2015 April

AEA Astronomy Club Newsletter April  2015

Contents
AEA Astronomy Club News & Calendar p.1
Video(s) & Picture(s) of the Month p. 5
Astronomy News p. 9
General Calendar p.11
    Colloquia, lectures, mtgs. p. 11
    Observing p. 14
Useful Links p. 15
About the Club p. 16

Club News & Calendar.

Club Calendar

Club Meeting Schedule:

2 April	AEA Astronomy Club Meeting	Pizza Party, Astrophotos & Videos	Club Members	A1/1735
2 July	AEA Astronomy Club Meeting	Pizza Party, Planetary Society Speaker	Mat Kaplan	A1/1735

AEA Astronomy Club meetings are now on 1^st  Thursdays at 11:45am.  For all of 2015, the meeting room is A1/1735.  Jan. 8 is an exception (2^nd Thursday) due to New Year’s Day).

Club News:  

Total Solar Eclipse in 2017.  Everyone should see at least one total solar eclipse – an unforgettable and awesome experience.  And there’s little excuse when one rarely crosses the U.S, as in 2017.  It’s not too early to plan for the August 21, 2017 total solar eclipse -- for the 1991 eclipse in Cabo San Lucas, lodging was booked in the region 2-3 years in advance.  We scouted it out 4 yrs ahead & made arrangements for 110 colleagues from our astronomy & travel clubs.  

The eclipse path is shown below – you can zoom in on it at the NASA link below.  Eastern Oregon, Idaho & Wyoming appear to be the closest to L.A.  Not only that, but as the graph shows, the area appears to have the best cloud climatology along the entire eclipse path across the US (from Oregon to S. Carolina).  Eastern Oregon, just north of Boise, north of Idaho Falls, Riverton WY & Scottsbluff are good (see also the table of airport cloud records in the 2^nd link).  Further east has slightly longer totality, but increasingly worse cloud cover – an important trade.  Some learned in 1991 not to be greedy with longer totality -- they went to the centerline and were clouded out, but we stayed at the coastal resort & lost several seconds, but saw the whole thing.

http://eclipse.gsfc.nasa.gov/SEgoogle/SEgoogle2001/SE2017Aug21Tgoogle.html 

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~jander/tot2017/tse17intro.htm (clearly, the Canadians are planning ahead)

Also, I note that northeast of Idaho Falls, the Tetons would be in roughly the same direction as the mid-morning sun (about 50 deg. elevation), making a nice wide-angle shot.  The club has some nice telescopes, CCD video & still cameras, w. solar H-alpha & neutral density filters, and we need to begin discussing a possible expedition.  See the APOD below for an example of what I recall the corona looking like to the naked eye & through binoculars, in the 1991 eclipse.  I’ll try to remember to bring to our next meeting the photos the club took in 1991.

For our July 2 mtg., in addition to the regular quarterly pizza, we’ll have a guest speaker – Mat Kaplan is the Planetary Society Radio Producer and Host.  He will talk about the work of the Society, and his experiences as a science and space reporter for several decades.

Solar photo courtesy of Jim Edwards with our Atik CCD & Coronado 40 H-alpha scope.

Moon photo courtesy of Walt Sturrock:

The latest ideas for spending our budget for 2015 include a Canon DSLR that is rated highly for astrophotography, and image-stabilizer binoculars.  And a spectrographic grating.  Other last suggestions before we spend it?

A reminder that for most of us, our club membership expired Dec. 31 (except those who joined in the last few months and likely paid also for 2015).  If you haven’t yet, we invite you to renew for 2015 at your earliest convenience & in time for the pizza lunch Jan. 8 (the first of our quarterly pizza parties of the year) -- we must have your $12 dues payment (& pizza order -- see the menu above) by Thursday, Jan. 8 to get member credit.  See the club website for the many other benefits of membership.  Please submit the renewal form (available on Aerolink at https://aerolink.aero.org/cs/llisapi.dll?func=ll&objId=13659520&objAction=browse&viewType=1, or attached) with your payment ($12 check made out to AEA Astronomy Club) to Alan Olson at M1-107. 

Astronomy Video(s) & Picture(s) of the Month

(from Astronomy Picture of the Day, APOD: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html)

VIDEO: Relative sizes of larger & larger celestial objects:  https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=1058679800813708&fref=nf

VIDEO: Twinkle Lullaby by the Piano Guys: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDHxhhB8710

Corona from Svalbard 
Image Credit & Copyright: Miloslav Druckmüller, Shadia Habbal, Peter Aniol, Pavel Starha

Explanation: During a total solar eclipse, the Sun's extensive outer atmosphere, or corona, is an inspirational sight. Streamers and shimmering features that engage the eye span a brightness range of over 10,000 to 1, making them notoriously difficult to capture in a single photograph. But this composite of 29 telescopic images covers a wide range of exposure times to reveal the crown of the Sun in all its glory. The aligned and stacked digital frames were recorded in the cold, clear skies above the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard, Norway during the Sun's total eclipse on March 20 and also show solar prominences extending just beyond the edge of the solar disk. Remarkably, even small details on the dark night side of the New Moon can be made out, illuminated by sunlight reflected from a Full Earth. Of course, fortunes will be reversed on April 4 as a Full Moon plunges into the shadow of a New Earth, during a total lunar eclipse.

Voorwerpjes in Space 
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, William Keel (Univ. Alabama)

Explanation: Mysterious Hanny's Voorwerp, Dutch for "Hanny's Object", is really enormous, about the size of the Milky Way Galaxy and glowing strongly in the greenish light produced by ionized oxygen atoms. It is thought to be a tidal tail of material left by an ancient galaxy merger, illuminated and ionized by the outburst of a quasar inhabiting the center of distant spiral galaxy IC 2497. Its exciting 2007 discovery by Dutch schoolteacher Hanny van Arkel while participating online in the Galaxy Zoo project has since inspired a search and discovery of eight more eerie green cosmic features. Imaged in these panels by the Hubble Space Telescope, all eight appear near galaxies with energetic cores. Far outside their associated galaxies, these objects are also likely echoes of quasar activity, illuminated only as light from a core quasar outburst reaches them and ultimately fading tens of thousands of years after the quasar outburst itself has faded away. Of course a galaxy merger like the impending merger of our own Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy, could also trigger the birth of a quasar that would illuminate our distant future version of Hanny's Voorwerp.

The Clouds of Orion the Hunter 
Image Credit & Copyright: Rogelio Bernal Andreo

Explanation: Cradled in cosmic dust and glowing hydrogen, stellar nurseries in Orion the Hunter lie at the edge of giant molecular clouds some 1,500 light-years away. Spanning about 30 degrees, this breath-taking vista stretches across the well-known constellation from head to toe (left to right) and beyond. At 1,500 light years away, the Great Orion Nebula is the closest large star forming region, here visible just right and below center. To its left are theHorsehead Nebula, M78, and Orion's belt stars. Sliding your cursor over the picture will also find red giant Betelgeuse at the hunter's shoulder, bright blue Rigel at his foot, the Witch Head Nebula above -- and illuminated by -- Rigel, and the glowing Lambda Orionis (Meissa) nebula on the left, near Orion's head. Of course, the Orion Nebula and bright stars are easy to see with the unaided eye, but dust clouds and emission from the extensive interstellar gas in this nebula-rich complex, are too faint and much harder to record. In this mosaic of broadband telescopic images, additional image data acquired with a narrow hydrogen alpha filter was used to bring out the pervasive tendrils of energized atomic hydrogen gas like in the arc of the giant Barnard's Loop.

Enhanced Color Caloris 
Image Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins Univ. APL, Arizona State U., CIW

Explanation: The sprawling Caloris basin on Mercury is one of the solar system's largest impact basins, created during the early history of the solar system by the impact of a large asteroid-sized body. The multi-featured, fracturedbasin spans about 1,500 kilometers in this enhanced color mosaic based on image data from the Mercury-orbiting MESSENGER spacecraft. Mercury's youngest large impact basin, Caloris was subsequently filled in by lavas that appear orange in the mosaic. Craters made after the flooding have excavated material from beneath the surface lavas. Seen as contrasting blue hues, they likely offer a glimpse of the original basin floor material. Analysis of these craters suggests the thickness of the covering volcanic lava to be 2.5-3.5 kilometers. Orange splotches around the basin's perimeter are thought to be volcanic vents.

Astronomy News:

Scientists reveal the hidden structure and size of our galaxy

Jesus Diaz

Our galaxy is not what we thought it was. According the paper Rings and Radial Waves in the Disk of the Milky Way—published in the Astrophysical Journal—we should call it the Corrugated Cardboard Galaxy, as shown in the diagram above. Even more surprising: It's 50-percent larger than previously thought.

According to Heidi Jo Newberg—professor at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and lead author for this paper—"in essence, what we found is that the disk of the Milky Way isn't just a disk of stars in a flat plane—it's corrugated. As it radiates outward from the sun, we see at least four ripples in the disk of the Milky Way. While we can only look at part of the galaxy with this data, we assume that this pattern is going to be found throughout the disk."

Here's the paper excerpt for detail:

We show that in the anticenter region, between Galactic longitudes of 110∘<l<229∘, there is an oscillating asymmetry in the main sequence star counts on either side of the Galactic plane using data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. This asymmetry oscillates from more stars in the north at distances of about 2 kpc from the Sun to more stars in the south at 4-6 kpc from the Sun to more stars in the north at distances of 8-10 kpc from the Sun. We also see evidence that there are more stars in the south at distances of 12-16 kpc from the Sun. The three more distant asymmetries form roughly concentric rings around the Galactic center, opening in the direction of the Milky Way's spiral arms. The northern ring, 9 kpc from the Sun, is easily identified with the previously discovered Monoceros Ring. Parts of the southern ring at 14 kpc from the Sun (which we call the TriAnd Ring) have previously been identified as related to the Monoceros Ring and others have been called the Triangulum Andromeda Overdensity. The two nearer oscillations are approximated by a toy model in which the disk plane is offset by of the order 100 pc up and then down at different radii. We also show that the disk is not azimuthally symmetric around the Galactic anticenter and that there could be a correspondence between our observed oscillations and the spiral structure of the Galaxy. Our observations suggest that the TriAnd and Monoceros Rings (which extend to at least 25 kpc from the Galactic center) are primarily the result of disk oscillations.

Here's Professor Heidi Jo Newberg explaining it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MO01qDl1np8

VIDEO: The most amazing and inspiring vision of the future I've ever seen https://vimeo.com/108650530

Jesus Diaz

I have seen countless science fiction movies and documentaries about the future of humanity. None of them were as inspiring, beautiful, and realistic as this extraordinary short film by Erik Wernquist, narrated by Carl Sagan. Watch it and get ready for goosebumps.

For maximum effect, I highly recommend that you use headphones, turn off the lights, and make sure the video is playing back in HD:

Here's the original text narrated by Sagan, from his book The Pale Blue Dot—a book that, if you haven't yet, you must read.

For all its material advantages, the sedentary life has left us edgy, unfulfilled. Even after 400 generations in villages and cities, we haven't forgotten. The open road still softly calls, like a nearly forgotten song of childhood. We invest far-off places with a certain romance. This appeal, I suspect, has been meticulously crafted by natural selection as an essential element in our survival. Long summers, mild winters, rich harvests, plentiful game—none of them lasts forever. It is beyond our powers to predict the future. Catastrophic events have a way of sneaking up on us, of catching us unaware. Your own life, or your band's, or even your species' might be owed to a restless few—drawn, by a craving they can hardly articulate or understand, to undiscovered lands and new worlds.

Herman Melville, in Moby Dick, spoke for wanderers in all epochs and meridians: "I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas..."

Maybe it's a little early. Maybe the time is not quite yet. But those other worlds— promising untold opportunities—beckon.

Silently, they orbit the Sun, waiting.

After I saw it on my phone, I couldn't resist opening my computer at 2:40AM—when Gawker's J.K. Trotter sent it to me in the middle of the night—to share it with you as soon as possible.

This is our solar system, not fantasy worlds

General Calendar:

Colloquia, Lectures, Seminars, Meetings, Open Houses & Tours:

Colloquia:  Carnegie (Tues. 4pm), UCLA, Caltech (Wed. 4pm), IPAC (Wed. 12:15pm) & other Pasadena (daily 12-4pm):  http://obs.carnegiescience.edu/seminars/ 

Carnegie astronomy lectures – only 4 per year in the Spring www.obs.carnegiescience.edu.  Visit www.huntington.org for directions.  For more information about the Carnegie Observatories or this lecture series, please contact Reed Haynie.  This year's Astronomy Lecture Series will take place at A Noise Within on March 30, April 13, April 27, and May 11. Click here for more information.

All four lectures this year will be held at A Noise Within, the theater located at 3352 East Foothill Blvd, Pasadena, CA 91107 (just North of the 210 Freeway, take the Madre street exit). Free parking is available in the Metro Gold Line parking structure just South of the theatre. Enter the structure East off Sierra Madre Villa Ave. (if you are traveling North on Sierra Madre Villa) or West off Halstead Street. Click here for a map which depicts the site with the theatre, parking structure, and surrounding streets. Visit www.anoisewithin.org for directions and more information.  All lectures are free and open to the public, but seating is limited. Please arrive early. Doors open at 6:45 PM and all lectures start at 7:30 PM. Light refreshments will be served in advance of the lectures.

Monday, April 13^th 2015
The Genes That Built You
Dr. Matthew P. Scott
President,
Carnegie Institution for Science

Carnegie Astronomy is also part of Carnegie Science and the study of all living species. From ancient single-celled organisms evolved multicellular animals whose immense numbers of specialized cell types—skin, muscle, nerve—allow division of labor. Each cell type forms in the right place, is suited to its task, and activates certain genes. Powerful cell-to-cell communication systems organize structured tissues such as lungs, limbs and brain. Dr. Scott will discuss half-billion-year-old genes that have been gradually modified to give rise to the vast diversity of animals.

Monday, April 27^th 2015
At the Edge of Reason: The Black Holes in the Universe
Dr. Juna Kollmeier
Staff Scientist,
Carnegie Observatories

Black holes remain among the most enigmatic objects in the universe. Using both computer simulations and traditional analytic theory, Dr. Kollmeier is making major discoveries showing how tiny fluctuations in density in the early universe have become the galaxies and black holes that we see after 14 billion years of cosmic evolution. In this Lecture, Dr. Kollmeier will review our basic knowledge of black holes and explore outstanding mysteries
regarding their formation and structure.

Monday, May 11^th 2015
The Accelerating Universe
Dr. Robert P. Kirshner
Clowes Professor of Science,
Harvard University

The expanding universe was discovered at Mount Wilson almost 100 years ago. But there is something new! In the past 20 years, astronomers have found that cosmic expansion is speeding up, driven by a mysterious “dark energy” whose nature we do not understand. Dr. Kirshner, one of today”s preeminent astrophysicists, is the recipient of many prestigious awards, including the 2014 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics (sponsored by Google, among others), as well as the 2014 James Craig Watson Medal of the National Acad- emy of Sciences for “service to astronomy.”

2 April

AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

Pizza Party, Astrophotos & Videos

Club Members

A1/1735

3 April

Friday Night 7:30PM SBAS  Monthly General Meeting in the Planetarium at El Camino College (16007 Crenshaw Bl. In Torrance) Friday Night 7:30PM Monthly General Meeting Topic: Globular Clusters Speaker: Tim Thompson

13 April

LAAS LAAS General Meeting.

Griffith Observatory Event Horizon Theater 8:00 PM to 10:00 PM

April 23 & 24 The von Kármán Lecture Series: 2015

Robots to the Rescue!: JPL’s RoboSimian and Surrogate Robots are here to Help

JPL has been engaged in several programs over the last couple of years that have developed new robots and software that can help out in terrestrial disaster scenarios or hazardous environments. In particular, the RoboSimian and Surrogate sibling robots have been designed to move through human environments after humans have had to evacuate and execute key manipulation tasks that will ameliorate the situation. RoboSimian will be put to the test against an international field of robotic competitors at the DARPA Robotics Challenge this June 5-6 at the Pomona Fairplex.

Speaker:
Brett Kennedy - Supervisor, Robotic Vehicles and Manipulators Group, JPL

Locations:	Thursday, April 23, 2015, 7pm The von Kármán Auditorium at JPL 4800 Oak Grove Drive Pasadena, CA › Directions Friday, April 24, 2015, 7pm The Vosloh Forum at Pasadena City College 1570 East Colorado Blvd. Pasadena, CA › Directions
Webcast:	We offer two options to view the live streaming of our webcast on Thursday: › 1) Ustream with real-time web chat to take public questions. › 2) Flash Player with open captioning If you don't have Flash Player, you can download for free here.

Observing:

The following data are from the 2015 Observer’s Handbook, and Sky & Telescope’s 2015 Skygazer’s Almanac & monthly Sky at a Glance.

Current sun & moon rise/set/phase data for L.A.:  http://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/usa/los-angeles

Sun, Moon & Planets for April:

Moon: April 4 full, April 12 last quarter, April 18 new, April 25 1^st quarter              

Planets: Mercury, Venus & Mars are visible in the W for 1-3 hours after sunset (Venus the longest).  Jupiter is up until a few hours before dawn.  Saturn rises about 9pm.

Other Events:

4 April Saturday Total Lunar Eclipse Starts at about 2 AM and runs through sunrise. As it approaches totality, the moon will occult a bright elliptical galaxy, NGC 4697. The galaxy will exit the occultation while the moon is fully in the shadow of earth.

8 April Mercury Passes 0.5 Degrees from Uranus.

11 April

SBAS Saturday Night In Town Dark Sky Observing Session at Ridgecrest Middle School– 28915 North Bay Rd. RPV, Weather Permitting: Please contact Greg Benecke to confirm that the gate will be opened! http://www.sbastro.net/

12 April Yuri’s Night – World Space Party Celebrate the first human to go into space! See info at https://yurisnight.net/

18 April

LAAS Dark Sky Night : Lockwood Valley (Steve Kufeld Astronomical Site; LAAS members and their guests only)

18 April

SBAS out-of-town Dark Sky observing – contact Greg Benecke http://www.sbastro.net/.

22 April Lyrids Meteor Shower Peak The Lyrids generally begin on April 16 and end on April 26, with maximum generally occurring during the night of April 21/22. At maximum, hourly rates can reach about 10 meteors per hour.

23 April Mercury Passes 1.4 Degrees from Mars

25 April

Public  Star Party: Griffith Observatory Grounds 2-10pm

Internet Links:

Telescope, Binocular & Accessory Buying Guides

Sky & Telescope Magazine -- Choosing Your Equipment

Orion Telescopes & Binoculars -- Buying Guides

Telescopes.com -- Telescopes 101

General

Getting Started in Astronomy & Observing

The Astronomical League

 e! Science News Astronomy & Space

NASA Gallery

Astronomical Society of the Pacific (educational, amateur & professional)

Amateur Online Tools, Journals, Vendors, Societies, Databases

The Astronomy White Pages (U.S. & International Amateur Clubs & Societies)

American Astronomical Society (professional)

More...

Regional (Southern California, Washington, D.C. & Colorado)

Southern California & Beyond Amateur Astronomy Organizations, Observatories & Planetaria

Mt. Wilson Observatory description, history, visiting

Los Angeles Astronomical Society (LAAS)

South Bay Astronomical Society (SBAS)

Orange County Astronomers

The Local Group Astronomy Club (Santa Clarita)

Ventura County Astronomical Society

The Astronomical Society of Greenbelt

National Capital Astronomers

Northern Virginia Astronomy Club

Colorado Springs Astronomical Society

Denver Astronomical Society

About the Club

Club Websites:  Internal (Aerospace): https://aeropedia.aero.org/aeropedia/index.php/Astronomy_Club  It is updated to reflect this newsletter, in addition to a listing of past club mtg. presentations, astronomy news, photos & events from prior newsletters, club equipment, membership & constitution.  We have linked some presentation materials from past mtgs.  Our club newsletters are also being posted to an external blog, “An Astronomical View” http://astronomicalview.blogspot.com/. 

 
Membership.  For information, current dues & application, contact Alan Olson, or see the club website (or Aerolink folder) where a form is also available (go to the membership link/folder & look at the bottom).  Benefits will include use of club telescope(s) & library/software, membership in The Astronomical League, discounts on Sky & Telescope magazine and Observer’s Handbook, field trips, great programs, having a say in club activities, acquisitions & elections, etc.

Committee Suggestions & Volunteers.  Feel free to contact:  Mark Clayson, President & Program Committee Chairman (& acting club VP), TBD Activities Committee Chairman (& club Secretary), or Alan Olson, Resource Committee Chairman (over equipment & library, and club Treasurer).

Mark Clayson,
AEA Astronomy Club President