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)

Sunday, April 17, 2016

2016 April

AEA Astronomy Club Newsletter April  2016

Contents
AEA Astronomy Club News & Calendar p.1
Video(s) & Picture(s) of the Month p. 3
Astronomy News p. 8
General Calendar p. 9
    Colloquia, lectures, mtgs. p. 9
    Observing p. 13
Useful Links p. 14
About the Club p. 15

Club News & Calendar.

Club Calendar

Club Meeting Schedule:

7 April
AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

Pizza & Video Interview w. Andy Weir, The Martian author
(A1/1735)


5 May
AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

TBD
(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:  

For those who missed the YouTube interviews with Andy Weir that we saw at our April 7 mtg., here are the links (we saw the entire first one, about 22 minutes, and first 10 or 15 minutes of the 2nd where he read the first chapter of the book).  The 3rd was at the PV library, but lesser sound quality.

The Martian. An Interview With Andy Weir






The Martian. An Interview With Andy Weir
View on www.youtube.com
Preview by Yahoo


Andy Weir 2014






Andy Weir 2014
View on www.youtube.com
Preview by Yahoo


The Martian Q & A with Andy Weir






The Martian Q & A with Andy Weir
View on www.youtube.com
Preview by Yahoo







Here is a request by the Aerospace American Indian Alaskan Native Council (AAIANC) that could involve our club’s expertise/interests.  Let me know if you’re interested in being involved.

“I am writing to find out if you would be interested in participating in an event with Aerospace American Indian Alaskan Native Council (AAIANC) this summer. Our current plan is to book either A1 1029A/B or the Cafeteria rooms A and B and host a “Poetry Reading.” For AAIANC, we plan to select poems (the number of which will depend on how many other groups wish to participate) written by Native Americans or Alaskan Natives that focus on the cultural significance of the stars. The theme for this would be along the lines of storytelling as a means to pass on cultural knowledge and link that to how we perceive the stars through science today. We think it would be a great opportunity for your clubs to recruit new members, also! We intend to open this up to the other AGs also, but wanted to give you first dibs. We’re hoping that if at least a couple of the AGs join in on this, we can pool our resources sufficiently to cover light snacks and beverages for the attendees.

“A possible agenda would be:
11:15 set up room
11:30 AAIANC introduce event (if we have light snacks, people can get them at this time and settle in)
11:35 AAIANC lead with poem reading
11:41 Book Club reading? Offer suggestions for good books on these topics?
11:47 Astronomy Club reading?
11:53 ABC reading?
11:59 ALA reading?
12:05 ALMA reading?
12:11 AAPAA reading?
12:17 AAIANC closing remarks

“We would change this up depending on participation. All groups would be welcome to bring their brochures, etc. to recruit members and we will set them out on a table. Lisa Barnum and her group are looking into what other ADAC activities might be happening around that time so we don’t conflict. If you are interested, I will let you know what come up as possible dates.

Thanks!

Ginni Machamer
AAIANC President

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


A Solar Prominence Eruption from SDO http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160306.html

Video Credit: NASA/Goddard/SDO AIA Team
Explanation: One of the most spectacular solar sights is an erupting prominence. In 2011, NASA's Sun-orbiting Solar Dynamic Observatory spacecraft imaged an impressively large prominenceerupting from the surface. The dramatic explosion was captured in ultraviolet light in the above time lapse video covering 90 minutes, where a new frame was taken every 24 seconds. The scale of the prominence is huge -- the entire Earth would easily fit under the flowing curtain of hot gas. A solar prominence is channeled and sometimes held above the Sun's surface by the Sun's magnetic field. A quiescent prominence typically lasts about a month, and may erupt in a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) expelling hot gas into the Solar System. The energy mechanism that creates a solar prominenceis still a topic of research. As the Sun passes Solar Maximum, solar activity like eruptive prominences are expected to become less common over the next few years.
Cheering a Total Solar Eclipse http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160315.html

Video Credit & Copyright: Associated Press, Exploratorium
Explanation: What would you do if you saw the Sun disappear? Quite possibly: cheer. That's what many exuberant sky watchers did across Indonesia during a total eclipse of the Sun last week. There and then, the land and sky went dark during the day as our Sun disappeared for a few minutes behind our Moon. Many people watching knew they were witnessing a rare event, and their joyous exclamations can be heard on the featured video. What a far cry this reaction is from centuries ago, when more typical eclipse reactions derived from fear and worry. The video shows first shows a Sun only partly eclipsed by the Moon as totality approached. From many locations, foreground clouds on our Earth either obscured the view or made the view more interesting. The total eclipse was only visible from a narrow swath of Earth that included several Indonesian islands. At the same time, in the opposite direction, NASA's EPIC camera aboard NOAA's DSCOVR satellite captured theshadow of the Moon moving across the Earth.
NASA's Curiosity Rover at Namib Dune (360 View) http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap160329.html

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS
Explanation: Point or tilt to see a spectacular view of Mars visible to the Curiosity rover last December. In the foreground, part of Curiosity itself is visible, including its dusty sundial. Starting about seven meters back, the robotic rover is seen posing in front of a 5-meter tall dark sand dune named Namib, one of many dunes that span Bagnold field. Further in the distance is the summit of Mt. Sharp, the 5.5-kilometer peak at the center of 150-km wide Gale crater, the crater where Curiosity landed a few years ago. The featured composite spans a full 360-degrees around by combining several images taken on the same day, while the result has been color adjusted to mimic Earth lighting. Most recently, Curiosity is crossing the rocky and uneven Naukluft Plateau as it continues to make its way around and up Mt. Sharp.


Mystery Feature Now Disappears in Titan Lake 
Image Credit: Cassini Radar Mapper, Cornell, JPL, ESA, NASA
Explanation: What is that changing object in a cold hydrocarbon sea of Titan? Radar images from the robotic Cassini spacecraft orbiting Saturn have been recording the surface of the cloud-engulfed moon Titan for years. When imaging the flat -- and hence radar dark -- surface of the methane and ethane lake called Ligeia Mare, an object appeared in 2013 July just was not there in 2007. Subsequent observations in 2014 August found the object remained -- but had changed. In an image released last week, the mystery object seems to have disappeared in 2015 January. The featured false-color image shows how the 20-km long object has come, changed, and gone. Current origin speculative explanations include waves, bubbling foam and floating solids, but still no one is sure.Future observations, in particular Cassini's final close flyby of Titan in 2017 April, may either resolve the enigma or open up more speculation.

A Phoenix Aurora over Iceland 
Image Credit & Copyright: Hallgrimur P. Helgason; Rollover Annotation: Judy Schmidt
Explanation: All of the other aurora watchers had gone home. By 3:30 am in Iceland, on a quiet night last September, much of that night's auroras had died down. Suddenly though, a new burst of particles streamed down from space, lighting up the Earth's atmosphere once again. This time, unexpectedly, pareidoliacally, they created an amazing shape reminiscent of a giant phoenix. With camera equipment at the ready, two quick sky images were taken, followed immediately by a third of the land. The mountain in the background is Helgafell, while the small foreground river is called Kaldá, both located about 30 kilometers north of Iceland's capital Reykjavik. Seasoned skywatchers will note that just above the mountain, toward the left, is the constellation of Orion, while thePleiades star cluster is also visible just above the frame center. The new aurora lasted only a minute and would be gone forever -- possibly dismissed as an embellished aberration -- were it not captured in the featured, digitally-composed, image mosaic.
Solstice to Equinox Cubed 
Image Credit & Copyright: Olivér Nagy 
Explanation: This 3 month long exposure packed the days from December 22, 2015 through March 20 into a box. Dubbed a solargraph, the unconventional, unfolded picture was recorded with a pinhole camera made from a cube-shaped container, its sides lined with photographic paper. Fixed to a single spot for the entire exposure, the simple camera recorded the Sun's path through Hungarian skies. Each day a glowing trail was burned into the photosensitive paper. From short and low, to long and high, the trails follow the progression from winter solstice to spring equinox. Of course, dark gaps in the daily sun trails are caused by cloud cover. Sunny days produce the more continuous bright tracks.
NGC 6357: Cathedral to Massive Stars 
Image Credit: NASA, ESA and Jesús Maíz Apellániz (IAA, Spain); Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin (ESA/Hubble)
Explanation: How massive can a normal star be? Estimates made from distance, brightness and standard solar models had given one star in the open cluster Pismis 24 over 200 times the mass of ourSun, making it one of the most massive stars known. This star is the brightest object located just above the gas front in the featured image. Close inspection of images taken with the Hubble Space Telescope, however, have shown that Pismis 24-1 derives its brilliant luminosity not from a single star but from three at least. Component stars would still remain near 100 solar masses, making them among the more massive stars currently on record. Toward the bottom of the image, stars are still forming in the associated emission nebula NGC 6357. Appearing perhaps like a Gothic cathedral, energetic stars near the center appear to be breaking out and illuminating a spectacular cocoon.

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

1917 astronomical plate has first-ever evidence of exoplanetary system

Published: Tuesday, April 12, 2016 - 18:32 in Astronomy & Space

Related images

The Carnegie Institution for Science
The Carnegie Institution for Science

You can never predict what treasure might be hiding in your own basement. We didn't know it a year ago, but it turns out that a 1917 image on an astronomical glass plate from our Carnegie Observatories' collection shows the first-ever evidence of a planetary system beyond our own Sun. This unexpected find was recognized in the process of researching an article about planetary systems surrounding white dwarf stars in New Astronomy Reviews. Here's what happened: about a year ago, the review's author, Jay Farihi of University College London, contacted our Observatories' Director, John Mulchaey. He was looking for a plate in the Carnegie archive that contained a spectrum of van Maanen's star, a white dwarf discovered by Dutch-American astronomer Adriaan van Maanen in the very year our own plate was made.

Stellar spectra are recordings of the light emitted by distant stars. Spectra spread out all of the component colors of light, like a rainbow from a prism, and they can teach astronomers about a star's chemical composition. They can also tell them how the light emitted by a star is affected by the chemistry of the things it passes through before reaching us on Earth.
Stellar spectra images allowed 19th century astronomers to develop a system for classifying stars that is still used today. Modern astronomers use digital tools to image stars, but for decades, they would use glass photographic plates both to take images of the sky, and to record stellar spectra.
As requested, the Observatories located the 1917 plate, made by former Observatories Director Walter Adams at Mount Wilson Observatory, which was then part of Carnegie. Other than a notation on the plate's sleeve indicating that the star looked a bit warmer than our own Sun, everything seemed very ordinary.
However, when Farihi examined the spectrum, he found something quite extraordinary.
The clue was in what's called an "absorption line" on the spectrum. Absorption lines indicate "missing pieces," areas where the light coming from a star passed through something and had a particular color of light absorbed by that substance. These lines indicate the chemical makeup of the interfering object.
Carnegie's 1917 spectrum of van Maanen's star revealed the presence of heavier elements, such as calcium, magnesium, and iron, which should have long since disappeared into the star's interior due to their weight.
Only within the last 12 years has it become clear to astronomers that van Maanen's star and other white dwarfs with heavy elements in their spectra represent a type of planetary system featuring vast rings of rocky planetary remnants that deposit debris into the stellar atmosphere. These recently discovered systems are called "polluted white dwarfs." They were a surprise to astronomers, because white dwarfs are stars like our own Sun at the end of their lifetimes, so it was not at all expected that they would have leftover planetary material around them at that stage.
"The unexpected realization that this 1917 plate from our archive contains the earliest recorded evidence of a polluted white dwarf system is just incredible," Mulchaey said. "And the fact that it was made by such a prominent astronomer in our history as Walter Adams enhances the excitement."
Planets themselves have not yet been detected orbiting van Maanen's star, nor around similar systems, but Farihi is confident it is only a matter of time.
"The mechanism that creates the rings of planetary debris, and the deposition onto the stellar atmosphere, requires the gravitational influence of full-fledged planets," he explained. "The process couldn't occur unless there were planets there."
"Carnegie has one of the world's largest collections of astronomical plates with an archive that includes about 250,000 plates from three different observatories--Mount Wilson, Palomar, and Las Campanas," concluded Mulchaey. "We have a ton of history sitting in our basement and who knows what other finds we might unearth in the future?"

Source: Carnegie Institution for Science


 

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.







1 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:   “Gravitational Waves”
Speaker: Dr. Timothy Thompson, JPL Science Division, Retired


7 April
AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

Pizza & Video Interview w. Andy Weir, The Martian author
(A1/1735)



11 April
LAAS LAAS General Meeting.
Griffith Observatory
Event Horizon Theater
8:00 PM to 10:00 PM
April 21 & 22 The von Kármán Lecture Series: 2016

CubeSats: Big Goals, Tiny Package

Over the last 15 years, a miniature revolution in space science has been underway: CubeSats! First flown as educational tools the size of soup cans, significant capabilities have now been developed to allow these nanospacecraft to travel to the Moon, asteroids, and even Mars. We’ll talk about how NASA, companies, and students are building and flying small spacecraft, and what types of missions they are achieving. Tiny telescopes, plume fliers, and asteroid rovers – the solar system is open for novel exploration!
Speaker:
Dr. Andrew Klesh, Chief Engineer for Interplanetary Small Spacecraft, JPL

Webcast:
Click here to watch the event live on Ustream (or archived after the event)
Locations:
Thursday, April 21, 2016, 7pm
The von Kármán Auditorium at JPL
4800 Oak Grove Drive
Pasadena, CA
› Directions

Friday, April 22, 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.


5 May
AEA Astronomy Club Meeting

TBD
(A1/1735)


6 May SBAS Friday Evening 7:30 PM Monthly General Meeting Topic: The James Webb Space Telescope Speaker: Jon Arenberg, Chief Engineer, Northrup/Grumman


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 April:



Moon: April 7 new, April 13 1st quarter, April 22 full, April 29 last quarter              
Planets: Saturn & Mars rise before midnight.  Jupiter rises before sunset & is up all night.  Venus rises just before sunrise.  Mercury is visible just after sunset.
Other Events:

 
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/

2 April
LAAS Private dark sky  Star Party

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


6,13,20,27 April
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

16 April
LAAS Public  Star Party: Griffith Observatory Grounds 2-10pm

18 April Mercury at Greatest Eastern Elongation

30 April SBAS Saturday Evening In Town Dark Sky Observing Session at Ridgecrest Middle School– 28915 NorthBay Rd. RPV, Weather Permitting: Please contact Greg Benecke to confirm that the gate will be opened!


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 
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