Quarter 2/ Observations #4

12/17/11

10:00 P.M to 11:00 P.M

Many circumpolar constellations were visible  and were (almost) directly overhead this time. I could see Cepheus and Cassiopeia with the greatest ease. Then I used Cassiopeia and my knowledge of our star charts to jump to Perseus and Andromeda. I think I also saw Camelopardalis with its trapezoidal shape. Unfortunately I could not find Cetus.

Jupiter, Mars, Orion, and even Sirius could be seen as well.

APOD 2.6

An Unusual Vein of Deposited Rock on Mars 
2011 December 12 

In the Endeavour Crater located on Mars there is a vein of minerals that the Mars Explorer Rover Mission, Opportunity, found. Veins are distinct, sheetlike bodies of minerals that are formed from the process of precipitation. This bit of information lends itself to the ideas of water being on Mars, life existing on Mars (at some point), and even Mars being capable of supporting life. The mineral line is about a thick "as a human thumb" and is composed mainly of calcium and sulfur. Personally, I find the idea of life and water on Mars both entertaining and intriguing; it shows how humanity scales in comparison to the universe and lends itself to our endless pursuit of knowledge.

*Water on Mars*

Quarter 2/ Observations #3

7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
My goal tonight was to identify as many constellations as I could with my focus primarily on the fall constellations. In the eastern sky the moon was full which made finding Cepheus, Andromeda, and Perseus hard but not impossible. I had used Pegasus above me as a jumping off point to locate most of the constellations; additionally, Jupiter and Cassiopeia were overhead. To the north was Draco and Ursa Minor (Polaris gave it away). In the southeast I could see Orion thanks to a trio of vertical stars, Orion's Belt. In the southwest there was Aquarius pouring water into Piscis Austrinus's "mouth". To the south Cetus could be interpreted based on the  constellations I was finding around it. Finally in the northwestern sky there was Lacerta the lizard, high in the sky, and the Summer Triangle was close to the horizon.

APOD 2.5

As Above, So Below
2011 December 3

The picture above was taken from atop the Medvednica mountain in Croatia. In the northern historical area of Croatia is Zagreb, whose lights dance playfully (like sunlight on the ocean) in the clouds above. The area featured is the Pannonian Basin which housed an entire ocean - the "Pannonian Sea" - during the Pliocene Epoch. The ocean of lights in the sky are almost reminiscent of the long lost sea that was here many years ago....

APOD 2.4

A Landslide on Asteroid Vesta
2011 November 28
Below should be a clip of Vesta's five hour rotation.

To find the most impressive cliffs and prominences in our universe, we should look towards the Asteroid Vesta. It boasts some of the steepest cliffs we have discovered, including an elevation of 22 kilometers. That's about three times Mount Everest's elevation (8.8 km.)! The gigantic space rock is 500 kilometers in diameter and is currently the focus of the Dawn Mission. The Dawn Mission's goal is to "characterize the conditions  and processes of the solar system's earliest epoch" by investigating two of the largest protoplanets (asteroids) that are still intact. As of now it has photographed an image that suggests huge landslides have occured along the asteroid's slopes.

From this point the Dawn Mission will travel down to a lower altitude orbit in order to better analyze Vesta's gravitational field. In 2012 it will blast away from Vesta's gravitational pull and investigate the only object in the asteroid belt that is larger - Ceres.

The Dawn Mission may prove instrumental in our understanding of the universe's early formation.

APOD 2.3

A Colorful Side of the Moon
2011 November 18

Pink Floyd was right to assume that "the dark side of the moon" could be colorful! Every month the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter uses its wide angle lens to capture the moon's surface that is not visible from Earth, then it uses stereo overlap to provide information regarding lunar topography. The process might seem redundant but each month the lighting on the moon changes; therefore we can methodically build up data on how different rocks react under different lighting conditions. The image displayed below should show the range of elevations portrayed with this false coloring, from highest elevation to lowest: white, red, green, and purple.

As you can see there is a large depression in the moon's surface near its southern pole, this is the South Pole-Aitken (SPA) basin. The basin reveals the moon's deepest minerals including its rich deposits for iron. If the moon holds minerals, it would be in our best interest to fund space programs and more shuttle missions.

Quarter 2/ Observations #2

Nov.15, 2011
7:00 P.M. - 7:20 P.M.
In the North/ Northeastern sky I saw one of our constellations of the week, Cassiopeia. Just above Cassiopeia I saw Andromeda and off to Cassiopeia's left was the upside-down house of Cepheus. Then I turned around and faced South and picked out the square of Pegasus. From that point I was able to jump to Aquarius the Water Bearer and then to Piscis Austrinus the Southern Fish, which was just above the horizon. The Summer Triangle was directly above me during this time and Jupiter was in the Eastern sky.
Total time observed = 20 minutes

Nov.16, 2011
5:30 P.M. - 6:10 P.M.
HALLELUJAH, I FINALLY SAW MERCURY! It has been fifteen days since my last trip to the beach and I was worried I would miss it again. My mum and I managed to catch the sunset and a couple of dolphins on camera while we were there. More importantly, we managed to make out Mercury just below Venus in the southwestern sky at precisely 6:10 P.M. It could not of been more opportune because we had just decided to leave before any sketchy people could show up on the dark beach! Also Jupiter was the most visible object in the eastern sky and the moon was waning gibbous today.
Total time observed = 40 minutes

Cumulative time observed = 1 hour

APOD 2.2

2011 November 9
Asteroid 2005 YU55 Passes the Earth
On November. 8, 2011, the asteroid 2005 YU55 passed through our moon's orbit. Thankfully we suffer no negative effects form this occurrence, but if the asteroid had hit Earth there would be varying degrees of damage depending on its impact site. If YU55 had hit land it would have caused a category nine earthquake and a city-size crater; however, if the impact site had been the ocean then the result would have been a tsunami. An asteroid hitting the sea would cause all the environmental damage an asteroid hitting land would but the energy being passed through a medium like water would cause mega-tsunamis capable of wiping out many different areas. Objects like YU55 are so faint and fast that they are hard to detect. This is a frightening realizations because it means that other potentially hazardous may still be out there. Perhaps an asteroid hitting the Earth in 2012 isn't such a ludicrous notion after all.

APOD 2.1

2011 November 2
NGC 7380: The Wizard Nebula

Why is NGC 7380 titled "The Wizard Nebula"? Did a self-proclaimed magician discover it, is it magic, or was there something "wizardly" about this nebula? Actually the open cluster was discovered by Caroline Herschel in 1787 and was given its name due to its appearance being reminescent of a medival sorcercer! The only powers it weilds are entirely scientific and based off the properties of gravity and solar wind; these powers include the production of new stars, and the ability to create/dissolve towers of gas that are light years in length! The Nebula itself resides in the constellation Cepheus -the King of Aethiopia- so we should be able to see this beautiful nebula year round.

Quarter 2/ Observations #1

At 6:40 P.M. I left my house and proceeded to drive three miles to Manasota Beach. The sky was completely clear except for a dark cloudy haze that covered the sunset. While I was hoping to see the sunset, my priority was seeing Mercury and Venus in the southwestern horizon. To pass the time I decided to skip shells on the waves in a manner similar to the way x-rays are focused  using paraboloid/ hyperboloid surfaces in a telescope. I found that a smaller incident angle would produce more shell skips. By applying this method I managed to reach a record of four shell skips that evening.. At ten minutes past seven I could see Venus through the cloud coverage. Unfortunately, Mercury did not shine as bright and I could not see it with the naked eye. I stayed on the beach till 7:20 and then decided to head home.

After finishing my homework for the night I went outside for one last look at the sky at around 8 P.M. Initially I could hardy make out any constellations; however, twenty minutes passed and my eyes adjusted to the darkness. Directly overhead  the Summer Triangle and its respective constellations were visible. Due east in the sky I saw the square of Pegasus hanging upside down.

Additionally, the moon was waxing crescent, but tomorrow it will be First Quarter.
Total observed time = 1 hour

Great World Wide Star Count

At 27.01368,-82.38721 (Latitude and Longitude)
Englewood, Florida
Magnitude 3 (used Cygnus)
*I already reported my findings on the website*

Quarter 1 / Observations #2

Oct.23,2011
Stargazing (8 P.M. - 10P.M)
We started off the night by looking up into the southwestern sky and observing Scorpius just above the horizon with Sagittarius pouring out over it. Using the binocular stand, we could observe a plethora of stars that ran through both constellations and comprising the Milky Way galaxy. Directly west, Delphinus and Job’s Coffin were visible over the shell parking lot. Opposite of Delphinus, lying in the eastern sky was Jupiter and Hercules. Jupiter had four moons that were visible through the telescope along with two weather bands going horizontally across its surface. Shortly thereafter we observed the Hubble Space Telescope orbiting above us at about 8:20 P.M; as the satellite came closer to us it got gradually brighter, peaked in brightness when it was directly overhead, and gradually decreased in brightness as it orbited away from us and through the constellation Pegasus. Approximately five satellites were spotted that evening: two on the binocular stand and three with the naked eye. Using a green laser pointer, we proceeded to star hop and identify constellations. We identified Cepheus by first finding Polaris in the northern sky and then we spotted Cassiopeia - which looks like a “lazy M or W” - in order to find Andromeda. Throughout the night we constantly referred back to Deneb, Altair, Vega, and even Alberio to find the Summer Triangle and identify the different Messier objects within their respective constellations. For example, in the constellation Lyra there were two binary star systems, one was vertically oriented and the other was horizontally oriented in the nighttime sky. Other observations include Fomalhaut, Ophiuchus, Serpens, Scutum, the Coathanger cluster(in Vulpecula), and Sagitta. Also the sky around Pine View was determined to be forth magnitude. The stargazing group collectively saw a meteor flash by at approximately 8:45 P.M. I personally managed to catch a glimpse of a meteor as it briefly streaked across the sky just as we were getting ready to begin observations.

APOD 1.8

2011 October 20
Tails of Comet Garradd

With binoculars or a small telescope, the Comet Garradd, which was discovered back in 2009, will be passing through the constellation Hercules over the next few months. The comet sports several tails and has a green glow about it, so it should be interesting to observe in the nighttime sky. Additionally the comet is 2 A.U. (186,000,000 miles)away from us and is intrinsically large. Perhaps the Comet Garradd will be visible this coming stargaze Sunday night.

This article got me wondering, what are the differences between a comet and an asteroid? After doing a bit of research I have found a few of these differences. A comet is a celestial object believed to be composed primarily of frozen space dust and gases. A comet follows an orbit around a star and as it approaches a star it will melt, releasing its frozen space dust. On the other hand, a meteor does not follow an orbit. Also a meteor is not a meteor until it enters Earth's atmosphere - until then it is a meteoroid. I also found that there are other celestial objects that I did not account for until I finished reading, including  the differences between asteroids, meteors, comets, and meteorites.

APOD 1.7

MAGIC Star Trails
2011 October 14
On the Canary island of La Palma there are a pair of MAGIC telescopes that capture air showers of high-energy particles that results from high energy gamma radiation/photons impacting the atmosphere! Of course these telescopes are not truely "magic", they are really quite scientific.These Major Atmospheric Gamma Imaging Cherenkov telescopes were the collaborative effort of about 150 researchers from Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Poland, Finland, Bulgaria, Armenia and the United States. Today only MAGIC-I is the only one that is operational, but it stands as the largest gamma ray telescope we have! Most gamma ray detectors require the use of a ballon or satelite to get above the Earth's gamma-ray-absorbing-atmosphere; however, the MAGIC telescope uses this problem to its advantage, by making the atmosphere part of the detector! The radiation shower is picked up by the satelite by means of using Cerenkov light reflected from its mirror, detected in the focal plane by one or many photomultipliers, and then converted from optical signal into an electronic signal to record the gamma-ray event.

John Flamsteed

Fuerst 1

Richard Fuerst

Mr. Percival

DE Astronomy

14 October 2011

John Flamsteed

            John Flamsteed was born in Denby, England, 19 August 1946 to Stephen and Mary Flamsteed. His father was a prosperous businessman who abhorred John's desire to be an astronomer. Additionally, John's mother and stepmother both died early on in the young astronomer's childhood. Coupled with a serious rheumatic condition at age 14 and frequent incapacitation,  John's father denied his sickly son the chance to attend university in 1662. The father's decision turned out to be a mixed blessing for John Flamsteed as he was left to his own interests, namely the stars above.

            John made his debut into the field of astronomy in 1669 when he anonymously submitted his lunar occultations for 1670. This would lead to his meeting with Sir Jonas Moore, a man with connections to the King Charles II. Together the two astronomers would convince the king that there was a strong need for accurate measurements of celestial objects for navigation; afterwards the king would setup an observatory in Greenwich and designate John Flamsteed as "Astronomer Royal". In 1684 he was granted a place to stay in Surrey, which was not far from Greenwich, and later in 1692 he would marry a lovely lady by the name of Margaret Cooke. From his new

Fuerst 2

position, Flamsteed decided to rectify the tables of the motions of the heavens, a feat originally taken on by Tycho Brahe a century earlier. With his data he constructed three different tables: one supported Horrox's lunar theory, Doctrine of the Sphere (1680) which came close to predicting the sun's true eccentricity values of .01675, and Whiston's Praelectiones astronomicae (1707). All these represent Flamsteed's refusal for his predecessor's inaccuracies and his adoption of more modern astrological ideas. In the years following 1689, Flamsteed achieved the precise latitude of Greenwich (51° 28' 38"), the obliquity of the ecliptic, the position of the equinox, and then the method he used to observe absolute right ascensions. Using matched occasions at which the sun had identical meridian altitudes near each equinox, he measured the time intervals between the passage of the sun and a bright star across the meridian. Halving the difference between the two time intervals then located the solstice and gave the star’s right ascension. He used this method to determine the positions of forty stars that he would use as references, Flamsteed found the rest of his 3,000-star catalog from readings he had taken previously with a sextant.

            John's accurate fundamental astronomy would not go by unnoticed and beginning in 1704 there were two famous astronomers who wanted more than anything to pry the unverified observations from John Flamsteed, Isaac Newton and Edmond Halley. Eventually the two cohorts managed to publish a pirated version of John's observations in 1712. Later in 1714 John was able to have the pirated version burned except for seventy-nine pages. Unfortunately he died in Greenwich on Dec.31,1719 and he never got to see his work get published; however, his wife

Fuerst 3

managed to see his work released in Historia Coelestis Britannica (1725) and in its companion Atlas coelestis (1729). Despite a rough childhood, crippling health problems, and the animosity of his colleagues, John Flamsteed managed to accomplish a great deal for the field of astronomy through his meticulous industry and phenomenal mathematical ability.

APOD 1.6

2011 October 1 Asteroids Near Earth
There is good news for everyone on Earth; the inner solar system has less asteroids in the mid-size range than previously speculated. This means there is less of a chance we will collide with an asteroid and end up like the dinosaurs from 65 million years ago. Thanks to NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, we can more easily detect asteroids using infrared imaging. Using this technology astronomers now know that there are 40% less mid-size asteroids than indicated by visable light searches. All asteroids are heated by the sun so they all are displayed equally well in infrared imaging; however, the previous technique of visable light searches gave incorrect data since an asteroid's individual albedo was based on the metallic composition of it outer layer. In short the shiner the surface the brighter and larger the asteroid appeared, and visa versa. Now that this bias has been dispelled I feel a bit safer knowing that science has found more evidence against our imminent demise in 2012.

APOD 1.5

2011 September 26
Mars' southern pole houses a ice cap of carbon-diaoxide that sublimates every year during the martian summer. When the carbon dioxide sublimates it converts directly from dry ice to its gaseous form of matter. What I find most interesting is the gold dust-like substance that surrounds the permanetly frozen portions of the caps. Currently we have no idea what this substance is yet. This just proves how vast and mysterious the universe is to us still! The exciting things waiting to be discovered are theoretically limitless!

The image of this dust was captured by the HiRISE camera on the Mars Observational Orbiter. The orbiter was launched in 2006 and since then has only captured 1% of Mars' surface at its high resolution quality.

In the coming winter seasons the gas will once again freeze and form larger ice caps.

P.S. Dry ice can be made to use comets! http://www.dryiceinfo.com/science.htm

Neat!

Sources for John Flamsteed

Printed Source:
"Flamsteed, John." Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Vol. 5. Detroit: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2008. 22-26. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 27 Sep. 2011.
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?&id=GALE%7CCX2830901448&v=2.1&u=fl_sarhs&it=r&p=GVRL&sw=w


Electronic/Web Source:
Anonymous. "Greenwich England: John Flamsteed." Greenwich England: Home Page of World Heritage Site - Royal Observatory, Cutty Sark, Maritime Museum, Queens House, Millennium Dome. Greenwich 2000, 27 Sept. 1995. Web. 27 Sept. 2011. <http://wwp.greenwichengland.com/heritage/people/astronomers/flamsteed.htm>.

Podcast 1.1

Sky watch Podcast

6/30/11

The Hubble Telescope has found an almost “fountain of youth” for stars in a classification of stars known as The Blue Stragglers or “born again stars”. They are the hottest and bluest, but burn out first leaving behind yellow stars like our sun and other dwarf stars. In addition, when compared to other stars around them they appear to be lagging behind in the aging process. Never have Blue Stragglers been detected in our own Milky Way galaxy… until now! The Hubble Telescope has located forty-two of these “oddball” stars; however, there is still no concrete explanation on how these aging stars change into youthful looking blue hot stars. There is one idea regarding this transformation. A pair of closely orbiting stars make one, massive star, when this happens their hydrogen is stirred up. This makes the newly merged stars hotter and bluer, resulting in Blue Stragglers.

The most important star in the universe has no name and is not even visible to the naked eye. What makes it special is that in 1923 Edwin Hubble discovered it was in a special class of pulsating star known as Cepheid variable stars. The rate at which they pulsate is a direct indication of their true brightness, which can then be measured to record actual distance. The variable star that Hubble analyzed (in Andromeda) was located outside the Milky Way; this proved that there are other galaxies outside our own. This expanded our knowledge of the known universe as Edwin Hubble proved that stars could exist outside our galaxy. Nearly a century later we can use the Hubble Space Telescope to look onto these distance galaxies and verify his results.

APOD 1.4

September's Aurora
2011 September 23
Today is the day that we will experience (roughly) twelve hours of daylight and twelve hours of darkness under the Atumnal Equinox. Equinox itself means equal night. Another notable feature of this change is the beginning of auttum in the northen hemisphere. This season (along with spring) brings with it many geomagnetic storms. Amazingly enough these storms are caused by "solar winds" that hit Earth's magnetosphere, causing electrons and protons to be knocked loose and percipitate from the sky. This light is then carried along towards the poles, which explains why we almost never see any magnetic storms in Florida. The one time I remember seeing something like this was on Halloween in 2003, but since then I have yet to experience another geomagnetic storm. Hopefully one day I can travel north and see much an Aurora Borealis.

Quarter 1 / Observations #1

September. 22, 2011

I saw moon today in school parking lot around 6:50 A.M, was directly overhead and waning crescent. 6:50 A.M. - 6:55 A.M.

I saw the sunset around 7:10-7:15 P.M on the horizon.

I stayed out from 8:00 to 8:45 P.M because thunderstorms ruined my sky.

I was told the Autumnal equinox is tomorrow, I wonder if this will change the constellations in the sky tomorrow.

September. 16, 2011

At 6:00 A.M. saw a red light in the eastern sky, Mars maybe?

Jupiter is small and bright this morning. It is relatively close to the moon now, just to the right of it in the sky.

Moon is waning gibbous.

6:00 A.M. -6:10 A.M.

September. 11, 2011

I saw harvest moon at 8:30 P.M. in the eastern sky. The moonlight was extra bright tonight.

I went looking for constellations and saw the Summer Triangle (Vega, Altair, and Deneb).

I could not make out Aquila or Lyra.

Clouds started to cover the sky around 8 P.M.

7:30 - 8:30 P.M.
P.S - Harvest moon is orange.

Total observation hours so far... 2 hours and 5 mins.

APOD 1.3

Great Orion Nebulae
2011 September 13
One of the greatest and brightest nebulas in the night sky is visable now just south of Orion's Belt. This is known as the "Great Orion Nebulae", "Great Nebula in Orion", or even M42. It is made of of two nebula in close proximity to one another the one on the right is full of gaseous young stars making it appear red, while the nebula to the left is actually a reflection nebula. In addition, it is estimated to be 24 light years across and be the closest reigon of massive star formation to Earth. I think it will be exciting to look for this bright cluster in tonight's sky; thank goodness I can see it with my naked eye!

APOD 1.1

Nov.20,2008

Endeavour in the Moon


On the 10th anniversary of the constructing of the International Space Station, the space shuttle "Endeavour" would embark on the 27th launch to the International Space Station. What was truly remarkable (and beautiful) about this spectacle was the launch coinciding with the moon in perigee. The moon is in perigee when it is closest to the Earth in it elliptical orbit, this gives us the chance to see the the largest full moon possible. Unfortunately, there will not be another one till 14th November 2016, but by then the world will have already ended in 2012!

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap081120.html

APOD 1.2

2011 September 7
"SDSS J102915+172927: A Star That Should Not Exist"

The Sloan Sky survey catalogued a new star that has the lowest amount of metals yet. This would indicate that the star is one of the oldest ever studied since newer star tend to have more heavy metals such as lithium in them. What I found surprising was the "Population" numbering of stars that is used to differentiate between the ages of stars in the galaxy. In addition, I did not know that hydrogen is the most abundant element in the galaxy (about 90% of it) with helium is the second most abundant element. Besides random trivia, I learned that the population grading scale, that goes from I,II, III or earliest to latest stars, actually does not apply to SDSS because it is fifty times less lithium than what was thought to be needed for stars to form. This 13-billion old star, that exists in the constellation Leo and is 4/5ths the size of our own sun, is just one of a new group of stars that are smaller and less "metallic" than ever before. Maybe we can look forward with great anticipation for a new category of stars, Population IV!

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110907.html