MetaFilter posts tagged with astronomy and galaxy

Galaxy Zoo 2

Upton O'Good — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 21:10:22 -0800

Galaxy Zoo 2: Help astronomers sort through 250,000 galaxies! The Sloan Digital Sky Survey found hundreds of thousands of galaxies which needed to be accurately classified; the original Galaxy Zoo project was a collaborative effort by tens of thousands of volunteers around the world to sort these galaxies into spiral and elliptical categories. Now, it's entered its second phase: describing the details of these galaxies. Read the tutorial, and then you can jump in and start classifying. For those interested in the science from the first Galaxy Zoo, there's a brief rundown on the site, and a number of papers on arXiv. Galaxy Zoo has appeared previously here [1,2], and features Mefi's own edd.

Make That A RASPBERRY Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster

EmpressCallipygos — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 15:55:16 -0800

Astronomers searching for amino acids in space have discovered something unexpected -- the center of our galaxy tastes like raspberries and smells like rum. Scans of the Sagittarius B molecular cloud near the galaxy's center have turned up a good number of ethyl formate molocules; ethyl formate smells a lot like rum, and is one of the components of the flavor of raspberries. However, alongside the ethyl formate molocules, they also picked up evidence of 50 other interstellar molecules in the vicinity of a new-formed star. The size and complexity of the ethyl formate molecules suggests that larger proteins could also form in space -- what they'll smell like, though, is anyone's guess.

Sagittarius A*

Kronos_to_Earth — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 00:02:07 -0800

A sixteen year long astronomical study, led by Dr. Reinhard Genzel of the Max-Planck-Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, has provided what is considered to be the best empirical evidence yet of the existence of supermassive black holes, specifically one a relatively cozy 27,000 light years away.... "The stellar orbits [QT] in the Galactic Centre [QT] show that the central mass concentration of four million solar masses must be a black hole, beyond any reasonable doubt." A video describing the study; more photos and video here.

GalaxyZoo First Anniversary

flug — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:37:06 -0800

Today is the first birthday of Galaxy Zoo. The largest astronomical collaboration in history, Galaxy Zoo has enlisted nearly a 150,000 volunteers to help classify over a million galaxies and released four science papers. It's made a number of interesting discoveries such as a large number of ring galaxies, Hanny’s Voorwerp, and a large number of visually (but not physically) overlapping galaxies. You can help classify galaxies or classify galaxy mergers. Don't miss the visual catalog of over 250 Objects of the Day--pretty much every one of them stunning.

Billions and Billions

Blazecock Pileon — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 00:38:08 -0800

Billions and Billions astrophotography CCD gallery / film gallery / equipment / tutorials

My God, it's full of stars!

Irontom — Fri, 10 Oct 2003 05:41:54 -0800

Breathtaking Hubble picture of the Sombrero Galaxy (also identified as M104). The Hubble Heritage team took the original images during May and June of this year using the Advanced Camera for Surveys and multiple color filters. They then stitched 6 images together to make the final composite image.

3-D Maps of Nearby Space

kirkaracha — Fri, 30 May 2003 12:36:11 -0800

3-D Maps of Nearby Space "The first detailed map of space within about 1,000 light years of Earth places the solar system in the middle of a large hole that pierces the plane of the galaxy...The new map, produced by University of California, Berkeley, and French astronomers, alters the reigning view of the solar neighborhood." (one view|another view|links to bigger images)

samsara — Wed, 07 Aug 2002 16:14:00 -0800

A computer aided simulation builds a spiral galaxy from its beginning. In all, 390,000 particles were placed in an arrangement similar to a newborn galaxy. The end result after three months is an event that is believed to take billions of years to occur. (animation)