sky. Draco rotates around the North Star (Polaris) and is visible most of the year. This is called circumpolar. The Cat's Eye nebula is in Draco, but I could not see it with my telescope.

PROPER MOTION

We did an exercise in lab tonight that showed us that the stars are not stationary. We plotted the stars in Orion as they appear today, then using math (ugh) we plotted them one million years ago and one million years in the future. We learned that the farther the stars move away from each other, the faster they move. This exercise was challenging as I have never been good at math, but luckily the ladies at my lab table were willing to share tips on how to solve the problems.

New Planet

Astronomers have used the VLA in New Mexico, a radio telescope, to focus on the star HL Tau. HL Tau is a young star, only 100,000 years old. From the images they collected, the astronomers have identified a planet that is currently forming. This find could help us learn how the Earth formed.

http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=6783

I tried to look for Mars in it's retrograde motion today, but from the information I found on the internet, the event has already passed. Peak times to see the retrograde was from Nov 07 - Jan 08. I did find this cool video demonstrating the event.



http://

Cassiopeia

I found Cassiopeia by looking north along the horizon. Cassiopeia forms a W. Ptolemy charted this constellation and it is still considered one of the 88 modern constellations. The ancient Greeks told the story of the vain queen Cassiopeia who thought she and her daughter Andromeda were the most beautiful on Earth. She was ultimately punished by Poseidon by being placed in the Heavens in a place where through half of the year she was upside-down.

Yes, I'm SIRIUS and don't call me Shirley...

I found Sirius tonight by looking in the Southern Sky. Through binoculars I could see it very brightly. Sirius is the brightest star in the sky (-1.47 mag)and is in the constellation Canis Major. It's nickname is the Dog Star.

Winter Triangle

Tonight I decided to try to find the Winter Triangle which contains Betelgeuse, Procyon, and Sirius. Facing south with my handy Star Wheel, I could see Procyon slightly to my left, Sirius more left and lower, and finally Betelgeus (in the constellation Orion) stright up.

Today on the Internet I read about the Cassini Satellite and it's current mission to test moon dust and photograph Saturn's moon Enceladus. In two days the satellite will pass close enough to caputre and test particles from the moon to determine which elements are present. It is known that ice and water exsist, but it will be new to find out what is mixed with them.

Earth from Mars

While searching NASA's webpage today I found this amazing photo of Earth taken from Mars via the HiRISE telescope currently at Mars on the Mars Orbiter. The only photos I've seen up to this point have been taken from space shuttles or Earth's satellites.

Lab Night

It was cloudy again. BOO! So instead of spending time outside, we were given sky maps for the month of March. I have already purchased a sky chart that looks like a wheel inside a card board frame. I have been using it when I look at the stars to familiarize myself with the constellations.

Cloudy again...

Viewing the BIG DIPPER

Tonight was a very clear, crisp night so I spend some time outside after class. I looked in the north sky and was able to see the asterism Big Dipper slightly to the left of center. I was only able to see three stars in the dipper handle. I could not notice a difference between Mizar and Alcor. I used the "pointer stars" in the bowl of the Big Dipper to find Polaris, the North Star.

I found this picture on the following site, which I found very helpful. It describes the polar constellations in clear, simple language:
http://my.execpc.com/60/B3/culp/astronomy/Spring/Polar.html

Viewing Orion

I volunteered for my lab group to view the constellation Orion and report in to the national survey being done called GLOBE at Night. I had taken a drive up to Green Bay and on the way home, noticed clear skies. I pulled the car over outside of Green Bay near Denmark (N44.385 W-87.872) From this vantage point I was able to see four stars in Orion's belt and I could see his sword. According to the handout, this was a level 5.
After I entered my data in on the site, I was able to see this map which indicates all of the individual entries.

Telescopes

Tonight in Astronomy we were shown the different telescopes that are available to us. We also had time to brainstorm for our class trip. I searched the internet to come up with ideas for places to visit and listed several for the class to think about.

I will be borrowing my parents' telescope for the remainder of the semester to hopefully get a better view of the heavens.

February 21, 2008

ONE SHOT, ONE KILL:
U.S. Navy Missile Strikes Down Dead Satellite

Today the Pentagon released a statement confirming a direct hit to the defunct spy satellite that was in danger of crashing into Earth, possibly injuring people with it's dangerous fuel. The satellie was 130 miles above the Earth at the time of impact. Relatively, the moon is in orbit 238,000 miles from Earth. International Space Station is 220 miles from Earth. A fireball was seen from the space observatory indicating that the dangerous fuel cell was hit. Most satellites that fall to Earth have no fuel left, but in this instance mechanical failure was to blame for the loss of power. This broken satellite has been falling back to Earth with a full fuel tank since 2006.

February 20, 2008

Tonight there was a total lunar eclipse. I have never took the time to observe an eclipse before, so being able to watch this one happen through a telescope was amazing. At 7:15 the eclipse could already be seen as a sliver of brown creeping across the moon, from the lower left corner. When I left campus around 8:15, nearly a quarter of the moon was in shadow. I continued to observe the eclipse from home with my family. By 9:30 pm the entire moon was a brownish color. From the research I did before class I learned that the full moon was in the constellation of Leo, with the brightest star being Regulus. Regulus, Saturn and the Moon would form a triangle.

Also tonight I was able to view Saturn using the telescope on campus. It was at the 8 o'clock position to the moon in the south east sky around 7pm. Through the telescope I could see the rings of Saturn, which we learned would not be visible soon due to Saturn tilting on its axis and the rings appearing edge-on. The following web site has a demonstration of Saturn tilting: http://demonstrations.wolfram.com/SaturnsDisappearingRings/aringRings/ .

February 19, 2008

Tonight the sky was finally clear so I braved the frigid temperature to do some sky gazing. The moon was nearly full, which I have researched and found that it's called a Waxing Gibbous. I attempted to take pictures of the moon, but it was so cold that my camera malfunctioned. So I'll attach a sample photo of a waxing gibbous moon. According to http://www.heavens-above.com/, the moon is in the constellation of Leo. Leo is the Lion, and sorta looks like a coat hangar. The brightest star in Leo is Regulus.

Plotting RA and DEC

Tonight in lab we practiced plotting stars on a chart using Right Ascension and Declination. RA is the equilivant of longitude and is measured in seconds, minutes, and hours. Declination is measured in degrees (both positive and negative starting at the celestial equator) and is the equilivant of latitude on Earth. This system was invented by the Ancient Greek astonomer Hipparchus (who I'm researching this semester).

Space Shuttle Goes Unsighted

At approximately 7:15 last night, February 7, the space shuttle and the space station crossed over Sheboygan in the Northwest sky. Unfortunatley, it was too cloudy to spot. Instead of gazing at the actual stars last night, we worked together in groups to make star globes. These turned out to be interesting low-tech tools for observing the sky, year round. To use them, you have to imagine yourself standing inside the globe, then you stand facing north and hold the globe with the current month facing you. From this point you will be able to see what positions the constellations are in at that time.

Will it ever clear up?

Well, since there are no clear skies in the forseeable future, I decided to do some surfing on the internet for astronomy topics to write about. I found two articles that caught my attention.

The first was titled "Cool Spacedust Survey Goes Into Orbit" by the staff writers at Space Daily, out of the UK. It's basically a press release for the telescope that will be launched this summer out of the Herschel Space Observatory. The students and astronomers at the University of Nottingham will study space dust for a three year period, focusing on dust more than a million light years away. This telescope will be twice as big as the Hubble and will be able to detect very very faint light.

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Cool_Spacedust_Survey_Goes_Into_Orbit_999.html

The second article that I read was titled "NASA to Beam Beatles' 'Across the Universe' Into Space" from the offical NASA website. Today (February 4) at 6pm central time, NASA will be transmitting the song 'Across the Universe' into space via Deep Space Network. Today's date marks the 40th anniversary of the song, and the 50th anniversary of NASA. The song will be aimed at Polaris 431 LY away.

The movie 'Across the Universe', which has nothing to do with space is also being released today, and on a personal note I loved the movie and recommend it to everyone.

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/universe/features/across_universe.html

January 31, 2008

Tonight was our first lab, and per instructions, I am setting up this web blog to record my diary entries.