APOD 2.5

This weeks picture includes the newly discovered planet, Kepler 22b! This plant was recently discovered 600 light years away near the constellation Cygnus. It has been found to be orbiting a smaller and cooler star and is actually orbiting in a habitable zone. Overall, the planet itself is twice as large as earth and may never get above 70 degrees Fahrenheit. If this planet does hold liquid water than there is a chance for life to be found! In order for possible contact to be made we would first have to know if something intelligent is actually alive there so we are now setting up sites to keep records of everything about Kepler 22b.

APOD 2.4

This week's picture features the launching of the Curiosity Rover! This rover, five times larger than the opportunity rover, is a new breed of rovers. I say this because this rover has two fully automated labs, a drill designed to work on mars and nuclear reactor for powering this mighty machine. It has the "standard" head with many cameras and other devices to determine where it is and where it would like to go. Also, this Rover has a new system of deployment on the surface of Mars that will allow it to jet pack into a spot instead of just letting it bounce along the surface of the planet. The mission of the rover is to explore the Gale crater, determine if life was ever on mars, and if we have a chance of settling mars in the near future.

Apod 2.3

This week's picture is that of the Butterfly Nebula. The Butterfly Nebula was formed by one star of a binary star system ejecting large amounts of gas very quickly while the core of the star ionized the gas and made it glow the colors we can see or falsely color. The surface temp of the core, now called a white dwarf star, is estimated to be around 250 thousand degrees Celsius. Overall, the hot center of the Nebula is projecting the gas, some of which has been detected to be hydrogen, across light years and the Nebula itself only lies 4000 light years away.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111113.html

apod 2.2 submitted early

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111108.html
this weeks post is not a picture but instead a video of the phenomenon known as "sun dogs". The sun dog shown in the video is center stage and appears to be quickly jumping from place to place high within the clouds. The magic behind this wonderful show is currently hypothesized to be changes in an electrical field within the cloud quickly changing. this quick change would induces water crystals in the clouds to rearrange themselves and bend light in a different way with each change in the field. As amazing as this occurrence is, very little data is had on the phenomenon so scientist are scouring the world and the world wide web to find more evidence to analyze.

apod 2.1

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111102.html
This week's picture features the Wizard Nebula! Only 8000 light years away, this nebula is huge star forming region, NGC 7380 to be specific, and is really just a tower of super heated and super irradiated gasses and the actual star forming region is only 100 light years across. The wizard nebula lies in the constellation Cepheus and some of the stars forming in this nebula have the chance to out live our own sun! so in a few billion years, our ancestors, if still living, will be able to view the star clusters that this nebula will leave behind.

Observation 2, Q1

Date: October 22, 2011
Time: 9:00 - 11:30 PM
Place: Charlotte Harbour
Sky Conditions: Mostly clear with a few pockets of light from Punta Gorda and Port Charlotte. Moon not present.

Instruments Used: eyes

Planets: Jupiter shown brightly and beautifully in the eastern sky, about 20 degres above the horizon .

Bright Stars noted: Vega, Epsilon Lyrae, Deneb, Alberio, Altair,( the summer triangle) in the western part of the sky, Antares early in the observation, Polaris dead ahead to the north. Overall, it seemed that the summer skychart had been cut in half and then turned 180 so that the side with Sagittarius on it was still above the sky. I noted that the Tea pot was pouring out all of it's contents into the western horizon.

Constellations noted: Lyra, Cygnus, Aquila, Scorpius, Sagittarius, Pegasus, Andromeda, Delphinus,Sagitta, Vulpecula, Hercules, Ursa Minor and what may have been Cepheus. all of these constellations were spread across the sky with Delphinus being the closest to the zenith. 

Deep Sky Objects: Pleiades was very faint but could be viewed rising almost due east from our location, and i could see what looked like a true little dipper being formed by the seven sisters.

Apod 1.8

This weeks picture is from Oct. 17th and shows a galaxy cluster where one galaxy appears to be curved on the right side of the picture. The galaxy cluster shown is MACS1206 and what we are seeing is a "gravitational lens". The gravitational distortion of light is caused by the galaxy's, the one in the back of the galaxy cluster,  light having to bend around multiple areas of heavy gravity which the scientist at NASA theorize is Dark Matter in this case. Dark Matter is substance that we have just recently discovered and we have also found out that most of the universe is composed of dark matter. The actual composition of dark matter is unknown but many theorize that is made up of exotic particles that allow for dark matter to have the gravitational pull that it does.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111017.html

Apod 1.5

This weeks picture is from September 28th and features a large solar flare coming from a group of sunspots known currently as AR1302. This group of sunspots is very important or special because it is one of the most active groups in many years and it can even be seen without a telescope! The picture featured what is known as an X-class flare, or in layman's terms, a flare that could cause plant-wide radio black outs! This means the flare has to be huge in size, even for the sun. Overall, we have been lucky because AR1302 could have sent a very devastating solar flare our way but we have yet to be in the direct path of one.
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110928.html

Apod 1.6

This weeks picture is that of M object 82, or better known as the Cigar Galaxy. this weeks picture shows a cloud of extremely hot and extremely fast moving gases being launched out of the galaxy. This massive amount of gas is being projected out of the galaxy because of the repeating supernovas inside of the galaxy and the solar winds that very large stars are giving off are combing to launch the debris into space. The supernovas and new star formations should last for another 100 million years, but until then, the galaxy will let loose unimaginable amounts of hydrogen gas enriched with heavier metals. 
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111006.html

apod 1.7

This weeks photo is from October 12th, 2011 and shows the rings of Saturn casting a beautiful shadow on the southern hemisphere of Saturn. The shadows the rings of Saturn cast are considered the sundial of seasons for Saturn. In 2009, Saturn had one of its equinoxes and now, for the next seven years, the shadows will be cast on the southern hemisphere of the great  gas planet. Sadly, we could not observe this from earth because of our position so close to the sun, but the Cassini orbiter was able to grab some photos of the shadows in august of this year. The Cassini orbiter has been in Saturn's  orbiut since 2004 and is expected to stay active until 2017.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111012.html

Jeremiah Horrocks, Biography

Kyle Violette

Mr. Percival

Astronomy Honors, Period 1

14 Oct. 2011

Biography quarter one: Jeremiah Horrocks

            Jeremiah Horrocks was born in 1618 in Lower Lodge, Liverpool to a father who was small farmer and a mother whose occupation is unknown. He lived a brief life and died on January 3^rd, 1641. During his life time he was a rather poor boy but he entered Emmanuel College in 1632 and later was added to the list of students attending Cambridge as a student with assisted living. Sadly, due to the cost of continuing his studies, he left both colleges in late 1635. It has been generally accepted that Horrocks supported himself after college by becoming a tutor for a wealthy family, the Stones family, and taught lower grade education to the stone children.

            Horrocks was not originally interested astronomy but during his short stay at Cambridge he learned of the advances made by Brahe and Kepler. He read about the discoveries made by some of the much better known astronomers and found certain flaws within some of their research. By 17, Horrocks was suggesting how to correct the faults within certain papers published by others and even started doing research of his own. The first thing Horrocks tried to prove was that the moon moved in an elliptical path around earth. Later, he even attempted to prove that the tides were in fact caused by the moon, but did not know what force the moon could be using to cause the tides. Although he alone did not prove his theories, they were later supported by Newton with his suggestion of gravity and how the gravities of the Earth, the Moon and the Sun interacted. Overall, it were the actions like this that made Horrocks a key piece in connecting the best known works of the most famous astronomers together into one cohesive unit.

            Finally, in 1639, Jeremiah Horrocks put himself on the list of notable astronomer by observing the transit of Venus across the sun. Horrocks was the only person in the known world that predicted when Venus would cross in front of the sun and was one of two people who actually observed the cross, the other person being William Crabtree, a friend of his who was informed of Horrocks prediction. Horrocks was able to make this immense observation because he had been taking data on Venus for many years and believed an earlier made table of data, Lansberg’s table, was inaccurate. The Lansberg table predicted a near miss transit of Venus in 1639 while Horrocks believed it would occur. Horrocks observed the transit on November 24, 1939 Julian calendar, December 4^th Gregorian calendar, and was able to observe it from 3:15 to 3:45. With this event now observed, Horrocks was able to make a well informed guess as to the size of Venus and make a much more accurate guess as to how far the planet was away from the sun. Horrocks predicted the plant was 59 million miles away while in reality it was 93 million miles away, but, this was a far more accurate prediction than what was previously though.

            Sadly, in 1640 Horrocks returned to his home town in Toxteth Park and on January 3^rd, 1641, Horrocks suddenly died at age 22. He was considered to be a blooming young astronomer and, as his friend Crabtree out it, his death was “an incalculable loss!”  

 

Links to sites

the links to the sites and books i will be using in my biography

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremiah_Horrocks

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A2769041

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1990QJRAS..31..333C book

http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1914Obs....37..335B book

APOD 1.4 sep. 23rd

This weeks picture is that of arp 272, or a picture of three galaxies colliding withing the  Hercules galaxy cluster. The galaxies are 450 million light years away and the picture of these galaxies alone spans 150 thousand light years. Collectively, the data was gathered by the Hubble legacy archive, and the galaxy NGC 6050 near center, and IC 1179 at upper right depict a massive collision that occurs rather often in our universe. In fact, our galaxy and the Andromeda galaxy will be colliding in the far future. Overall, this picture gives us a glimpse into the future of our galaxy and even a small glimpse into how our universe functions.

http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110922.html

observation one

This first observational post is about the night of 16th and the morning of the 17th of September. I was in downtown Tampa and i was able to see the moon nearly at its third quarter, with a slight tint of orange-ish yellow. The moon was just over the city buildings, still hanging nice and low in the night sky, and to the right of the moon was the only other visible celestial being, Jupiter. It was apparent that the moon was only a few days past the position of Jupiter. Also, Jupiter was a very clear orange color as it glowed in the night. Overall, it was very cool experience I wont be forgetting anytime soon.

APOD blog 1.3

The South Pole of Asteroid Vesta, or the second largest asteroid in the asteroid belt, is something similar to our moon. It has valleys, crevasses, mountains and craters all across its southern pole. Although very interesting to scientist, the most interesting feature of this asteroid is the spiraling features that scare a large portion of the asteroid's surface. the current theory as to where the feature came from is that a smaller meteor hit Vesta while it was traveling along it's usual path. Luckily for us, the Dawn Satellite will be going towards Vesta and will give us a large amount of new and even more crisp photos. 

APOD 1.2 September 6, 2011

This week's picture is that of M6, or the butterfly cluster. This cluster Spans about 20 light years from the farthest stars to the left going to the farthest star to the right. Also, we believed that the cluster was only 2000 light years or so away from us but current measurements have reduced that distance to 1500 light years. On top of the relatively small space separating us from the cluster, all of the stars in the cluster are estimated to be around 100 million years old. This being said, that means that almost all of the stars will have a blue color to them while some of the oldest of the stars will start to have an orange tint to them. Knowing all of this information, astronomers are able to get more accurate measurements of the scale of the universe.

Here is the picture: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110906.html 

APOD 1.1 Oct. 12, 1997

My picture shows the impact of the K-T event, or, the asteroid crater that proves that the cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs was an asteroid impact. Because the crater is so massive, scientist estimate that the meteor that hit the earth had to be at least 6 to 12 miles wide. Also, scientist have dated the impact to have occurred 65 million years ago. These findings concur with the theory previously accepted by scientist around the world about the death of the dinosaurs and 70% of all species of the earth that occurred 65 million years ago. The crater is currently named the Chicxulub crater. The carter is centered off of the Yucatan Peninsula but the rings of the impact stretch well into the peninsula itself. Overall, this discovery was a great achievement for scientist and paleontologist everywhere because they now have definite proof supporting their theory. The picture: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap971012.html