The Hubble Ultra Deep Field Image (see description on the right, below)

The Hubble Ultra Deep Field Image
(10,000 galaxies in an area 1% of the apparent size of the moon -- see description on the right, below)

Wednesday, March 2, 2016

2016 March

AEA Astronomy Club Newsletter  March  2016

Contents
AEA Astronomy Club News & Calendar p.1
Video(s) & Picture(s) of the Month p. 3
Astronomy News p. 10
General Calendar p. 12
    Colloquia, lectures, mtgs. p. 12
    Observing p. 16
Useful Links p. 18
About the Club p. 19

Club News & Calendar.

Club Calendar

Club Meeting Schedule:

3 March
AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

Cancelled for corporate events
(A1/1735)


AEA Astronomy Club meetings are now on 1st  Thursdays at 11:45am.  For all of 2016, the meeting room is A1/1735. 


Club News:  

From: Jason M Fields  “Imaging under light-polluted skies”
102-mm f/7 with SBIG STT-8300M CCD under light-polluted skies
M42: 5 x 60-sec R-band (0.57 - 0.67-um band)
M81/M82: 5 x 1200-sec H-alpha (7-nm bandpass)
No darks, flats, or bias frames applied; just aligning, stacking, and stretching.

Suggestions for how to best spend our AEA budget allotment are welcome, especially in preparation for the 2017 total solar eclipse.

Again, we will shortly be doing a company-wide survey of interest in the 2017 total eclipse, to coordinate expedition(s).


Astronomy Video(s) & Picture(s) of the Month
(from Astronomy Picture of the Day, APOD: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html
VIDEO: The Rise and Fall of Supernova 2015F http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160209.html
Video Credit & Copyright: Changsu Choi & Myungshin Im (Seoul National University)
Explanation: Sit back and watch a star explode. The actual supernova occurred back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, but images of the spectacular event began arriving last year. Supernova 2015F was discovered in nearby spiral galaxy NGC 2442 by Berto Monard in 2015 March and was unusually bright -- enough to be seen with only a small telescope. The pattern of brightness variation indicated a Type Ia supernova -- a type of stellar explosion that results when an Earth-size white dwarf gains so much mass that its core crosses the threshold of nuclear fusion, possibly caused by a lower mass white-dwarf companion spiraling into it. Finding and tracking Type Ia supernovae are particularly important because their intrinsic brightness can be calibrated, making their apparent brightness a good measure of their distance -- and hence useful toward calibrating the distance scale of the entire universe. The featured video tracked the stellar disruption from before explosion images arrived, as it brightened, and for several months as the fission-powered supernova glow faded. The remnants of SN2015F are now too dim to see without a large telescope. Just yesterday, however, the night sky lit up once again, this time with an even brighter supernova in an even closer galaxy: Centaurus A.



VIDEO: Flying Over Pluto's Moon Charon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrMBzJcvtt0
Video Credit: NASA, Johns Hopkins U. APL, SwRI, Stuart Robbins
Explanation: Given some poetic license, there is now scientific evidence that hell has frozen over. To start, Greek mythology holds that Charon is the ferryman of the underworld. Next, recent analysis of data taken by the robotic New Horizons spacecraft that shot past Charon -- the namesake that is the largest moon of Pluto -- in July now indicates that the cause of the huge chasm that runs across the 1200-km moon was that a huge internal sea froze. And since water expands when it freezes, the already hardened outer crust could not contain it and cracked. To better picture the crack, a fanciful journey over some of Charon's has been digitally created from collected images. The featured video starts by showing the Dark Polar Deposit (dubbed Mordor) near Charon's north pole and then flies over the dwarf-planet-wide canyon. Last, the video shows a much-debated protuberance called Moated Mountain. Understanding the history of Pluto and Charon is helping humanity to better understand both the friendliest and more forbidding places in the early Solar System from which Earth formed and life somehow emerged.
LIGO Detects Gravitational Waves from Merging Black Holes 
Illustration Credit: LIGO, NSF, Aurore Simonnet (Sonoma State U.)
Explanation: Gravitational radiation has been directly detected. The first-ever detection was made by both facilities of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) inWashington and Louisiana simultaneously last September. After numerous consistency checks, the resulting 5-sigma discovery was published today. The measured gravitational waves match those expected from two large black holes merging after a death spiral in a distant galaxy, with the resulting new black hole momentarily vibrating in a rapid ringdown. A phenomenon predicted by Einstein, the historic discovery confirms a cornerstone of humanity's understanding of gravity and basic physics. It is also the most direct detection of black holes ever. The featured illustration depicts the two merging black holes with the signal strength of the two detectors over 0.3 seconds superimposed across the bottom. Expected future detections by Advanced LIGO and other gravitational wave detectors may not only confirm the spectacular nature of this measurement but hold tremendous promise of giving humanity a new way to see and explore our universe.
Advanced LIGO: Gravitational Wave Detectors Upgraded 
Image Credit: LIGO, Caltech, MIT, NSF
Explanation: Accelerate a charge and you'll get electromagnetic radiation: light. But accelerate any mass and you'll get gravitational radiation. Light is seen all the time, but, so far, a confirmed direct detection of gravitational radiation has been elusive. When absorbed, gravitational waves create a tiny symmetric jiggle similar to squashing a rubber ball and letting go quickly. Separated detectors can be used to discern gravitational waves from everyday bumps. Powerful astronomical sources of gravitational radiation would coincidentally jiggle even detectors on opposite ends of the Earth.Pictured here are the four-kilometer-long arms of one such detector: the LIGO Hanford Observatory in Washington state, USA. Together with its sister interferometer in Louisiana, these gravitationalwave detectors continue to be upgraded and are now more sensitive than ever.
USA's Northeast Megalopolis from Space 
Image Credit: NASA, International Space Station
Explanation: Can you identify a familiar area in the northeast USA just from nighttime lights? It might be possible because many major cities are visible, including (right to left) New York,Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Richmond and Norfolk -- Boston of the USA's Northeast megalopolis is not pictured. The featured image was taken in 2012 from the International Space Station. In the foreground are two Russian cargo ships with prominent solar panels. This Northeast megalopolis of the USA contains almost 20 percent of the people of the USA but only about 2 percent of the land area. Also known also as the Northeast Corridor and part of the Eastern Seaboard, about 10 percent of the world's largest companies are headquartered here. The near continuity of the lights seem to add credence to the 1960s-era prediction that the entire stretch is evolving into one continuous city.

M82: Galaxy with a Supergalactic Wind 
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, The Hubble Heritage Team, (STScI/AURA) 
Acknowledgement: M. Mountain (STScI), P. Puxley (NSF), J. Gallagher (U. Wisconsin)
Explanation: What's lighting up the Cigar Galaxy? M82, as this irregular galaxy is also known, was stirred up by a recent pass near large spiral galaxy M81. This doesn't fully explain the source of the red-glowing outwardly expanding gas, however. Evidence indicates that this gas is being driven out by the combined emerging particle winds of many stars, together creating a galactic superwind. The featured photographic mosaic highlights a specific color of red light strongly emitted by ionized hydrogen gas, showing detailed filaments of this gas. The filaments extend for over 10,000 light years. The 12-million light-year distant Cigar Galaxy is the brightest galaxy in the sky in infrared light, and can be seen in visible light with a small telescope towards the constellation of the Great Bear (Ursa Major).

These WPA-style artworks from NASA’s design studio are wonderful. And they’re free, too.

http://www.thedrive.com/article/2171/nasas-giving-away-brilliant-space-travel-posters-for-free
White Rock Fingers on Mars 
Image Credit: THEMIS, Mars Odyssey Team, ASU, JPL, NASA
Explanation: What caused this unusual light rock formation on Mars? Intrigued by the possibility that they could be salt deposits left over as an ancient lakebed dried-up, detailed studies of these fingers now indicate a more mundane possibility: volcanic ash. Studying the exact color of the formation indicated the possible volcanic origin. The light material appears to have eroded away from surrounding area, indicating a very low-density substance. The stark contrast between the rocks and the surrounding sand is compounded by the unusual darkness of the sand. The featured picture was taken with the Thermal Emission Imaging System on the Mars Odyssey, the longest serving spacecraft currently orbiting Mars. The image spans about 10 kilometers inside a larger crater.
Julius Caesar and Leap Days 
Image Credit: Classical Numismatic Group, Inc., Wikimedia
Explanation: Today, February 29th, is a leap day - a relatively rare occurrence. In 46 BC, Julius Caesar, featured here in a self-decreed minted coin, created a calendar system that added one leap dayevery four years. Acting on advice by Alexandrian astronomer Sosigenes, Caesar did this to make up for the fact that the Earth's year is slightly more than 365 days. In modern terms, the time it takes for the Earth to circle the Sun is slightly more than the time it takes for the Earth to rotate 365 times (with respect to the Sun -- actually we now know this takes about 365.24219 rotations). So, if calendar years contained 365 days they would drift from the actual year by about 1 day every 4 years. Eventually July (named posthumously for Julius Caesar himself) would occur during the northern hemisphere winter! By adopting a leap year with an extra day every four years, the calendar year would drift much less. This Julian Calendar system was used until the year 1582 when Pope Gregory XIII provided further fine-tuning when he added that leap days should not occur in years ending in "00", unless divisible by 400. This Gregorian Calendar system is the one in common use today.


Astronomy News:
(from http://esciencenews.com/topics/astronomy.space)

 

Gravitational Waves Detected, Verifying Part of Albert Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity

Discovery of ripples in space and time from black holes opens new form of astronomy

Scientists announced they have directly detected gravitational waves for the first time, verifying an unproven portion of Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity. WSJ's Robert Lee Hotz reports. Photo: Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory
By 
ROBERT LEE HOTZ
Updated Feb. 11, 2016 8:58 p.m. ET
496 COMMENTS
After decades of searching, scientists Thursday announced they have directly detected gravitational waves for the first time, caused by a cosmic clash of black holes so violent that its shock waves rippled the ethereal fabric of space and time across a billion light years of distance.
Confirming rumors roiling the scientific world for months, the scientists said their find verifies an unproven portion of Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity and, because the waves are largely unimpeded by matter, offers a new way for astronomers to probe hidden recesses of the universe. Einstein first predicted the existence of gravitational waves in 1916.
“It is one of the most spectacular verifications of Einstein’s theory,” said Columbia University astrophysicist Zoltan Haiman, who wasn’t involved in the research effort. “This is like a new window into the universe.”
The team of more than 1,000 researchers in 15 countries, led by scientists at the California Institute of Technology and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, published their work in Physical Review Letters. The scientists discussed their work Thursday at a news conference convened by the National Science Foundation in Washington, D.C., which has spent $1.1 billion on the effort over the past 40 years.
“They picked up this minute tremble in space, but it is totally shaking up the field of science,” said physicist Robbert Dijkgraaf, director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., where Einstein once worked. “It is confirming the ideas of one of the most brilliant minds that ever lived.”
By Einstein’s reasoning, any object with mass warps the curvature of space and time, like a bowling ball on a trampoline. It stirs space and time, generating waves that radiate at the speed of light.
 

A technician performs an inspection on an optic of one of the LIGO devices that detected the black holes’ gravitational tremors. PHOTO: CALTECH/MIT/LIGO LABORATORY/REUTERS
The hunt for evidence of gravitational waves has consumed researchers world-wide for decades. Princeton University researchers in 1993 won a Nobel Prize for their discovery of an unusual pulsar star that offered indirect evidence of gravitational waves. In 2014, astronomers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics announced they had spotted gravitational waves from the earliest moments of the universe. Within a year, they had to admit they were wrong.
In the work announced Thursday, researchers said they detected gravitational tremors from a pair of spiraling black holes about 1.3 billion light years away from Earth. To do so, they used an elaborate measuring device called the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory, or LIGO. It is composed of two mammoth laser installations—one set in Hanford, Wash., and the other in Livingston, La.—operating in tandem to cross-check their results.
The LIGO detectors measure how long it takes controlled laser light to travel between suspended mirrors. Passing ripples in space-time alter the distance measured by the light beam, causing the amount of light falling on the LIGO photodetectors to vary infinitesimally.
As originally designed, the detectors could detect distortions in local space-time as small as 1/1000th of the diameter of a proton—equal to measuring the distance from Earth to the nearest star outside the solar system to within the width of a human hair. But even that precision wasn't enough to capture the faint perturbations caused by gravitational ripples.
After searching fruitlessly for a decade, researchers shut down the LIGO installations for a redesign in 2010. They renewed the search last fall after a $200 million overhaul to boost the detectors’ sensitivity.
Last September 14th, they detected the waves generated by the paired black holes as they crushed together and merged into a single black hole, the researchers said.
In that moment, they released 50 times the energy of all the stars in the universe put together. That event “created a violent storm in the fabric of space and time, a storm in which the shape of space was bent this way and then that way,” said Caltech theoretical physicist Kip Thorne, a co-founder of the LIGO project.
Astronomers hope to use gravitational waves to probe some of the most mysterious objects in the cosmos. As they travel, gravitational waves stretch and compress space, encoding the physics of the event that produced them. They can be translated into signature sounds.
“This discovery will illuminate what we can learn about merging black holes, neutron stars and other exotic astronomical phenomena that raise so many questions about the evolution of our universe,” said NSF director France Córdova, who is herself an astrophysicist.
Gravitational waves from the merger of black holes, neutron stars or other massive objects would produce a chirp much like the increasing pitch of a slide whistle, the researchers said. Those likely produced by supernovae or gamma ray bursts produce telltale pops and crackles. The oldest—relics of the Big Bang—simply sizzle.
“Not only can we explore the universe with neutrinos and cosmic rays, see it with light across a huge range of wavelengths, but we can now hear it too with gravitational waves,” said Caltech physicist Chiara M. F. Mingarelli, who studies them. “Imagine hearing the universe for the first time.”
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.  . Click here for more information.
Monday, April 4th 2016
Las Campans Observatory: A Southern Window on the Universe
Dr. Mark Phillips
Director, Las Campanas Observatory, Associate Director for Magellan
Carnegie Institution for Science
For 45 years, the Las Campanas Observatory of the Carnegie Institution for Science has provided a superlative window in the Southern Hemisphere for exploring the wonders of our Universe. Located in the Andes foothills of northern Chile, the Las Campanas telescopes have yielded many breakthrough discoveries: giant voids and immense structures in the distribution of galaxies, the first detection of a proto- planetary disk around a neighboring star, the first naked-eye supernova since the invention of the telescope, and much more. Dr. Phillips will recount the spectacular growth of astronomical research in this unique land, while also looking ahead to the bright future of scientific discovery that awaits Las Campanas.

Monday, April 18th 2016
A Short History of Planet Formation
Dr. Anat Shahar
Staff Scientist, Geophysical Laboratory
Carnegie Institution for Science
Our solar system formed 4.5 billion years ago in an extremely chaotic environment and has evolved significantly over that time. What we see today is an organized inner solar system with four very di erent terrestrial planets. Join Dr. Shahar for an exploration of these planets as we try to understand their diversity. By analyzing rocks we can hold in our hands today and conducting experiments in the laboratory, we can probe which processes and condi- tions the terrestrial planets experienced billions of years ago.

Monday, May 2nd 2016
Exoplanets
Dr. Kevin Schlaufman
Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy, Johns Hopkins University
Carnegie-Princeton Fellow
Carnegie Observatories & Princeton University
This is an extraordinary time in human history. While it has been only twenty years since astronomers first discovered planets outside of our solar system, we are already aware of several planets that could have liquid water on their surfaces. In just ten years, we will have the technological ability to search for signs of life, like oxygen and methane, in the atmospheres of a few select exoplanets. Dr. Schlaufman will tell the story of exoplanets to date, and outline the progress we will soon see in the search for life elsewhere in our Galaxy.


Monday, May 16th 2016
The Secret Lives of Galaxies
Dr. Katherine Alatalo
Hubble Fellow,
Carnegie Observatories
The Hubble sequence of galaxies resembles a simple classification chart, yet underneath the neatly aligned shapes and colors lie complex and violent histories. Through radio, infrared, UV and optical astronomy, today we can deduce these histories – and the future. Nearby examples of every stage in the Hubble sequence provide living galactic fossils that reveal their 10 billion years of evolution. Dr. Alatalo will tour the Hubble sequence, exploring three avenues to galactic transi- tions: the quiet, slow fade; the violent merger; and the quietly violent evolution of a galaxy, likely due to a supermassive black hole in its center. By exploring how each piece of the puzzle fits with every other piece, we can understand the evolution of the Universe and fundamental questions of how we got here.
3 March
AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

 Cancelled for corporate events
(A1/1735)










4 March
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:   “An Unseen Planet in the Solar System”
Speaker:  Konstantin Batygin, Assistant Professor of Planetary Science at California Institute of Technology

14 March
LAAS LAAS General Meeting.
Griffith Observatory
Event Horizon Theater
8:00 PM to 10:00 PM
March 24 & 25 The von Kármán Lecture Series: 2016


In the Blink of the Eye: What 10 Years at Mars Can Tell Us About the Planet

Our eyes in the sky at Mars include the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been orbiting Mars for 10 years. 

The orbiter has sent back thousands of high-resolution images and more data than all Mars missions combined and: 

• Found the strongest evidence yet that liquid water flows intermittently on present-day Mars
• Found evidence of diverse watery environments on early Mars, some more habitable than others
• Caught avalanches and dust storms in action
• Seen seasonal changes and longer-term changes over the last decade 

On Aug. 12, 2005, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Seven months later, the orbiter arrived at Mars. Thus began an incredible journey of exploration, guided by the Mars Exploration Program’s “follow-the-water” theme. 

Originally slated for a two-year prime science mission followed by a two-year relay mission, MRO has logged more than a decade of science operations and support for surface missions. MRO has probed the planet’s atmosphere, surface and subsurface with unprecedented spatial resolution and coverage. Its seven science investigations and six instruments have returned more than 250 terabits of data, enabling numerous discoveries. Among them, MRO has found evidence for a variety of water-laden environments dating to early Mars, and enough carbon dioxide ice buried in the south polar cap to double the current atmosphere if it were released in gaseous form. The orbiter has revealed a planet with a surface that is active today, decorated by moving dunes and mysterious strips that appear to be brine flows. 

At the same time, MRO has rendered invaluable service to landers and rovers at Mars. It not only delivered critical information for the selection of landing sites, but captured crucial data and historic images during the arrivals of the Phoenix lander and Mars Science Laboratory. Since then, MRO has frequently served as a relay for data and commands between those spacecraft and Earth. As NASA’s Mars Exploration Program looks to the future, MRO continues to characterize and certify new landing sites for both NASA and the European Space Agency, while preparing to cover critical events and landed operations for the InSight lander, Mars 2020 rover, and future missions.
Speaker:
Dr. Leslie Tamppari, MRO deputy project scientist

Webcast:
Click here to watch the event live on Ustream (or archived after the event)
Locations:
Thursday, March 24, 2016, 7pm
The von Kármán Auditorium at JPL
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Pasadena, CA
› Directions

Friday, March 25, 2016, 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 2016 Observer’s Handbook, and Sky & Telescope’s 2016 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 March:



Moon: Mar 1 last quarter, Mar 9 new, Mar 15 1st quarter, Mar 23 full, Mar 31 last quarter               
Planets: Saturn & Mars rise about midnight.  Jupiter rises at sunset – up all night.  Venus rises just before sunrise.  Mercury is not visible.
Other Events:

4,8,9,11,15,16,18,22,23,25,29 March  double shadow transits on Jupiter

5 March
SBAS out-of-town Dark Sky observing – contact Greg Benecke to coordinate a location. http://www.sbastro.net/.  

5 March
LAAS Private dark sky  Star Party: Griffith Observatory Grounds 2-10pm

8 March Jupiter opposition

2,9,16,23,30 Mar
LAAS The Garvey Ranch Observatory is open to the public every Wednesday evening from 7:30 PM to 10 PM. Go into the dome to use the 8 Inch Refractor or observe through one of our telescopes on the lawn. Visit our workshop to learn how you can build your own telescope, grind your own mirror, or sign up for our free seasonal astronomy classes.

Call 213-673-7355 for further information.
Time: 7:30 PM - 10:00 PM
Location: Garvey Ranch Obs. , 781 Orange Ave., Monterey Park, CA 91755

12 March
LAAS Public  Star Party: Griffith Observatory Grounds 2-10pm

13 March  Daylight Savings Time begins

19-20 March Vernal Equinox

 
2 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/

Internet Links:

Telescope, Binocular & Accessory Buying Guides


General


Regional (Southern California, Washington, D.C. & Colorado)
Southern California & Beyond Amateur Astronomy Organizations, Observatories & Planetaria
Mt. Wilson Observatory description, history, visiting


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 
Posted by at
Labels: , , , ,

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)