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Category Archives: Astronomy

Astronomy enthusiasts to meet in Blaine County

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GEARY The Oklahoma City Astronomy Club invites the public to share views of a rare event at their Blaine County observatory Saturday night.

Astronomy club members will gather at the club's Cheddar Ranch Observatory to view the supernova and other objects including Jupiter and a number of galaxies.

Club members will meet visitors from the public at the Cherokee Truck Stop at Exit 108 on Interstate 40 at its junction with U.S. 281 south of Geary at 5 p.m. Saturday to escort them to the observatory, which features a spacious building, according to a news release.

Participants are advised to dress warmly in several layers, though Saturday temperatures are predicted to be milder than in recent days.

Astronomers in several locations detected a new supernova explosion in the nearby galaxy M 82 early in the week, and the exploded star has been brightening steadily for several days, promising a rare show this weekend for those with telescopes. Neither the supernova nor its home galaxy can be seen with the naked eye.

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Astronomy enthusiasts to meet in Blaine County

OKC Astronomy Club Hosts Stellar Explosion Public Viewing In Watonga

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WATONGA, Oklahoma -

The Oklahoma City Astronomy Club will host a public viewing of a stellar explosion this Saturday night in Blaine County.

Earlier this week, astronomers detected a new supernova explosion in M 82, a nearby galaxy close to the Milky Way galaxy.

The last supernova to travel this close to Earth was at least 1993. The brightness of a supernova is based on its magnitude. The lower the magnitude number, the brighter the object will be. Astronomers have rated the new supernova at less than magnitude 12 with a potential to brighten to magnitude eight or nine. With a low magnitude number, the stellar blast will be easy to view through telescopes.

The public is invited to join the OKC Astronomy Club members at the Cheddar Ranch Observatory in Watonga, Oklahoma. The public will have the opportunity to share views on the stellar explosion, as well as Jupiter and other galaxies.

Public attendees have been asked to meet at 5 p.m. Saturday at the Cherokee Truck Stop at exit 108 on I-40 at the US-281 junction. Club members will meet and escort public attendees to the observatory.

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OKC Astronomy Club Hosts Stellar Explosion Public Viewing In Watonga

Continental Telescope Array Could Usher Astronomy Revolution in Africa

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Able to detect light from the first stars just 380,000 years after the big bang, the Square Kilometer Array will be the world's biggest radio observatory and promises to spur science and economic development in Africa

Thousands of radio telescopes are being built in Africa as part of the Square Kilometer Array, to be the world's largest network of radio telescopes, which could help usher in a new age of astronomy in Africa.

Scientists are predicting an astronomy renaissance on the African continent in coming years, thanks in part to a giant radio telescope array being built there. But the road to cosmic cachet is not an easy one, and African science advocates are scrambling to take full advantage of the opportunities coming their way. "Astronomy really is about to explode across the African continent," astronomer Kartik Sheth of the U.S. National Radio Astronomy Observatory said January 9 at the 223rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society near Washington, D.C. The challenge, he said, is to make sure African astronomers benefit from the surge of facilities being built in their midst. "We want to build long-term sustainable collaborations that are mutually beneficial to the U.S. and to Africa. We dont want brain and data drain from Africa to the U.S." The biggest game-changer on the continent will be the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), the world's largest network of radio telescopes designed to survey the sky faster than any instrument before it. Roughly 3,000 radio disheshaving a combined total surface equal to a light-collecting area of about a square kilometerwill be spread across vast distances to offer a resolution akin to a single dish encompassing the whole span. "SKA will be the premier project of the coming decades, completely revolutionizing radio astronomy," said Ted Williams, director of the South African Astronomical Observatory. "The largest part of the SKA will be sited in Africa, and it's continent-wide, extending across eight African countries:" Botswana, Ghana, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa and Zambia. A smaller portion of the project will be built in Australia. South Africa, headquarters for the African contingent of the project, mounted a competitive campaign to bring the observatory to Africa, and the news in 2012 that its bid had won the lion's share of the project was unexpected to many. "We kind of took them by surprise but we did our homework very well," says Takalani Nemaungani, an engineer at South Africa's Department of Science and Technology who led his country's SKA lobbying campaign. Nemaungani sold the SKA committee on South Africa's clear skies (necessary for precision radio astronomy), the promised political support of its president and cabinetwho have passed legislation to strictly limit the amount of radio noise in the remote site areaand its expertise in engineering and infrastructure. Construction of the $1.6-billion observatory is due to begin in 2016 and will be added to in phases, with the first observations to take place in 2019 and full operation by 2024. South Africa's apartheid past posed a special challenge. Until the race-separation policy ended in 1994 the country faced local unrest and international opprobrium. Trade sanctions imposed on South Africa by other countries, especially the U.S., hampered the nation's economy but resulted in some unintended consequences in boosting homegrown technologies. "Because of the embargoes and sanctions here, there were technologies and expertise we had to build for ourselves to sustain the country," Nemaungani says. For example, the international oil embargo against South Africa enacted in 1987 forced the nation to become the world leader in technology to convert coal to oil. Still, Africa's goal of astronomical ascendancy faces serious challenges, including many African countries' high levels of unemployment, poverty, poor education and lack of investment in science. According the UNESCO 2010 Science Report (pdf), scientific development in sub-Saharan Africa faces "poor infrastructure development, a small pool of researchers and minimal scientific output. The continent has failed to invest in science, technology and innovation (STI) as drivers of economic growth and long-term sustainable development." Proponents of Africas new age of astronomy want to change all that. "SKA is helping us to change perspectives on Africa as a destination for high-tech opportunities and industry," Nemaungani says. "We're using astronomy as a gateway science to interest young kids to study math and science. That's where a big project like SKA can make an impact." Virtually everywhere in South Africa people have heard about the SKA, although they might not know much about it, Williams said. Leaders are particularly working to help South Africa's black population reap the new scientific opportunities, which have traditionally gone to the nation's privileged whites. "Several generations of Africans were told, 'You can't do this,'" he told Scientific American. "The message we're trying to send is, 'Yes, you can.'" And the SKA is just one of numerous astronomical projects on the continent. The High Energy Stereoscopic System (HESS) gamma-ray observatory opened in 2002 in Namibia, new telescopes are being built in Burkina Faso and Ethiopia, and the Southern African Large Telescope (SALT) was inaugurated in South Africa in 2005 and came fully online in 2011. Ted Williams was a Rutgers University astronomer in 1998 when he first came to South Africa to investigate the possibility of building SALT. His wife insisted on coming on the trip because it was a "once-in-a-lifetime" opportunity to visit. It was not long, though, before the two moved to Cape Town. In his time there Williams has seen significant technological, scientific and social advancement. "When we started on SALT, nobody could have conceived that a project like SKA would go to South Africa," Williams says. "So much has changed."

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Continental Telescope Array Could Usher Astronomy Revolution in Africa

Telescope array could usher in astronomy revolution in Africa

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SKA Organisation

An article by Scientific American.

Scientists are predicting an astronomy renaissance on the African continent in coming years, thanks in part to a giant radio telescope array being built there. But the road to cosmic cachet is not an easy one, and African science advocates are scrambling to take full advantage of the opportunities coming their way.

"Astronomy really is about to explode across the African continent," astronomer Kartik Sheth of the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory said January 9 at the 223rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society near Washington DC The challenge, he said, is to make sure African astronomers benefit from the surge of facilities being built in their midst. "We want to build long-term sustainable collaborations that are mutually beneficial to the US and to Africa. We dont want brain and data drain from Africa to the US."

The biggest game-changer on the continent will be the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), the world's largest network of radio telescopes designed to survey the sky faster than any instrument before it. Roughly 3,000 radio dishes having a combined total surface equal to a light-collecting area of about a square kilometer will be spread across vast distances to offer a resolution akin to a single dish encompassing the whole span. "SKA will be the premier project of the coming decades, completely revolutionizing radio astronomy," said Ted Williams, director of the South African Astronomical Observatory. "The largest part of the SKA will be sited in Africa, and it's continent-wide, extending across eight African countries:" Botswana, Ghana, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa and Zambia. A smaller portion of the project will be built in Australia.

South Africa, headquarters for the African contingent of the project, mounted a competitive campaign to bring the observatory to Africa, and the news in 2012 that its bid had won the lion's share of the project was unexpected to many. "We kind of took them by surprise but we did our homework very well," says Takalani Nemaungani, an engineer at South Africa's Department of Science and Technology who led his country's SKA lobbying campaign. Nemaungani sold the SKA committee on South Africa's clear skies (necessary for precision radio astronomy), the promised political support of its president and cabinet who have passed legislation to strictly limit the amount of radio noise in the remote site area and its expertise in engineering and infrastructure. Construction of the $1.6-billion observatory is due to begin in 2016 and will be added to in phases, with the first observations to take place in 2019 and full operation by 2024.

South Africa's apartheid past posed a special challenge. Until the race-separation policy ended in 1994 the country faced local unrest and international opprobrium. Trade sanctions imposed on South Africa by other countries, especially the US, hampered the nation's economy but resulted in some unintended consequences in boosting homegrown technologies. "Because of the embargoes and sanctions here, there were technologies and expertise we had to build for ourselves to sustain the country," Nemaungani says. For example, the international oil embargo against South Africa enacted in 1987 forced the nation to become the world leader in technology to convert coal to oil.

Still, Africa's goal of astronomical ascendancy faces serious challenges, including many African countries' high levels of unemployment, poverty, poor education and lack of investment in science. According the UNESCO 2010 Science Report, scientific development in sub-Saharan Africa faces "poor infrastructure development, a small pool of researchers and minimal scientific output. The continent has failed to invest in science, technology and innovation (STI) as drivers of economic growth and long-term sustainable development."

Proponents of Africas new age of astronomy want to change all that. "SKA is helping us to change perspectives on Africa as a destination for high-tech opportunities and industry," Nemaungani says. "We're using astronomy as a gateway science to interest young kids to study math and science. That's where a big project like SKA can make an impact."

Virtually everywhere in South Africa people have heard about the SKA, although they might not know much about it, Williams said. Leaders are particularly working to help South Africa's black population reap the new scientific opportunities, which have traditionally gone to the nation's privileged whites. "Several generations of Africans were told, 'You can't do this,'" he told Scientific American. "The message we're trying to send is, 'Yes, you can.'"

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Telescope array could usher in astronomy revolution in Africa

By chance, astronomy students spot humongous space explosion

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It was a euphoric moment for students at the University of London after they serendipitously spotted a powerful supernova in the M82 galaxy. The supernova is one of the closest to be spotted from Earth in recent decades, say scientists.

The sky was getting cloudy.

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Instead of the planned practical astronomy class, Steve Fossey at the University of London Observatory, decided to train four undergrads how to use a CCD camera on one of the observatorys automated 0.35meter telescopes, according to the press release by the University of London.

The students decided to look at the Messier 82 galaxy, located 12 million light years from Earth. "It is a very photogenic galaxy and fascinating, so we often look at it," Fossey says.

What followed was a serendipitous discovery of a supernova, an exploding star.

Working with Dr. Fossey, the students Ben Cooke, Tom Wright, Matthew Wilde, and Guy Pollack spotted the explosion in nearby galaxy Messier 82, the press release stated.

Fossey and his students noticed a starlike object on the galaxy, which Fosseydid not recognize from previous observations, according to the press release.

They looked up online archive images of the galaxy, and it appeared that what they were looking at was probably some kind of a new star in the galaxy, the team said in the press release.

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By chance, astronomy students spot humongous space explosion

It’s a new era in astronomy

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The recent discovery of neutrino particles bombarding Earth from outer space has ushered in a new era in neutrino astronomy, scientists say.

Neutrinos are produced when cosmic rays interact with their surroundings, yielding particles with no electrical charge and negligible mass. Scientists have wondered about the source of cosmic rays since they were discovered, and finding cosmic neutrinos could provide clues about the origin of the mysterious rays.

In November, a team of scientists announced the discovery of cosmic neutrinos by the giant IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica. [Neutrinos from Beyond the Solar System Found (Images)]

- Francis Halzen, principal investigator of the IceCube observatory

"We now have the opportunity to determine what the sources are, if we are indeed seeing sources of cosmic rays," said Francis Halzen, principal investigator of the IceCube observatory and a theoretical physicist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "The big difference why it's new astronomy is that we are not using light, we are using neutrinos to look at the sky."

Cosmic visitorsNeutrinos are the social misfits of the particle world they rarely interact with matter. Produced in some of the most violent, but unknown, events in the universe, they travel to Earth at close to the speed of light and in straight lines, which reveals information about their origin. Supernovas, active galactic nuclei and black holes are some of the possible sources for these ghostly particles.

Until recently, scientists had only detected neutrinos beyond Earth from the sun or from a supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud in 1987. No neutrinos from distant cosmic sources had been seen.

But in April 2012, IceCube recorded two neutrinos with extremely high energies almost a billion times that of the ones found in 1987 that could only have come from a high-energy source outside the solar system. After looking deeper into the data, scientists found a total of 28 high-energy neutrinos with energies greater than 30 teraelectronvolts (TeV), reporting their finding in the journal Science.

The finding opens the door to a new kind of astronomy that would "image" the sky in the light of neutrinos, rather than photons. "Each time we find another way to make a picture of the sky using gamma rays, X-rays, radio waves you have always been able to see things you never saw before," Halzen told SPACE.com.

The successful completion of IceCube and the prospect of other telescopes on the horizon have set the neutrino world abuzz.

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It's a new era in astronomy

John Dobson, evangelist for amateur astronomy, dies at 98

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John Dobson, a former Hindu monk and a self-taught stargazer who developed a powerful, inexpensive telescope that almost anyone could build and became one of amateur astronomys most influential evangelists, died Jan. 15 at a hospital in Burbank, Calif. He was 98.

The death was confirmed by Bob Alborzian, coordinator of the Burbank chapter of Sidewalk Astronomers, an international organization that Mr. Dobson helped found in 1968. Mr. Dobson had a stroke a few years ago.

Called the Johnny Appleseed of amateur astronomy, the lanky, ponytailed Mr. Dobson started building telescopes in the 1950s as a monk at the Vedanta Monastery in San Francisco. His passion for the hobby led to his expulsion, freeing him to become a roving ambassador for the simple joys of studying the night sky.

He created a hobby and a type of telescope that ensured that people could build their own and look farther across the universe than was possible for most people before his time, said Anthony Cook, astronomical observer at Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles.

Mr. Dobson used cheap or salvaged materials such as glass from ship portholes and cardboard tubing to make his telescopes, the most radical feature of which is a simple, sturdy and highly effective wooden mount that allows users to easily point the scope at any spot in the sky. Over five decades, he taught thousands of people how to build one.

His design was eventually embraced by commercial manufacturers, who advertise the telescopes as Dobsonians. They remain one of the most popular telescopes on the market, said Dennis di Cicco, senior editor of Sky & Telescope magazine.

Dobsonian telescopes have made important contributions to astronomy, including the discovery in 1995 of Comet Hale-Bopp, the most-distant comet ever discovered by amateurs. One of its namesakes, Tom Bopp, was using a Dobsonian.

Alborzian, who had known Mr. Dobson since 1968, said he once urged Mr. Dobson to patent his design. He refused. He said, These are gifts to humanity, Alborzian recalled. His goal was to open astronomy to the common man.

Mr. Dobson had his critics. He did not, for instance, subscribe to the Big Bang theory but favored the idea of a steady-state universe with no beginning and no end. Im not interested in just the stars, he told the Los Angeles Times in 2005. Im interested in the whole ball of wax.

Although the steady-state theory has been widely discredited, Mr. Dobson was an unwavering supporter, which caused many in the astronomy establishment to dismiss him.

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John Dobson, evangelist for amateur astronomy, dies at 98


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