MetaFilter posts tagged with astronomy

The Leonid Meteor Shower 2009

nickyskye — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 16:34:18 -0800

NASA's Fluxtimator helps calculate the meteor shower activity in your area. There will be one of the biggest meteor shower events of our lifetime, the Leonid Meteor shower of 2009. Start time: this Monday November 16, 2009 at 11:00pm EST. End Time: Tuesday, November 17, 2009 at 4:00am EST (best 2am to 4 am EST). An Atomic Age song in mp3 to celebrate: What Is A Shooting Star. What Is A Shooting Star, written by Hy Zaret and Lou Singer and originally recorded by Tom Glazer for the 1959 album Space Songs. National Geographic says, "you may see anywhere from 30 to 300 shooting stars an hour, depending.." NASA and Caltech say up to 500 an hour. Quoting Orin K, a friendly, generously informative astronomy geek on FaceBook: "If you can see stars directly over head, you will see the brighter meteors only. It's best to get out of town or go to a larger park with trees If you are interested in finding a USA or Canada dark sky site near you, check out this site:http://cleardarksky.com/csk/ and an interesting Calif example observing spot off Rte 40- http://cleardarksky.com/c/AmbyCtCAkey.html?1 Find this on google maps with satellite and terrain views. Use the light pollution map choice to find dark areas near you. Use the sites by state or miles, mouse over pins for site name, dbl click to find next 48 hr forecast of seeing conditions. Black and blue pins are darker sites. Makes Maps, etc. Also, google and install - Cartes du Ciel - free software. Also, well before you leave, check out ( when it is working! ) - the GOES 12 live view satellite 6 hr visible and infrared 6 hr animation to see the cloud flow patterns in your area of interest: http://wwwghcc.msfc.nasa.gov/GOES/goeseastconus.html Get advice from local astronomy clubs. Take Lawn Chairs or thick foam pads, sleeping bags, layered clothing, wool caps, hand warmers, warm drinks. camera, 24mm lens at f2.8 with 20 second or more exposure, on tripod, and shutter cable trigger or 10 second count down shutter release. No binoculars or telescopes needed - just look up. The head stars of Constellation Leo will be rising after the Gemini Twins and the planet Mars in the northeast after midnight. Record brightness and direction of travel. Do clear nights Nov 16-19, but 11PM to dawn on 17 into 18 is best. Also think badly of ground fog, local light domes from cities, farmyard lights. As Ever, Orin, near Chicago." What do the colors under the "light pollution" column mean? Viewing suggestions in California l on the East Coast. The most famous depiction of the 1833 Leonid meteor showers. Previously

The sun is a mass of incandescent (Blue) gas...

Taft — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:30:38 -0800

Astronomy Picture of the Day presents a truly magnificent sight: the blue sun.

I miss Carl Sagan.

jiawen — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 23:06:54 -0800

I miss Carl Sagan . I miss Carl Sagan . I miss Carl Sagan . Previously. Inspired by .

Bubble Nebula

homunculus — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 11:44:13 -0800

Reprocess of Bubble Nebula Data. NGC 7635, also called the Bubble Nebula, is an emission nebula in the constellation Cassiopeia. It's created by stellar winds from a superhot star 40 times the size of our sun which whip the cloud of gas around the star into a bubble. [Via]

Much Cooler Than Ceiling Cat!

cjorgensen — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 18:45:18 -0800

There's ceiling cat, then there is this! Be sure to watch the video. (via.)

The Sun Is a Miasma of Incandescent Plasma

Upton O'Good — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 21:49:59 -0800

...the lyrics to that last song were basically taken from an encyclopedia written in the 50s, and since the 50s, some remarkable things have happened...

In 1959, a number of songs about science were released on an album called Space Songs. One of these was later covered by the band They Might Be Giants: Why Does The Sun Shine? (The Sun Is A Mass of Incandescent Gas). Only one problem: it isn't--the song was based on an incorrect text from 1951. So they wrote an answer song to themselves: Why Does The Sun Really Shine? (The Sun Is a Miasma of Incandescent Plasma). Bonus link: see for yourself! (previously)

Please Prepare For Landing

msalt — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 10:33:36 -0800

1,512 high-resolution images of Mars from the viewpoint of an airplane passenger. Previous photos: 1 2 3

cosmic spiral visuals

nickyskye — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 07:56:21 -0800

The Anatomy of Spiral Arms, shows how galaxies naturally evolve to form grand-design two-arm spirals. The Hubble Ultra Deep Field in 3D. A Visual Dictionary of Special Plane Curves. Spiral galaxies make up approximately 60% of galaxies in the local Universe. The Equiangular Spiral Grand Design Spiral Galaxy M81 l Barred Spiral Galaxies Are Latecomers to the Universe From SpiralZoom, an intriguing tidbit on spiral consciousness, from I am a Strange Loop Previously.

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.

Saturn's Rings to Disappear Tonight

filthy light thief — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 12:17:04 -0800

August 11th marks the coming of Spring to Saturn's northern hemisphere, when the 170,000 miles wide rings turn edge-on to the sun and reflect almost no sunlight. The rings are only some 10 meters (30 feet) thick and made of mud and ice. As Saturn shifts towards its once every 15 year equinox, out-of-plane structures will cast long shadows across the rings' broad expanse, making them easy to detect (previously). Though you can't see the rings with the unaided eye, professional and amateur astronomers have captured the gas giant in its transition towards the equinox.

St. Lawrence cried like a baby

IvoShandor — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 00:30:10 -0800

As Earth continues its pass through the debris field left by periodic Comet Swift-Tuttle on August 11 and 12, the annual Perseid Meteor Shower could deliver a double peak and a brief period of up to 200 meteors per hour. Even though a 66% gibbous moon promises to obscure many of the faint meteors, dozens could still be visible, including the always spectacular "eart hgr azers". Viewing tips abound, but basically find a dark spot (preferably away from the city), lay on the ground and stare at the sky between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. local time. The radiant, or where the meteors appear to originate from geek-speak style, is found near the constellation Perseus in the northeast sky. The 2009 Perseids have actually already started, but special attention is to be paid around 0800 UDT (1 am PDT) when Earth will pass through a more dense than usual area of the debris field left by Swift-Tuttle. Spaceweather.com already has some '09 photos compiled. Last year, amateur astronomers observed Perseids striking the Moon. What will this year bring? It probably won't be what it's like when worlds collide but it promises to be quite impressive, even with the Moon trying to spoil the show. (Prev-iou-sly on Me-Fi)

Jupiter under fire

flug — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 00:02:21 -0800

Sunday morning amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley captured a photo of an apparent asteroid or comet strike on Jupiter. Alerted by the announcement on the ALPO-Jupiter email list, other amateurs soon posted follow-up images. Coincidentally, the discovery came exactly fifteen years after Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 hit Jupiter, leaving a series of black impact clouds similar to the one discovered by Wesley. If you're interested in keeping abreast of the latest observations of the planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, Venus, the Sun, the Moon, comets, minor planets, and so on each have their own page and email list on the Association of Lunar and Planetary Observers web site. If you have a small telescope you can observe the impact yourself--Jupiter is perfectly placed for observing just now, rising about 10PM and setting about 8AM. Locater charts & info here. (Note that some of the Jupiter photos also show the shadow of a moon, which is close to perfectly circular and near Jupiter's equator. The impact crater is near the south pole, which is at the top of most images. The impact crater is dark, but not as dark as the moon's shadow, and slightly fuzzy.)

The Size of Things

nola — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 15:13:16 -0800

Welcome to the Universe - III: The Size of Things . . .we take a breif trip through the Solar System and beyond to see the size of the Universe. A youtube video by AndromedasWake about the scale of the Universe.

Zeta Reticuli is watching the Brady Bunch

Artw — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 09:19:22 -0800

If extraterrestrial civilizations are monitoring our TV broadcasts, then this is what they are currently watching.

Happy 40th anniversary, mankind.

sexyrobot — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:01:13 -0800

Moon Landing Tapes Found! All the videos you've seen of the first moon landing are crap. Remember, back in the day, video cameras and recorders were two different things. So it went like this: camera on moon sends footage to Australia, where it's recorded on tape (and then those tapes were lost), then downsized onto a smaller monitor, which is filmed by another video camera, uploaded to satellite, and disseminated around the world. America watches it on TV, cheers. Some of this footage is filmed off of a television onto 16mm film. This is what goes into the national archives. Crap. So, the original tapes have been found (spoiler: they never left Australia). So what, right? How good could they be, recorded back in the late 60's and all? Pretty darn good, apparently...seems recording heads were much better than the output available at the time (like playing a Blu-Ray disc on a B&W TV), and several recent projects have shown that it's possible to extract very high resolution data from these old analog tapes. How hi-rez? High enough to see Neil Armstrong's nipples get hard. (be sure to click on that picture) So when can we see this amazing footage? Probably soon.

It's full of stars

Hactar — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:06:50 -0800

One of the hardest things for people to understand about the universe is just how big it is. There are three approaches typically used in describing its size. The first, the song, was pioneered by Monty Python (NSFWish, wireframe of naked woman) and then done just as masterfully by the Animaniacs. The second, the zoom method has been featured twice before here on the blue. The third method is the comparison method (skip to 1:30, unless you like looking at a image of the solar system with terrible distorted orbits), yielding some truly beautiful videos (this one found via the fantastic Bad Astronomy blog). These videos go, at most, as far as looking at the local cluster or the Virgo Supercluster. There are two videos that attempt to show the size of the entire universe, one unsuccessfully (although with great music) and one successfully. (Warning, all links except the first one, are to YT videos). (These links are not YT videos, with the one noted exception) The last video shows the Sloan Great Wall (although it confuses the entire image with just the wall itself, which is only the largest galaxy filament (large mpg of a filament) that we can see in the sky. These filaments create the large scale structure of the universe, resembling a web or a cotton ball. (YT Video) Once one looks larger than the filaments, one hits the "End of Greatness", where the universe appears homogeneous. (This can be seen, more or less, in the first link.) Finally, and perhaps the best link of the bunch, more pictures and videos of similar things from the Max Planck Institute of Astrophysics.

The seeming nonsensicalness of this incredible universe

l33tpolicywonk — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:50:13 -0800

"Workmanlike" astronomy: The Vatican Observatory, among the oldest astronomical centers in the world, brings a team of Jesuits to the papal summer residence. Its scientists play a large part in the church's efforts to reconcile faith with reason. [Previously.] George V. Coyne, SJ, former director of the observatory, writes:

The universe as we know it today through science is one way to derive analogical knowledge of God. For those who believe modern science does say something to us about God, it provides a challenge, an enriching challenge, to traditional beliefs about God. God in his infinite freedom continuously creates a world which reflects that freedom at all levels of the evolutionary process to greater and greater complexity. God lets the world be what it will be in its continuous evolution. He does not intervene, but rather allows, participates, loves. Is such thinking adequate to preserve the special character attributed by religious thought to the emergence not only of life but also of spirit, while avoiding a crude creationism? Only a protracted dialogue will tell.

The speech may have ruffled some cardinal feathers.

Star light, star bright, how many stars can I see tonight?

filthy light thief — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 23:51:10 -0800

"The arc of the Milky Way seen from a truly dark location is part of our planet's natural heritage," said Connie Walker, and astronomer from the U.S. National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson, Arizona. Yet "more than one fifth of the world population, two thirds of the U.S. population and one half of the European Union population have already lost naked eye visibility of the Milky Way." In these areas, people are effectively living in perennial moonlight. They rarely realize it because they still experience the sky to be brighter under a full moon than under new moon conditions. "Reducing the number of lights on at night could help conserve energy, protect wildlife and benefit human health," astronomer Malcolm Smith of the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. One study found an increased risk of breast cancer for women living in areas with the most light pollution (abstract). Some communities are embracing their dark skies, such as the New Zealand community of Tekapo, possibly home to first "Starlight Reserve," waiting on UNESCO's official approval. Not sure where to look in the vast night sky? Follow some guidelines, or check the view in Chile, Queensland, Australia, or Texas.

HD videos from Kaguya

Rinku — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 21:07:51 -0800

The lunar orbital spacecraft Selene, better known by its Japanese name Kaguya, has been sending back some incredible HD video, including some of Earth rising and the Moon's surface. Many more videos from (and about) Kaguya here, with English versions of some here. Kaguya, named after the moon princess in perhaps Japan's oldest folktale, The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, will impact the surface of the moon on June 10th. Kaguya previously.

The Curious Case of the Missing Sunspots

Electric Dragon — Wed, 20 May 2009 04:48:24 -0800

Solar activity normally follows an 11-year cycle. The new cycle was originally predicted to start in early 2008, but despite a few sunspots appearing last year, the Sun still features a remarkable lack of activity - the deepest minimum since 1913. However, NASA's STEREO mission has seen indications that activity is increasing again, in the form of a coronal mass ejection (video [.mov, 3.3 Mb]), with an accompanying radio burst.

[Previously]

But that's where the fun is

dhartung — Fri, 15 May 2009 15:01:12 -0800

Atlantis. Hubble. And a big, yellow friend. Astrophotographer Thierry Legault managed to get amazing shots of Space Shuttle Atlantis approaching the Hubble Space Telescope during a transit of the sun. Don't do this at home, kids. (His site is down, so the link is through Coral.)

"And then I said, 'why not call it Pluto?' And the whole thing stemmed from that."

Morrigan — Mon, 11 May 2009 16:02:22 -0800

Venetia Phair, who named Pluto as a child, dies at 90. The subject of a short film, "Naming Pluto," observed, " "It's interesting isn't it, that as they come to demote Pluto, so the interest in it seems to have grown," she says. Pre vious ly.

Gamma-Ray Burst

homunculus — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 17:40:59 -0800

New burst vaporizes cosmic distance record. "NASA's Swift satellite and an international team of astronomers have found a gamma-ray burst from a star that died when the universe was only 630 million years old, or less than five percent of its present age. The event, dubbed GRB 090423, is the most distant cosmic explosion ever seen."

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.

A Young Pulsar Shows its Hand

homunculus — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 20:10:55 -0800

Behold the Cosmic Hand of Destruction.