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Category Archives: Astronomy

Astronomy Update: Understanding our Milky Way

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Editor's note: Astronomy Update is a column provided by the Chippewa Valley Astronomical Society, Hobbs Observatory and L.E. Phillips Planetarium. It is compiled by Lauren Likkel of the UW-Eau Claire physics and astronomy department.

Common knowledge for many people is that we live in the Milky Way Galaxy, but that is usually about where it ends.

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Astronomy Update: Understanding our Milky Way

Radio astronomy publication a milestone for SA

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ASTRONOMERS working on the KAT-7 radio telescope have published their first scientific paper, a milestone that is as much about proving the device is up to scratch as it is about doing cutting-edge science.

The KAT-7 is a critical precursor to the much bigger MeerKAT, which in turn is a pathfinder for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), which will be the worlds most powerful radio telescope when completed. South Africa is co-hosting the SKA with Australia and has invested heavily in the project, with R2bn set aside for it over the next three years alone.

South African and foreign scientists have used the KAT-7 and the radio telescope at the Hartebeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory to observe periodic jet flares emerging from a binary star system called Circinus X-1.

This star system consists of a neutron star and an ordinary star that orbit each other every 16.5 days in an elliptical orbit.

When these two bodies are at their closest, the gravity of the dense neutron star sucks in matter in a plate-like disc from the ordinary star and fires it out again in a powerful jet, which can be detected with a radio telescope, said Richard Armstrong, SKA SA fellow at the University of Cape Town and co-author of the paper, published on Thursday in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomy Society.

"With KAT-7 we were able to see details of two extreme radio flares, and show that the power of these jets may be connected to a decrease in the accretion rate of the neutron star," he said.

Accretion describes the way a neutron star "gobbles" material from the other. It is the first time Circinus X-1 has been observed in such detail over several flare cycles. While it is clearly important to astronomers working in this field, it also has bearing on the overall SKA project.

"KAT-7 was really intended as an engineering test bed to refine the design and systems for the MeerKAT telescope that we are working on now, but we are absolutely delighted that it has turned out to be a top quality science instrument, capable of producing significant science," said Rhodes Universitys Prof Justin Jonas, associate director for science and engineering at the SKA project office in South Africa.

Science and Technology Minister Derek Hanekom said the publication proved South Africas engineers could deliver a cutting-edge scientific instrument capable of conducting "frontier" science.

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Radio astronomy publication a milestone for SA

Neutrinos spark 'new astronomy era'

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15 May 2013 Last updated at 13:10 ET By Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News

An experiment buried beneath the ice of the South Pole has for the first time seen the particles called neutrinos originating outside our Solar System.

They are produced in our atmosphere and in the Universe's most violent processes, but the IceCube experiment has seen the first "cosmic neutrinos".

It detected 28 of the exceptionally fast-moving neutrinos - but it remains unclear exactly where they came from.

The pioneering finds could herald an entirely new branch of astronomy.

The results were presented on Wednesday at the IceCube Particle Astrophysics Symposium in Wisconsin, US.

Researchers have gathered there to discuss the findings of the world's largest neutrino detector, occupying a cubic kilometre. It is made up of 86 strings sunk into the Antarctic ice, each with 60 sensitive light detectors strung along it like "fairy lights".

As neutrinos pass, they very rarely bump into the nuclei of atoms in the ice, producing a brief flash that the detectors can catch. With more than 5,000 detectors catching flashes at different times, the direction of the neutrinos' arrival can be determined.

Neutrinos can be produced in our own atmosphere here on Earth - IceCube picks up about 100,000 of them a year - but previous attempts to associate them with more far-flung cosmic processes, such as those described in April 2012, have turned up nothing.

However, in April this year, the IceCube collaboration reported seeing two neutrinos - nicknamed Bert and Ernie - of energies greater than a "petaelectronvolt".

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Neutrinos spark 'new astronomy era'

PM Lee, tell us how many out there know astronomy?

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PM Lee, tell us how many out there know astronomy?

Love of astronomy launches Pittsfield native's education to new heights

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Duane Lee, a Williams College graduate, is close to attaining his doctorate degree in astronomy at Columbia University. (Courtesy photo)

PITTSFIELD -- For Pittsfield native son Duane M. Lee, the next stop after graduating this year from the School of Arts and Sciences at Columbia University will be starting a post-doctoral fellowship at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory in China this fall.

His story begins, however, as an African-American child growing up on Linden Street on the city's west side, a less-affluent section of Pittsfield that also is teeming with young children full of potential and dreams.

"I was always interested in science," said Lee, 33, during a recent interview from Columbia University in New York City, where he is fine-tuning his final dissertation for a doctorate degree in astronomy.

"Particularly, I remember my neighbors across the street had a telescope. In the summer, they invited neighborhood kids to come look through it," he said. "I was fortunate. Where I grew up we had very dark skies, where you can see stars and planets with the naked eye."

His mother, Francine Lee, said she recalls that her son wanted to be an astronaut, but issues with asthma prevented his pursuit.

Duane recalls how his father, Henry Lee, did buy him his own telescope. "I was about 11 or 12 and that pretty much cemented my love of astronomy," Duane said.

Before that, however, Francine said she wanted to instill an early love of learning in all of her children.

In 1981, when Duane was 2, she enrolled him in Pittsfield's free Parent-Child Home Program, a home-based

While attending Conte Community School, Duane also received Title I reading support through second grade, a program that also supports disadvantaged students.

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Love of astronomy launches Pittsfield native's education to new heights

NASA's Center for Astronomy Education Teaching Excellence Workshops

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NASA's Center for Astronomy Education, or CAE, announces a series of educator workshops for astronomy and space science educators.

These workshops provide participants with experiences needed to create effective and productive active-learning classroom environments. Workshop leaders model best practices in implementing many different classroom-tested instructional strategies. But most importantly, you and your workshop colleagues will gain first-hand experience implementing these proven strategies yourselves. During many microteaching events, you will have the opportunity to role-play the parts of student and instructor. You will assess and critique each other's implementation in real time, as part of a supportive learning community. You will have the opportunity to use unfamiliar teaching techniques in collaboration with mentors before using them with your students. CAE is funded through NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Exoplanet Exploration Program.

June 1-2, 2013 -- Indianapolis, Ind. CAE Tier I Teaching Excellence Workshop for Current and Future Astronomy and Space Science Instructors

June 17-20, 2013 -- College Park, Md. New Faculty Workshop for Physics and Astronomy

Aug. 24-25, 2013 -- Albuquerque, N.M. CAE Tier I Teaching Excellence Workshop for Current and Future Astronomy and Space Science Instructors

For more information and to register for workshops online, visit http://astronomy101.jpl.nasa.gov/workshops/index.cfm.

Inquiries about this series of workshops should be directed to Gina Brissenden at gbrissenden@as.arizona.edu.

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NASA's Center for Astronomy Education Teaching Excellence Workshops


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