Space - Tullamore Astronomical Society
Space - Tullamore Astronomical Society
Space - Tullamore Astronomical Society
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REALTA<br />
9+-<br />
Reviews, Events And Lectures –<br />
<strong>Tullamore</strong> Astronomy<br />
Publication of the <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong><br />
<strong>Society</strong>.<br />
The Midlands only <strong>Astronomical</strong> Newsletter!<br />
Volume 7: Issue 2 – November/December 2005<br />
Price: €5.25<br />
www.tullamoreastronomy.com<br />
<strong>Space</strong>:<br />
Imagination<br />
Knows No<br />
Frontiers<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 1
And then there were 12 Winners<br />
<strong>Space</strong>: Imagination Knows No Frontiers<br />
Comes to a climatic close<br />
The competition finally came to a close on Saturday October 22 nd . A presentation ceremony was organised, the music was<br />
playing, Big Bear made an appearance, and one end of the Byrne’s World of Wonder <strong>Tullamore</strong> store filled with eagerly<br />
awaiting kids and their families! Big Bear had lots of candy to give out, and with the festive atmosphere of a birthday<br />
party, and presents galore, the kids one by one came up and received their prize. The end to the TAS & Byrne’s<br />
Children’s Art Competition, had come to a climatic finale.<br />
There was a short recap by TAS’s Seanie Morris, and a welcome speech by Councillor Richard Egan, as emphasis was on<br />
the children and their imaginations in space and astronomy were highlighted and acknowledged.<br />
During the weeks leading up to the presentation, Michael O’Connell<br />
and Seanie Morris compiled the calendar. It now consists of the 12 winning<br />
posters accompanying each month, loaded with fun facts and historical dates<br />
and snippets. It also shows the key phases of the Moon throughout each<br />
month, and includes notes on where to observe each of the planets.<br />
The calendar is available to buy in Byrne’s World of Wonder, or at<br />
TAS meetings, priced €10. You can also obtain one by sending an SAE (96<br />
cents stamped) with €10 o the club secretary. All monies raised go into the<br />
clubs fund towards erecting a clubhouse next to the observatory. This will be<br />
a public accessible structure, which is hoped to be completed within 3 years.<br />
Back (l-r): Seanie Morris (TAS), Conor Rohan, Sean Hughes, John Cooke (Mngr, Byrne's WoW), Siobhain McCormack (judge), Big<br />
Bear (aka Earl Morris), Councillor Richard Egan, Shane Murray (Ast. Mngr, Byrne's WoW). Middle (l-r): Ciara O'Shea, Eanna Duffy,<br />
Conor Lynch, Jason Boland, Lucinda Daly, Shauna Stringer. Front (l-r): Heather Burke, Becky McDonagh, Colm McGuinness, Conor<br />
McGuinness. Picture by Darren Dempsey (TAS).<br />
2<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
Key organisers and folks involved in the running of<br />
the competition: (l-r) Councillor Richard Egan, Shane<br />
Murray (Byrnes WoW), Siobhain McCormack (judged<br />
the entries), Michael O’Connell (TAS), Seanie Morris<br />
(TAS), John Cooke (Byrnes WoW), and Earl Morris<br />
(Byrne’s WoW). A very special thank you is extended<br />
to them for giving their time and energy into the<br />
competition and calendar. (Photo by Darren<br />
Dempsey)<br />
Many casual shoppers came in to have a look at what<br />
went on! Interest even went further than was hoped, as John<br />
Flannery (centre-right) from South Dublin Astronomy <strong>Society</strong><br />
(SDAS) came down all the way from Ranelagh! Even the<br />
competition itself drew in entries from Offaly, Westmeath,<br />
Kildare Galway, and Laois counties! (Photo by Darren<br />
Dempsey)<br />
Seanie Morris after setting up his ETX-70 and the P.A.<br />
system – but was he overlooking them to make sure Big<br />
Bear would not ‘steal’ the show?! Deirdre Campbell helps<br />
out.<br />
Seanie Morris presented Shane Murray with a batch of<br />
the TAS 2006 Calendars a couple days after the<br />
presentation. So far (at the time of print), it is on sale in<br />
Byrne’s World of Wonder <strong>Tullamore</strong> and Mullingar shops.<br />
(Photo by Seanie Morris)<br />
It was deemed that each<br />
winning entry was worthy of 1 st<br />
Place!<br />
Becky McDonagh (7) from <strong>Tullamore</strong>, Ciara O’Shea (12) from Clonderig in Ballinahowen, Colm<br />
McGuinness (6) from Ballycue in Geashill, Conor Lynch (8) from Aughanrush in Killeigh, Conor<br />
McGuinness (5) from Ballycue in Geashill,Conor Rohan (11) from Ballinahowen, Eanna Duffy (9)<br />
from Ballinahowen, Heather Burke (8) from Tannery Wharf in Rathangan, Jason Boland (10) from<br />
Ballinahowen, Lucinda Daly (10) from Ballinahowen, Sean Hughes (12) from Kearney Park in<br />
<strong>Tullamore</strong>, and Shauna Stringer (7) from Corolanty in Shinrone.<br />
TAS says Congratulations to each of the winners, and a huge Well Done<br />
to over 330 more that entered!<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 3
Letters to the Editor<br />
From: Girvan McKay<br />
Hello again, Seanie. This has nothing to do with Maire's lecture title, but maybe readers of Réalta might be faintly<br />
interested to read the following enquiry and my reply, which I received from a correspondent re: constellation names.<br />
ORIGINAL ENQUIRY:<br />
----- Original Message -----<br />
From: "Sìol Cultural Enterprises" <br />
To: <br />
Sent: Monday, September 19, 2005 2:13 PM<br />
Subject: Inquiry to Gaelic Constellations<br />
Hi,<br />
I’m doing some research on Scottish Gaelic (and older Celtic) astronomical terms. In my searching on-line I ran across a<br />
listing of the constellations in numerous languages including Galeic and Irish (constellation-names.at). I believe you<br />
contributed the Scottish Gaelic names of constellations (and the Irish). I was wondering what your source for these names<br />
was. Thanks for your help.<br />
Cheers,<br />
Trueman Matheson,<br />
Sìol Cultural Enterprises,<br />
St. Andrew's, NS, CANADA<br />
http://www.gaelicbooks.com<br />
MY REPLY:<br />
Thanks for the enquiry. The sources for the constellation names were, respectively:<br />
Scots Gaelic:<br />
REUL-EOLAS - by Patrick Moore, translated by Iain Aonghas MacLeoid, published 1997 by John A. Macleod, Largs,<br />
Ayrshire, ISBN 0 9530874 0 9.<br />
Also: THE ILLUSTRATED GAELIC-ENGLISH DICTIONARY, Edward Dwelly, various editions and reprints.<br />
Irish Gaelic:<br />
FOCLOIR REALTEOLAIOCHTA/ Dictionary of Astronomy, (name of compiler not given), publisher AN GUM, Dublin,<br />
1996, ISBN 1-85791-175-X.<br />
Also: ENGLISH-IRISH DICTIONARY, Tomas de Bhaldraithe, published by Government Publications, Dublin 1959.<br />
-Hope this helps. Girvan McKay / Garbhan MacAoidh.<br />
Thanks for that Girvan. It’s nice to get a query from across the waters! –Ed.<br />
Club Snippets<br />
TAS Christmas Party will be coming up soon. A date has<br />
not been fixed yet, so keep an eye on our website, or you will<br />
be notified via e-mail. If you are not already on the TAS E-mail<br />
List to be kept up to date with club news and astronomy events,<br />
send an e-mail to tullamoreastronomy@yahoo.co.uk.<br />
Club Fleeces There are still a few left. Sizes available are<br />
Large or Medium. Priced €15, they can be purchased at any<br />
meeting.<br />
TAS AGM This was fixed for Tuesday December<br />
6 th , but due to some committee members not being<br />
able to make it that night, it may be pushed up to the<br />
start of the New Year. Members will be advised. If<br />
you would like to become a more active member,<br />
then this will be your chance as a member to have<br />
your say in what the club should do. The AGM is<br />
open to everyone.<br />
4<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
NEWS UPDATE<br />
From Around The Universe<br />
New crater formation theory • HST searches for oxygen on the Moon •<br />
Russia to launch Brazils first astronaut • 10 th ‘planet’ has a moon • Mars<br />
was once like Earth • 2 new moons for Pluto • Life’s building blocks<br />
abundant in space<br />
Hubble Searches for Oxygen on the Moon<br />
During the summer, scientists pointed the Hubble<br />
<strong>Space</strong> Telescope at the Moon to take a closer look at<br />
its soil. Initial findings support the potential existence of<br />
some unique varieties of oxygen–rich glassy soils in<br />
both the Aristarchus and Apollo 17 regions. They could<br />
be well suited for visits by robots and human explorers<br />
to learn how to live off the land on the Moon.<br />
While Hubble wasn't specifically designed to<br />
look at the Moon (it only has the resolution of a football<br />
field for an object so close) scientists can use the<br />
ultraviolet capability of its Advanced Camera for<br />
Surveys to analyse the contents of lunar soil, particularly<br />
minerals and ore that might contain oxygen.<br />
Since the Moon does not have a breathable<br />
atmosphere, and spacecrafts have limited load capacities,<br />
harvesting oxygen from the soil may be critical for longterm<br />
human missions. Hubble found that the soil in the<br />
regions examined contained abundant amounts of<br />
ilmenite, a mixture of titanium, iron, and oxygen.<br />
Laboratory experiments on Earth have shown<br />
that applying certain chemical processes to terrestrial<br />
ilmenite can easily liberate oxygen and water. Water can<br />
then be turned into oxygen and hydrogen, which could<br />
also be used for rocket fuel.<br />
Other studies have found evidence for water ice<br />
near the lunar poles. While those areas might serve well<br />
for human outposts, they are not necessarily the first<br />
choices for science missions.<br />
The Hubble team examined three lunar sites,<br />
two of which – the Apollo 15 and 17 landing sites –<br />
where soil chemistry is well known. The third was the<br />
Aristarchus crater, a "geologic wonderland" that has<br />
piqued geologists' interest for decades. The Aristarchus<br />
crater is the brightest feature of the Moon's near side,<br />
nearly twice as bright as most spots on the Moon and<br />
visible to the naked eye. It's just 25 miles across but<br />
more than two miles deep. At only 450 million years old,<br />
it is one of the younger major features on the Moon.<br />
More importantly, it sits in a region of the Moon<br />
that scientists believe was once rocked by volcanic<br />
explosions and tectonic shifts. The two-mile gouge<br />
exposes the historical record of what went on in the<br />
region, including the history of crust and mantle<br />
formation on a young satellite.<br />
Aristarchus crater was the planned landing site for<br />
Apollo 18, but no human or robot has ever set foot there,<br />
making it a likely target for the Lunar Reconnaissance<br />
Orbiter as it explores the lunar surface in 2008,<br />
according to current plans. Data from that mission,<br />
combined with Hubble's observations, will help plan the<br />
location of future robotic and human missions.<br />
Craters in Planets and Moons Not What They Seemed<br />
A hole in a moon or planet does<br />
not always mean what<br />
astronomers thought. Most of the<br />
craters on Jupiter's moon Europa<br />
are formed by chunks of rock and<br />
ice splashing back down onto the<br />
moon's surface after a meteor<br />
strike, a new study suggests. It was<br />
previously thought that most of the<br />
craters seen on moons and planets<br />
were the work of direct, or<br />
"primary" impacts from asteroids<br />
and comets. The new finding<br />
suggests that most of those craters<br />
might instead be "secondaries,"<br />
impacts that formed by the<br />
material ejected from primary<br />
impacts.<br />
For Europa, secondaries<br />
account for as much as 95% of all<br />
the small craters - those less than a<br />
mile in diameter - observed on the<br />
moon. The finding has<br />
implications for how astronomers<br />
date the ages of planetary surfaces.<br />
Asteroids, comets and<br />
chunks of cosmic debris routinely<br />
bombard the surface of planets and<br />
moons. Earth's atmosphere protects<br />
us from most of these impacts,<br />
incinerating most objects before<br />
they hit the ground. Even so, Earth<br />
has experienced countless meteor<br />
impacts throughout its long<br />
history. The evidence for most of<br />
those impacts have been erased by<br />
erosion from wind and rain and by<br />
constant turnover of the Earth's<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 5
crust (read the article about<br />
Apophis and a likely Earth impact<br />
in 2036 in the Sept/Oct 2005 issue<br />
of Réalta –Ed.).<br />
Earth's Moon, on the other<br />
hand, is pockmarked with millions<br />
of craters because it lacks both<br />
atmosphere and geologic activity.<br />
Similarly, Mars has thin<br />
atmosphere and relatively little<br />
geologic activity.<br />
On both the Moon and<br />
Mars, teasing out the primary<br />
impacts from the secondaries is<br />
difficult because the craters are just<br />
too numerous.<br />
The researchers instead<br />
turned to Europa and a world<br />
covered in a thick crust of ice.<br />
More importantly, Europa is<br />
geologically active like Earth. Its<br />
surface is constantly being repaved<br />
with new ice and as a result,<br />
Europa has very few craters.<br />
Using high-resolution<br />
images from NASA's Galileo<br />
spacecraft, the researchers<br />
measured the number, size and<br />
distribution of craters on Europa.<br />
They then ran a computer<br />
simulation of meteors randomly<br />
striking Europa but with the<br />
condition that the number and size<br />
of the craters had to match the real<br />
number and size observed in the<br />
images. After running the<br />
simulations hundreds of times and<br />
comparing the results to the<br />
images, they found that the crater<br />
distributions were not similar as<br />
would be expected if most of the<br />
craters were caused by primary<br />
impacts.<br />
The finding is important<br />
because scientists typically use<br />
crater counts to date the ages of<br />
planet and moon surfaces. When<br />
comparing two similar regions on a<br />
moon, for example, scientists<br />
generally assume that the region<br />
with more impact craters is older.<br />
Scientists can also use a region's<br />
crater density to calculate it's<br />
absolute age. They usually use our<br />
own Moon as a reference because<br />
scientists have reliably dated the<br />
age of some its craters based on<br />
rocks brought back by astronauts.<br />
If it turns out that most of<br />
these small caters are secondary<br />
and not primary, then that means<br />
the calibrated age from our Moon<br />
is not right.<br />
Most of the objects that<br />
strike Jupiter and its moons come<br />
from a region of the Solar System<br />
known as the Kuiper Belt.<br />
Therefore, another implication of<br />
the finding may be that there are<br />
fewer small asteroids in the Kuiper<br />
Belt than previously thought. It<br />
may be that small asteroids are<br />
rarely made or perhaps some<br />
process depletes them before they<br />
can reach Jupiter and its moons.<br />
Life's Building Blocks<br />
'Abundant in <strong>Space</strong>'<br />
The idea that comets and meteorites seeded an early<br />
Earth with the tools to make life has gained<br />
momentum from recent observations of some of these<br />
building blocks floating throughout the cosmos.<br />
Scientists scanning a galaxy 12 million light-years away<br />
with NASA's Spitzer <strong>Space</strong> Telescope detected copious<br />
amounts of nitrogen containing polycyclic aromatic<br />
hydrocarbons (PANHs), molecules critical to all known<br />
forms of life.<br />
PANHs carry information for DNA and RNA<br />
and are an important component of haemoglobin, the<br />
molecule that transports oxygen through the body. They<br />
also make chlorophyll, the main molecule responsible<br />
for photosynthesis in plants, and perhaps most<br />
importantly, they're the main ingredient in caffeine and<br />
chocolate.<br />
"There once was a time that the assumption was<br />
that the origin of life, everything from building simple<br />
compounds up to complex life, had to happen here on<br />
Earth," said study leader Doug Hudgins of Ames<br />
Research Center. "We've discovered that some very<br />
biologically interesting molecules can be formed outside<br />
our earthly environment and delivered here."<br />
While organic compounds have been discovered<br />
in meteorites that have landed on Earth, this is the first<br />
direct evidence for the presence of complex, important<br />
biogenic compounds in space. So far evidence suggests<br />
that PANHs are formed in the winds of dying stars and<br />
spread all over interstellar space.<br />
"This stuff contains the building blocks of life,<br />
and now we can say they're abundant in space," Hudgins<br />
said. "And wherever there's a planet out there, we know<br />
that these things are going to be raining down on it. It<br />
did here and it does elsewhere." Using the Spitzer <strong>Space</strong><br />
Telescope, Hudgins and his colleagues detected the<br />
familiar chemical signature of regular polycyclic<br />
aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the spiral galaxy M81,<br />
as well as a similar, but unknown signature.<br />
"There were a few anomalies in the spectrum<br />
that we couldn't explain," Hudgins says. The researchers<br />
compared their readings to the infrared signatures of<br />
similar molecules, finally settling on nitrogen containing<br />
PANHs because their data showed there was nitrogen in<br />
the regions they were investigating.<br />
"When we did that, we found that by putting a<br />
little nitrogen in these molecules explained the troubling<br />
molecules," Hudgins said. "This discovery takes this<br />
reservoir of molecules that we didn't think were<br />
interesting and transforms all this stuff into something of<br />
biologic interest."<br />
6<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
Moon discovered orbiting<br />
Solar System's 10th<br />
planet<br />
The newly discovered 10th planet, 2003 UB313, is<br />
looking more and more like one of the Solar System's<br />
major players. It has the heft of a real planet (latest<br />
estimates put it at about 20 percent larger than Pluto), a<br />
catchy code name (Xena, after the TV warrior princess),<br />
and a Guinness Book-ish record of its own (at about 97<br />
astronomical units-or 9 billion miles from the sun, it is<br />
the Solar System's farthest detected object). And,<br />
astronomers from the California Institute of Technology<br />
and their colleagues have now discovered, it has a moon.<br />
The discovery of the moon of<br />
the 10th planet from the W.M.<br />
Keck Observatory. The planet<br />
appears in the centre, while the<br />
moon is the small dot at the 3<br />
o'clock position.<br />
The moon, 100 times fainter than Xena and orbiting the<br />
planet once every couple of weeks, was spotted on<br />
September 10, 2005, with the 10-meter Keck II telescope<br />
at the W.M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii by Michael E.<br />
Brown, professor of planetary astronomy, and his<br />
colleagues at Caltech, the Keck Observatory, Yale<br />
University, and the Gemini Observatory in Hawaii.<br />
"Since the day we discovered Xena, the big<br />
question has been whether or not it has a moon," says<br />
Brown. "Having a moon is just inherently cool-and it is<br />
something that most self-respecting planets have, so it is<br />
good to see that this one does too."<br />
Brown estimates that the moon, nicknamed<br />
"Gabrielle"-after the fictional Xena's fictional sidekick-is<br />
at least one-tenth of the size of Xena, which is thought to<br />
be about 2700 km in diameter (Pluto is 2274 km), and<br />
may be around 250 km across.<br />
To know Gabrielle's size more precisely, the<br />
researchers need to know the moon's composition, which<br />
has not yet been determined. Most objects in the Kuiper<br />
Belt, the massive swath of miniplanets that stretches<br />
from beyond Neptune out into the distant fringes of the<br />
solar system, are about half rock and half water ice.<br />
Since a half-rock, half-ice surface reflects a fairly<br />
predictable amount of sunlight, a general estimate of the<br />
size of an object with that composition can be made.<br />
Very icy objects, however, reflect a lot more light, and<br />
so will appear brighter-and thus bigger-than similarly<br />
sized rocky objects.<br />
Further observations of the moon with the<br />
Hubble <strong>Space</strong> Telescope, planned for November and<br />
December, will allow Brown and his colleagues to pin<br />
down Gabrielle's exact orbit around Xena. With that<br />
data, they will be able to calculate Xena's mass, using a<br />
formula first devised some 300 years ago by Isaac<br />
Newton.<br />
"A combination of the distance of the moon<br />
from the planet and the speed it goes around the planet<br />
tells you very precisely what the mass of the planet is,"<br />
explains Brown. "If the planet is very massive, the moon<br />
will go around very fast; if it is less massive, the moon<br />
will travel more slowly. It is the only way we could ever<br />
measure the mass of Xena-because it has a moon."<br />
The researchers discovered Gabrielle using Keck<br />
II's recently commissioned Laser Guide Star Adaptive<br />
Optics system. Adaptive optics is a technique that<br />
removes the blurring of atmospheric turbulence, creating<br />
images as sharp as would be obtained from space-based<br />
telescopes. The new laser guide star system allows<br />
researchers to create an artificial "star" by bouncing a<br />
laser beam off a layer of the atmosphere about 75 miles<br />
above the ground. Bright stars located near the object of<br />
interest are used as the reference point for the adaptive<br />
optics corrections. Since no bright stars are naturally<br />
found near Xena, adaptive optics imaging would have<br />
been impossible without the laser system.<br />
"With Laser Guide Star Adaptive Optics,<br />
observers not only get more resolution, but the light<br />
from distant objects is concentrated over a much smaller<br />
area of the sky, making faint detections possible," says<br />
Marcos van Dam, adaptive optics scientist at the W.M.<br />
Keck Observatory, and second author on the new paper.<br />
The new system also allowed Brown and his<br />
colleagues to observe a small moon in January around<br />
2003 EL61, code-named "Santa," another large new<br />
Kuiper Belt object. No moon was spotted around 2005<br />
FY9-or "Easterbunny"-the third of the three big Kuiper<br />
Belt objects recently discovered by Brown and his<br />
colleagues using the 48-inch Samuel Oschin Telescope<br />
at Palomar Observatory. But the presence of moons<br />
around three of the Kuiper Belt's four largest objects-<br />
Xena, Santa, and Pluto-challenges conventional ideas<br />
about how worlds in this region of the solar system<br />
acquire satellites.<br />
Previously, researchers believed that Kuiper Belt<br />
objects obtained moons through a process called<br />
gravitational capture, in which two formerly separate<br />
objects moved too close to one another and become<br />
entrapped in each other's gravitational embrace. This<br />
was thought to be true of the Kuiper Belt's small<br />
denizens-but not, however, of Pluto. Pluto's massive,<br />
closely orbiting moon, Charon, broke off the planet<br />
billions of years ago, after it was smashed by another<br />
Kuiper Belt object. Xena's and Santa's moons appear<br />
best explained by a similar origin.<br />
"Pluto once seemed a unique oddball at the<br />
fringe of the solar system," Brown says. "But we now<br />
see that Xena, Pluto, and the others are part of a diverse<br />
family of large objects with similar characteristics,<br />
histories, and even moons, which together will teach us<br />
much more about the solar system than any single<br />
oddball ever would."<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 7
Russia Agrees to Launch Brazil's First Astronaut to ISS<br />
Brazil’s first astronaut will<br />
launch toward the International<br />
<strong>Space</strong> Station (ISS) in March<br />
2006 under an agreement with<br />
Russia’s Federal <strong>Space</strong> Agency.<br />
Lt. Col. Marcus Pontes, of the<br />
Brazilian Air Force, is slated to<br />
ride up to the ISS aboard a<br />
Russian-built Soyuz spacecraft<br />
with the crew of Expedition 13<br />
under an agreement signed<br />
between the Federal <strong>Space</strong> Agency<br />
and Brazilian <strong>Space</strong> Agency<br />
(Agéncia Espacial Brasileiria).<br />
The Brazilian cosmonaut’s<br />
flight has been set for late March<br />
2006 at the insistent request of<br />
Brazil, which failed to launch its<br />
cosmonaut under a program of<br />
NASA. Pontes, 42, reported to<br />
NASA’s Johnson <strong>Space</strong> Center in<br />
Houston, Texas in 1998 to begin<br />
astronaut training. He served with<br />
the <strong>Space</strong> Station Operations<br />
Branch of NASA’s Astronaut<br />
Office while awaiting a spaceflight<br />
assignment, according to NASA<br />
officials.<br />
In a statement posted to<br />
their space agency’s website,<br />
Brazilian space officials said<br />
Pontes will carry about 33 pounds<br />
(15 kilograms) of scientific<br />
equipment into orbit on his 10-day<br />
flight, and conduct a series of<br />
experiments before returning to<br />
Earth with the Expedition 12 crew.<br />
He has already reported to Russia’s<br />
Star City for cosmonaut training<br />
and will spend eight days aboard<br />
the ISS, they added.<br />
Expedition 12 commander<br />
Bill McArthur and flight engineer<br />
Valery Tokarev boarded the ISS on<br />
Oct. 3 rd and are expected to spend<br />
at least six months in space before<br />
returning to Earth aboard their<br />
Soyuz TMA-7 spacecraft in early<br />
April<br />
New map provides more<br />
evidence Mars once like<br />
Earth<br />
NASA scientists have discovered additional evidence<br />
that Mars once underwent plate tectonics, slow<br />
movement of the planet's crust, like the present-day<br />
Earth. A new map of Mars' magnetic field made by the<br />
Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft reveals a world whose<br />
history was shaped by great crustal plates being pulled<br />
apart or smashed together.<br />
Above: An artistic illustration of Earth magnetic field and Mars<br />
magnetic field<br />
Scientists first found evidence of plate tectonics on Mars<br />
in 1999. Those initial observations, also done with the<br />
Mars Global Surveyor's magnetometer, covered only one<br />
region in the Southern Hemisphere. The data was taken<br />
while the spacecraft performed an aerobraking<br />
manoeuvre, and so came from differing heights above<br />
the crust.<br />
This high resolution magnetic field map, the first<br />
of its kind, covers the entire surface of Mars. The new<br />
map is based on four years of data taken in a constant<br />
orbit. Each region on the surface has been sampled many<br />
times. The more measurements that are obtained, the<br />
more accuracy, and spatial resolution, can be achieved.<br />
The map lends support to and expands on the<br />
1999 results. Where the earlier data showed a "striping"<br />
of the magnetic field in one region, the new map finds<br />
striping elsewhere. More importantly, the new map<br />
shows evidence of features, transform faults, that are a<br />
"tell-tale" of plate tectonics on Earth. Each stripe<br />
represents a magnetic field pointed in one<br />
direction-positive or negative - and the alternating stripes<br />
indicate a "flipping" of the direction of the magnetic<br />
field from one stripe to another.<br />
Scientists see similar stripes in the crustal<br />
magnetic field on Earth. Stripes form whenever two<br />
plates are being pushed apart by molten rock coming<br />
up from the mantle, such as along the Mid-Atlantic<br />
Ridge. As the plate spreads and cools, it becomes<br />
magnetized in the direction of the Earth's strong global<br />
field. Since Earth's global field changes direction a<br />
few times every million years, on average, a flow that<br />
cools in one period will be magnetized in a different<br />
direction than a later flow. As the new crust is pushed<br />
out and away from the ridge, stripes of alternating<br />
magnetic fields aligned with the ridge axis develop.<br />
Transform faults, identified by "shifts" in the magnetic<br />
pattern, occur only in association with spreading centres.<br />
To see this characteristic magnetic imprint on<br />
Mars indicates that it, too, had regions where new crust<br />
came up from the mantle and spread out across the<br />
surface. And when you have new crust coming up, you<br />
need old crust plunging back down - the exact<br />
mechanism for plate tectonics.<br />
8<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
Two New Moons for Pluto?<br />
New images gathered by the<br />
Hubble <strong>Space</strong> Telescope have<br />
revealed that this distant planet<br />
could have two additional<br />
moons. If this is true, Pluto will be<br />
the first Kuiper Belt Object found<br />
to have multiple moons. The<br />
candidate moons have been<br />
provisionally named S/2005 P1<br />
and S/2005 P2, and are<br />
approximately 44,000 km (27,000<br />
miles) away from Pluto.<br />
Using NASA's Hubble<br />
<strong>Space</strong> Telescope to probe the ninth<br />
planet in our Solar System,<br />
astronomers discovered that Pluto<br />
may have not one, but three<br />
moons. If confirmed, the discovery<br />
of the two new moons could offer<br />
insights into the nature and<br />
evolution of the Pluto system,<br />
Kuiper Belt Objects with satellite<br />
systems, and the early Kuiper Belt.<br />
The Kuiper Belt is a vast region of<br />
icy, rocky bodies beyond<br />
Neptune's orbit.<br />
Pluto was discovered in<br />
1930. Charon, Pluto's only<br />
confirmed moon, was discovered<br />
by ground-based observers in<br />
1978. The planet resides 3 billion<br />
miles from the sun in the heart of<br />
the Kuiper Belt. The candidate<br />
moons, provisionally designated<br />
S/2005 P1 and S/2005 P2, were<br />
observed to be approximately<br />
27,000 miles (44,000 kilometres)<br />
away from Pluto. The objects are<br />
roughly two to three times as far<br />
from Pluto as Charon. The team<br />
plans to make follow-up Hubble<br />
observations in February to<br />
confirm that the newly discovered<br />
objects are truly Pluto's moons.<br />
Only after confirmation will the<br />
International <strong>Astronomical</strong> Union<br />
consider names for S/2005 P1 and<br />
S/2005 P2.<br />
The Hubble telescope's<br />
Advanced Camera for Surveys<br />
observed the two new candidate<br />
moons on May 15 th . The new<br />
satellite candidates are roughly<br />
5,000 times fainter than Pluto, but<br />
stood out in these Hubble images.<br />
Three days later, Hubble looked at<br />
Pluto again. The two objects were<br />
still there and appeared to be<br />
moving in orbit around Pluto.<br />
A re-examination of Hubble<br />
images taken on June 14, 2002 has<br />
essentially confirmed the presence<br />
of both P1 and P2 near the<br />
predicted locations based on the<br />
2005 Hubble observations.<br />
The teams involved looked long<br />
and hard for other potential moons<br />
around Pluto. These Hubble<br />
images represent the most sensitive<br />
search yet for objects around Pluto,<br />
and it is unlikely that there are any<br />
other moons larger than about 10<br />
miles across in the Pluto system.<br />
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<strong>Astronomical</strong><br />
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over Ireland<br />
Super Christmas Catalogue<br />
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Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 9
UPCOMING ASTRONOMICAL EVENTS<br />
Compiled by John Flannery, South Dublin AS<br />
Summary<br />
Winter Solstice occurs on December 21 st at 18:35hrs:<br />
Winter officially begins in the Northern Hemisphere.<br />
Eclipses<br />
No eclipses occur during this time.<br />
The Planets<br />
Heads<br />
Binocular users may just about spot Mercury in the<br />
evening sky around time of greatest eastern elongation on<br />
November 3 rd (24°) given a clear south-western horizon.<br />
Your best chance of seeing the planet falls during<br />
December in the morning sky. Mercury begins December<br />
about 5° above the south-eastern skyline at the beginning of<br />
civil twilight and climbs higher each day until greatest<br />
western elongation (21°) on the 12 th when it can be found at<br />
an altitude of 9.5° around the same time of morning.<br />
Thereafter, it slowly retreats sunward (but remains quite<br />
bright at magnitude -0.4) and will probably be lost to view<br />
by New Year’s Day. A word of caution; if you are looking<br />
for Mercury in any sort of optical instrument make sure you<br />
do not accidentally sweep up the Sun in the field. It<br />
therefore makes sense to look for the planet in binoculars or<br />
a telescope after sunset or before sunrise. Advanced<br />
amateurs do observe the planet in daylight close to the Sun<br />
but only by taking careful precautions and having<br />
telescopes with setting circles that allow you to accurately<br />
“home in” on Mercury’s position in the sky.<br />
Venus has remained quite low in the evening sky all year<br />
but is now beginning to pull clear, gaining in altitude<br />
during the two-month period covered by these notes. It lies<br />
highest in our evening skies in mid-December (still only<br />
about 12 in altitude though) and reaches greatest brilliancy<br />
on December 9 th (magnitude -4.6).<br />
Telescopes will show the phase of the planet<br />
change from half to a thin crescent over the next two<br />
months, while the diameter of the disk swells from 24.5" to<br />
55". You should be able to spot Venus as a tiny crescent in<br />
binoculars by the end of the year. The Moon is nearby on<br />
November 5 th and December 4 th , making for an attractive<br />
sight.<br />
Still awaiting launch at time of writing is the<br />
European <strong>Space</strong> Agency’s Venus Express mission,<br />
designed to study the atmosphere and space-environment of<br />
Venus. Following launch, the spacecraft will take 153 days<br />
to reach Venus after which it will settle into orbit and begin<br />
science operations. Although previous missions such as<br />
Magellen have used radar to pierce the veil shrouding this<br />
mysterious world, we are still no closer to understanding<br />
UP<br />
why Earth’s sister planet boasts a greenhouse effect run<br />
riot.<br />
Mars continues to steal the show as it reaches opposition<br />
on November 7 th in the constellation Aries and shines at<br />
magnitude -2.3 throughout the night. The disk measures<br />
20" at this time and the Red Planet is sure to be carefully<br />
scrutinised by backyard observers. Or so we hope! Recent<br />
reports on the International Mars-watch page<br />
(http://elvis.rowan.edu/marswatch/) suggest that a dust<br />
storm first noticed brewing on the planet in mid-October<br />
has now increased in intensity. Should the storm grow in<br />
size it will gradually obscure features for observers and the<br />
disk will look bright orange. Any reports you have should<br />
be forwarded to the Mars-watch web site mentioned above.<br />
A detailed article on observing the planet during this<br />
apparition can be found at<br />
http://www.tnni.net/~dustymars/Article_2005.htm The<br />
Moon is close to Mars on November 14 th and December<br />
11 th .<br />
Jupiter necessitates an early rise as it is strictly a morning<br />
sky object during November and December. You will<br />
probably only first spot the cream-coloured planet from the<br />
second week of November onwards as its time of rising<br />
becomes progressively earlier ahead of the Sun. Jupiter<br />
shines at magnitude -1.7 at the moment and the disk is quite<br />
small (for Jupiter!), measuring 32". The planet moves from<br />
Virgo into Libra at the start of December. Look for the<br />
Moon nearby on the mornings of November 29 th and<br />
December 27 th .<br />
Saturn rises before midnight at the beginning of<br />
November and a little earlier each night until the end of the<br />
period covered by these notes. It brightens slowly from<br />
magnitude 0.3 to magnitude 0.0 during November and<br />
December as it closes in on its January 2006 opposition<br />
date.<br />
The beautiful ring system is easily visible in a<br />
small telescope but if you’ve been keeping a keen eye on<br />
the planet the last few years you will notice that they are<br />
gradually closing up -- their Earthward tilt is now around<br />
17.5°. It’s all to do with the inclination of Saturn’s orbit<br />
and ours; twice during Saturn’s 29 year long circuit of the<br />
Sun the rings appear edge-on to Earth-based observers as<br />
we pass through their plane. The rings will next be edge-on<br />
in September 2009 and will disappear from view in all but<br />
larger amateur telescopes.<br />
The Ringed Planet is still a dramatic sight at the<br />
moment close to the Beehive star cluster in Cancer that was<br />
mentioned in the previous issue’s notes. With the Moon<br />
close to the planet too on the evenings of November 22 nd<br />
and December 18 th it will add to an already dramatic sight<br />
in binoculars.<br />
Details for Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto are beyond<br />
10<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
viewing for the most part during this time.<br />
Data & Phases of The Moon<br />
Data Summary<br />
November:<br />
5 th : below Venus in evening sky<br />
14 th : Full Moon right of Mars<br />
15 th : Full Moon left of Mars<br />
21 st : Last Quarter above Saturn<br />
28 th : thin Crescent next to Spica in Virgo<br />
29th: thin Crescent below Jupiter in morning<br />
30 th: Crescent right of Mercury in morning<br />
December:<br />
4 th : Crescent below Venus evening<br />
11 th : waxing Gibbous right of Mars<br />
12 th : waxing Gibbous left of Mars<br />
18 th : waning Gibbous right of Saturn<br />
19 th : waning Gibbous left of Saturn<br />
27 th : Crescent below Jupiter morning<br />
29 th : thin Crescent left of Mercury morning<br />
Phases<br />
New 1 st Qtr Full Last Qtr<br />
Nov 2 nd Nov 9 th Nov 16 th Nov 23 rd<br />
Dec 1 st Dec 8 th Dec 15 th Dec<br />
23 rd<br />
Dec 31 st<br />
I.S.S. Passes<br />
As we come into winter, the angle of the ISS’s orbit<br />
means it can only be viewed either early evening or early<br />
morning, mostly occurring twice each day.<br />
Nov 3 rd to Nov 20 th : early evening object, with<br />
sometimes 2 passes occurring 93 minutes apart.<br />
Nov 21 st to Nov 30 th : not visible over Ireland.<br />
Dec 1 st to Dec 17 th : early morning object, almost twice<br />
each morning.<br />
Dec 18 th to Dec 31 st : not visible over Ireland.<br />
The passes are too numerous to list here, but if you have<br />
access to the web, check out the reliable and free<br />
www.heavens-above.com for a comprehensive list of<br />
passes –Ed.<br />
Asteroids<br />
While sourcing material for these sky notes I discovered<br />
that a reasonably bright asteroid for binoculars, (19)<br />
Fortuna, will be close to Mars during November. Fortuna<br />
reaches opposition on the night of November 4 th when it<br />
can be found as a magnitude 8.9 speck of light 4.5° slightly<br />
north of east from Mars. Should the Irish weather cooperate<br />
around this time, carefully draw the star field over a few<br />
successive nights. You’ll find that the “star” that moves<br />
will be the asteroid. The apparent gap between Mars and<br />
the asteroid actually shrinks to about 2.5° by the end of<br />
November but Fortuna’s brightness has declined somewhat<br />
to magnitude 9.8 by this time, making binocular<br />
observation rather more difficult. Fortuna was discovered<br />
on August 22 nd , 1852 and lies 159 million kilometres from<br />
Earth when at opposition this year.<br />
The asteroid ranked third in order of discovery, (3)<br />
Juno, is at opposition on December 9 th in the eastern part<br />
of the constellation Orion. It peaks at magnitude 7.6 which<br />
is quite bright for Juno because this particular opposition<br />
occurs close to the asteroid’s minimum distance from the<br />
Sun in its eccentric 4.36 year long orbit. The asteroid falls<br />
within the same low power binocular field as Beta Eridani<br />
at this time, lying 3° northwest of the star.<br />
Meteors<br />
November<br />
The Taurids peak on the night of Nov. 3 rd /4 th in the<br />
constellation Taurus, high in the southeast at 9pm (as a<br />
guide). These average 10 per hour, with only a tiny sliver of<br />
the Moon on view, so it will be a dark night. The Leonids<br />
peak on Nov. 17 th , but an almost full Moon will spoil the<br />
view – only the brightest of meteors will be seen. Leo rises<br />
after midnight from the east. Rates that we were familiar<br />
with in recent years (but were clouded out for) that occur<br />
every 33 years will not be realistically met, but this shower<br />
could still throw in a few surprises.<br />
December<br />
The Geminids peak on December 14 th , but succumb to the<br />
nearly Full Moon. They can be considered even richer than<br />
the better known Perseids. The hours before midnight will<br />
probably be the most productive to observe The Ursids,<br />
peaking on Dec 22 nd . The waning gibbous Moon rises just<br />
after 11pm and will interfere with your watch somewhat<br />
after that. The Ursid radiant is close to Kocab (Beta Ursae<br />
Minoris) and so the shower is visible all night from our<br />
latitude.<br />
Name Max ZHR<br />
Taurids Nov 4 th 10<br />
Andromedids Nov 14 th 5<br />
Leonids Nov 17 th 30+<br />
Geminids Dec 14 th 25+<br />
Ursids Dec 22 nd 10<br />
Skynotes Extra<br />
The Moon<br />
A favourable lunar libration close to the Full Moon of<br />
December 15 th will tip the rugged southern highlands more<br />
towards us, allowing observers to view craters normally too<br />
close to the limb. It’s a fine opportunity to become<br />
acquainted with this terrain little explored by amateur<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 11
astronomers.<br />
Currently in orbit about our near neighbour is<br />
SMART-1, Europe’s first lunar mission. It’s primarily a<br />
demonstration of new spacecraft technologies but ESA<br />
scientists are now engaged in a programme that will see the<br />
probe map the Moon’s surface in detail through to August<br />
2006.<br />
Mars. Just mention the fourth world from the Sun and you<br />
conjure up many examples of our fascination with the Red<br />
Planet. Every two years or so, the Earth and Mars reach<br />
opposition, when Mars appears “Full” to the telescopic<br />
observer. It’s rather like what you get with Full Moon; the<br />
Sun lies directly opposite the Moon in the sky with the<br />
Earth sitting in the middle. To say it’s an exact straight line<br />
is a bit misleading but the example is sound.<br />
Because Mars has a more eccentric orbit than us<br />
some of these oppositions can be closer than others; that of<br />
August 2003 was touted as the closest in 58,000 years but<br />
we’re splitting hairs when compared to some of the close<br />
oppositions of the last 100 years. It was the widely studied<br />
oppositions of the 1890s coupled with the canal<br />
controversy that spurred H.G. Wells to write his classic<br />
“The War of the Worlds” which was published in 1898.<br />
Forty years later the tale was to terrify the populace of the<br />
eastern seaboard of America on Halloween when Orsen<br />
Welles and his Mercury Theatre Company broadcast a<br />
radio production based on the book, updating the original to<br />
an almost believable account of a Martian invasion of the<br />
US. This year, Mars is closest to Earth (but still 69.42<br />
million kilometres distant) on October 30 th . Make a point of<br />
glancing skyward at Mars around this time and ponder its<br />
continuing allure.<br />
This chart is based at midnight on Dec 1 st . For every 15 days before that, subtract 1 hour. Likewise, for every 15 days after<br />
this time, add one hour.<br />
12<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
Great Irish Women Astronomers<br />
By Girvan McKay, <strong>Tullamore</strong> AS<br />
Having read and heard a bit recently about the<br />
contribution made to astronomy by a number of<br />
remarkable Irish women, I think I can understand<br />
why some women become militant feminists. Women<br />
astronomers and scientists have had a raw deal – and not<br />
only in Ireland. We know a great deal about people like<br />
William Parsons, the Third Earl of Rosse, but how many<br />
of us can mention one female astronomer? Those of us<br />
who were at Cosmos some years ago, when Dr. Susan<br />
McKenna Lawler was a guest, can name one anyway,<br />
but she is by no means alone in her field.<br />
Take the Irishwoman Agnes Mary Clerke, for<br />
example. She lived from 1842 to 1907 and has been<br />
described as ‘the chief astronomical writer of the<br />
English-speaking world. She is commemorated in a<br />
crater on the moon which bears her name. Mary Ward<br />
(1827-1869), a first cousin of William Parsons is<br />
remembered as an early pioneer of the microscope rather<br />
than being involved in astronomy, but since both involve<br />
optics, the two activities are not unconnected. Mary<br />
Ward was the author of “Microscope Teachings” which<br />
helped to popularise the instrument.<br />
Recently I heard a very interesting radio<br />
interview with another outstanding Irish astronomer,<br />
Professor (Susan) Jocelyn Bell Burnell, born 1943 in<br />
Lurgan, Co. Armagh and educated at the Universities of<br />
Glasgow and Cambridge. The entry under her name in<br />
the Encyclopaedia of Ireland reads as follows: “While a<br />
postgraduate student at the Mullard Radio Laboratory,<br />
Cambridge, she collaborated with her supervisor<br />
Anthony Hewish, in constructing a radio telescope to<br />
investigate the scintillation of distant radio sources”.<br />
It seems, however, from what she said during<br />
the interview that most of the work of construction was<br />
done by herself. She says that it was then that she<br />
learned to use tools, such as pliers, a skill that girls<br />
weren’t taught at her school. In 1967 she discovered the<br />
first known pulsar – a rapidly spinning neutron star of<br />
about twice the Sun’s mass which had collapsed to a<br />
sphere of only a few kilometres in diameter. She told the<br />
interviewer that such a collapsed star is so dense that a<br />
piece of its material the size of a sugar cube would be as<br />
massive as our Earth. She managed the British support<br />
team of the international submillimetre-wave telescope<br />
in Hawaii. In 2001 she was appointed dean of science at<br />
the University of Bath. She has received nine honorary<br />
doctorates besides many other awards.<br />
Without any show of resentment, Dr. Bell<br />
Burnell mentioned how credit for the discovery of<br />
pulsars was given to the male astronomers she worked<br />
with. In the 1960s women scientists were not taken<br />
seriously. When the news broke of the pulsar discovery<br />
the team at the Radio Laboratory was swamped by<br />
reporters and photographers. All the scientific questions<br />
were fired at the men while the newspaper people were<br />
interested only in asking Dr. Bell Burnell personal<br />
questions, such as, did she have any boy friends and who<br />
was her present one? She was asked by the<br />
photographers to undo the top button of her dress for the<br />
photographers. Yet this was the person who made one<br />
of the most important astronomical discoveries of our<br />
time.<br />
It was striking how mildly Dr. Bell Burnell<br />
reacted to the way she was treated. During the radio<br />
broadcast she was asked what astronomers’ attitude was<br />
to religion. She replied that many were religious while<br />
others were not, and mentioned that she herself was of a<br />
Quaker background. She said that Quakers had a history<br />
of being involved in science because of their openness to<br />
freedom of thought and research. We can compare this<br />
with the way great scientists like Galileo were treated by<br />
the Church and the distrust of science by some United<br />
States fundamentalists today.<br />
I hope we in TAS and Réalta readers will have a<br />
chance to learn more about pulsars and other distant<br />
bodies in space. It is a fascinating subject.<br />
Girvan McKay, TAS.<br />
Editors Note: Its funny you should submit this Girvan. No sooner had I received your piece than I received the<br />
following article next page by Deirdre Kelleghan from the Irish <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>, about her recent trip to Trinity<br />
College Dublin to see Dr. Burnell talk about Arthur Stanley Eddington (1882-1944). Read On…<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 13
Subject: Arthur Stanley Eddington<br />
Event: BA Festival of Science Lecture Sept 8th 2005 – Trinity College Dublin<br />
Speaker: Professor Jocelyn Bell Brunell – Oxford University –CBE<br />
By Deirdre Kelleghan, Irish AS<br />
“Oh leave the Wise our measures to collate<br />
One thing at least is certain, light has weight<br />
One thing is certain and the rest debate<br />
Light rays, when near the Sun, do not go straight”<br />
-A.S. Eddington<br />
Professor Brunell came to Trinity College Dublin not<br />
to speak about her own field of radio astronomy and<br />
her involvement in the discovery of pulsars. The great<br />
professor came to deliver a lecture on Arthur Stanley<br />
Eddington (1882-1944) an English born astronomer who<br />
was instrumental in expounding the theories of Albert<br />
Einstein. Jocelyn Bell Brunell has an interest in the<br />
public understanding of science and has a penchant to<br />
present physics topics among non-traditional groups.<br />
A. S. Eddington was<br />
born in Kendal in 1882.<br />
As a child he had a<br />
fascination with numbers<br />
and Professor Burnell<br />
tells the anecdote of the<br />
child Eddington<br />
attempting to count all<br />
the stars in the sky and<br />
he was also driven to<br />
count all the words in the bible. He excelled<br />
academically and did a maths degree in the short space<br />
of two years. Shortly after graduating he won the Smiths<br />
prize and was appointed to the Royal Observatory<br />
Greenwich where he improved and developed practical<br />
observational techniques. She relayed that Eddington<br />
was a popular member of “The Dinner Club” as he did<br />
not drink and if you sat beside him at dinner you were<br />
likely to get his share of wine as well. He was made<br />
secretary of The Royal Observatory Greenwich in 1912<br />
and at the age of 31 he became Plumian Professor of<br />
Cambridge. Eddington never married or had children, he<br />
was a Quaker by faith and his primary belief that there is<br />
god and good within everybody was significant in his<br />
life in that he did not get caught up in the mass hysteria<br />
of anti-German feeling that permeated in Europe prior to<br />
the outbreak of WW1. Eddington was a pacifist and he<br />
avoided the war as a conscientious objector. He did get<br />
called to account for his stance but still managed to get<br />
out of fighting by being proved far too valuable a<br />
scientist.<br />
Eddington was one of the few people to read and<br />
understand Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. At<br />
that time German scientists were being expelled from<br />
The Royal <strong>Society</strong> and the scientific work of Germans<br />
was hardly getting any attention from the rest of the<br />
world. Albert Einstein gave up his nationality in 1901<br />
and became a Swiss citizen, but this failed to protect him<br />
from the welling anti German climate of the time.<br />
Eddington with his fundamental belief in the good in<br />
everyone set out to prove Einstein’s ideas in a practical<br />
way. He used the solar eclipse of May 29th 1919 to<br />
show one of the principals of Relativity. A know group<br />
of stars the Hyades star cluster is observed at night as<br />
usual, then in the unusual circumstances of a total solar<br />
eclipse the sun is observed against the same star cluster,<br />
some of the stars in this cluster appeared out of position<br />
as their light had bent around the mass of the sun. Sir<br />
Arthur Eddington stationed himself on an<br />
island off the western coast of Africa and sent another<br />
group of British scientists to Brazil. Their measurements<br />
of several of the stars in the cluster showed that the light<br />
from these stars was indeed bent as it grazed the Sun, by<br />
the exact amount of Einstein's predictions. Eddington’s<br />
team exposed 16 photographic plates in 5 minutes to<br />
capture the eclipse and the possible shift or apparent<br />
shift in the position of the stars. This research eventually<br />
confirmed Albert Einstein's theory that as light passes a<br />
very massive star; its path is bent due to gravity. Einstein<br />
became a celebrity overnight when the results were<br />
announced. Well this concept is not that easy to<br />
understand, so this is the way I thought about it, and it<br />
became clearer too me.<br />
The Hyades cluster is well known in the night sky<br />
Eddington knew that the Suns position on the 19th of<br />
May 1919 was in front of the Hyades cluster in daylight<br />
at the moment of the solar eclipse.<br />
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One would expect one or some of the stars to be<br />
masked by the Sun as it is a very massive star, as the<br />
solar eclipse revealed the Hyades cluster in the<br />
temporary night in the daylight at the moment of the<br />
solar eclipse. The sun in fact appeared to sit along beside<br />
them in the sky and caused the apparent position of a<br />
few of them to shift a bit.<br />
Eddington exposed photographic plates to record the<br />
eclipse and reveal that the stars of the cluster were not<br />
masked by the Suns mass, but the light from them was<br />
bent or curved by the Suns mass and gravitational field<br />
and continued to shine down on the earth, and appear on<br />
the developed plates.<br />
As light from Stars is coming from a very great<br />
distance, it takes many thousands of years and light<br />
years to travel to our eyes or to Eddington's photographic<br />
plates.<br />
The fact that the stars concerned appeared on his<br />
photographic plates and were not masked by the Sun,<br />
therefore Eddington proved this prediction of Einstein<br />
correct.<br />
Because the light from a star is travelling<br />
through time and space - when it bends around a large<br />
mass like the Sun - therefore time and space are<br />
temporally bent or curved or misshapen. This effect<br />
occurs close to the Sun at the 96 million mile mark and it<br />
is then the kink happens. The apparent displacement of<br />
light results from the warping of space in the vicinity of<br />
the massive object through which light travels. The light<br />
never changes course, but merely follows the curvature<br />
of space. Astronomers now refer to this displacement of<br />
light as gravitational lensing.<br />
According to Professor Brunell, Eddington was<br />
a wonderful communicator of science theory and was at<br />
the forefront of popularising Einstein’s work. There<br />
were few people in the world at the time that could<br />
understand the theory of Relativity yet alone explain it.<br />
A poster at the time announcing on of his talks on the<br />
subject claimed it was “A Book for 12 Wise Men”<br />
Arthur Stanly Eddington made Albert Einstein’s work<br />
popular and famous by his understanding and his desire<br />
to qualify Einstein’s theory for general consumption.<br />
Professor Jocelyn Bell Brunell in her lecture on<br />
September 8th 2005 continued that wonderful<br />
achievement of clear communication for both Albert<br />
Einstein and Arthur Eddington.<br />
In his honour several items have been named after<br />
Eddington. The Eddington crater on the moon is the<br />
remains of a lava flooded lunar impact crater, it is on the<br />
western edge of Oceanus Procellarum. To the west is the<br />
Struve walled plain to the east/southeast is the prominent<br />
Seleucus crater and south of Eddington is Krafft crater.<br />
In physics the Eddington Limit is a natural limit to the<br />
luminosity of a star. It is a way of describing the density<br />
of luminous intensity in a direction from the star, in<br />
relation to how much more the object radiates energy<br />
compared to our Sun.<br />
Accretion is an increase in size by the gradual addition<br />
of smaller parts, and in astronomy is a description of a<br />
gravitational process by which bodies like planets and<br />
stars form from gas and dust.<br />
The European <strong>Space</strong> Agency<br />
had a comprehensive plan for<br />
The Eddington <strong>Space</strong><br />
Telescope, which would have<br />
been a very sensitive device<br />
for mapping the evolution of<br />
stars. It was to be launched in<br />
2008, the decision was taken<br />
to cancel the Eddington mission but several of its science<br />
packages will it is hoped make their way onto other<br />
missions to search for other habitable planets and to<br />
study the stars of our universe.<br />
On enquiring with The European <strong>Space</strong> Agency about<br />
the Eddington Mission this was the reply<br />
“Many thanks for your email enquiry concerning the<br />
Eddington<br />
Mission. As things currently stand the Eddington<br />
mission is cancelled, although it is possible that the<br />
mission could resurface at some point in the future There<br />
is a PDF document to be found by following this link<br />
that outline the scope of the Eddington mission”<br />
http://sci.esa.int/sciencee/www/object/doc.cfm?fobjectid=35806<br />
I would like to acknowledge and thank Professor Jocelyn<br />
Bell Brunell, for her kind advice and support in the<br />
development of this article.<br />
-Deirdre Kelleghan.<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 15
A Wrinkle in <strong>Space</strong>-Time<br />
By Trudy E. Bell<br />
When a massive star reaches the end of its life, it can<br />
explode into a supernova rivalling the brilliance of an<br />
entire galaxy. What’s left of the star fades in weeks, but<br />
its outer layers expand through space as a turbulent<br />
cloud of gases. Astronomers see beautiful remnants from<br />
past supernovas all around the sky, one of the most<br />
famous being the Crab Nebula in Taurus.<br />
When a star throws off nine-tenths of its mass in<br />
a supernova, however, it also throws off nine-tenths of<br />
its gravitational field.<br />
Astronomers see the light from supernovas. Can<br />
they also somehow sense the sudden and dramatic<br />
change in the exploding star’s gravitational field?<br />
Yes, they believe they can. According to<br />
Einstein’s general theory of relativity, changes in the<br />
star’s gravitational field should propagate outward, just<br />
like light—indeed, at the speed of light.<br />
Those propagating changes would be a gravitational<br />
wave.<br />
experiment to measure gravitational waves: the Laser<br />
Interferometer <strong>Space</strong> Antenna, or LISA.<br />
LISA will look for patterns of compression and<br />
stretching in space-time that signal the passage of a<br />
gravitational wave. Three small spacecraft will fly in a<br />
triangular formation behind the Earth, each beaming a<br />
laser at the other two, continuously measuring their<br />
mutual separation. Although the three ‘craft will be 5<br />
million kilometres apart, they will monitor their<br />
separation to one billionth of a centimetre, smaller than<br />
an atom’s diameter, which is the kind of precision<br />
needed to sense these elusive waves.<br />
LISA is slated for launch around 2015.<br />
To learn more about LISA, go to<br />
http://lisa.jpl.nasa.gov. Kids can learn about LISA and<br />
do a gravitational wave interactive crossword at<br />
http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/en/kids/lisaxword/lisaxw<br />
ord.shtml<br />
Einstein said what we feel as a gravitational<br />
field arises from the fact that huge masses curve space<br />
and time. The more massive an object, the more it bends<br />
the three dimensions of space and the fourth dimension<br />
of time. And if a massive object’s gravitational field<br />
changes suddenly - say, when a star explodes - it should<br />
kink or wrinkle the very geometry of space-time.<br />
Moreover, that wrinkle should propagate outward like<br />
ripples radiating outward in a pond from a thrown stone.<br />
The frequency and timing of gravitational waves<br />
should reveal what’s happening deep inside a supernova,<br />
in contrast to light, which is radiated from the surface.<br />
Thus, gravitational waves allow astronomers to peer<br />
inside the universe’s most violent events—like doctors<br />
peer at patients’ internal organs using CAT scans. The<br />
technique is not limited to supernovas: colliding neutron<br />
stars, black holes and other exotic objects may be<br />
revealed, too.<br />
NASA and the European <strong>Space</strong> Agency are now<br />
building prototype equipment for the first space<br />
LISA’s three spacecraft will be positioned at the corners of a<br />
triangle 5 million kilometres on a side and will be able to detect<br />
gravitational wave induced changes in their separation<br />
distance of as little as one billionth of a centimetre.<br />
This article was provided by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory,<br />
California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the<br />
National Aeronautics and <strong>Space</strong> Administration.<br />
16<br />
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Goldilocks and the (many) more than three<br />
planets: some notes on Astrobiology<br />
By Girvan McKay, <strong>Tullamore</strong> AS<br />
What is Astrobiology? I hope I hear you ask.<br />
According to my encyclopaedia: Astrobiology is defined<br />
as: “The multi-disciplinary study of the origin,<br />
distribution and destiny of life in the universe. It<br />
addresses the questions of how does life begin and<br />
develop, does life exist elsewhere in the universe, and<br />
what is life’s future on Earth and beyond. It is a major<br />
goal of NASA’s science programmes.”<br />
The study of Astrobiology (also known as<br />
Exobiology) is above all associated with the name of the<br />
late Carl Sagan, who is also regarded as the first<br />
astrobiologist. In a way it’s a little strange to refer to it<br />
as a study, since to study anything you have to have<br />
some data to study. In this sense Astrobiology is like<br />
Theology, which purports to be the study of God. But if<br />
God, by definition, is invisible and unknowable, what is<br />
there to study? It isn’t even possible to prove the<br />
existence of God by either argument or research.<br />
The same applies to Astrobiology. We don’t<br />
know whether there is any kind of life outside of our<br />
own planet Earth. But in both cases, the search still goes<br />
on. Also, in both cases, it’s a matter of faith rather than<br />
proof. We haven’t as yet found any evidence of<br />
extraterrestrial life. Within our own solar system<br />
investigations are still being carried on to see if there is<br />
any evidence of existing or extinct life on Mars. So far<br />
nothing has been found although US scientists claim to<br />
see signs that there was once water there, and liquid<br />
water often indicates the presence of life. There are also<br />
hopes that there might be liquid water under the surface<br />
crust of Europa, Jupiter’s second satellite.<br />
You’ll realise, of course, that the search for life<br />
doesn’t necessary mean the search for intelligent life.<br />
Probably most astrobiologists would be happy if they<br />
discover any kind of life elsewhere in the solar system or<br />
outside it. They would be jumping up and down with<br />
joy if even all they found were something like a<br />
bacterium, an amoeba, a fungus, a lichen, a slime mould<br />
or anything else that was alive, even if it couldn’t read,<br />
write or think and looked like something in your dist bin<br />
or on mouldy cheese.<br />
Also associated with Carl Sagan and<br />
Astrobiology is the SETI programme, although this is<br />
the search for extraterrestrial intelligence - in other<br />
words for intelligent life, not just any kind of life. Back<br />
in November 2001 I gave a talk on ‘Life in the Universe’<br />
in which I mentioned the SETI programme. For those of<br />
you who weren’t at that TAS lecture or who fell asleep<br />
during it, I’ll digress for a moment to say something<br />
about SETI.<br />
SETI was a research programme originally<br />
managed by NASA’s Ames Research Centre. It was<br />
aimed at using large radio telescopes to try and detect<br />
artificially generated radio signals from interstellar<br />
space. (I’m quoting here from another article in my<br />
encyclopaedia.) The hypothesis behind the belief that<br />
life might exist elsewhere in our galaxy is based on<br />
telescopic and spacecraft evidence that organic<br />
molecules are common in space and also on the<br />
hypothesis that planetary formation is a common byproduct<br />
of star formation. The SETI programme was<br />
first proposed in 1959 and thirty very limited searches<br />
were carried out. It was an American astronomer called<br />
Frank Drake who in 1960 was the first person to conduct<br />
a radio search for signals from extraterrestrial<br />
civilisations.<br />
Drake is mainly associated with an equation he<br />
proposed to organise this search. (By the way, Drake<br />
says himself that he only meant his equation as a<br />
gimmick and he was surprised when it was taken<br />
seriously and is now included in astronomy textbooks.)<br />
Here is the equation:<br />
N = R* fp n e fl fi f c L<br />
The factors indicate the following: R* , the number of<br />
stars; fp , the number of stars with planets; n e , the<br />
number of planets with habitable environments; fl , the<br />
fraction of these on which life has originated; fi , the<br />
number with intelligent life;<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 17
f c , creatures with the technology to send out<br />
signals; and L, the longevity of civilisations. N is the<br />
number of stars meeting all these criteria. Of all the<br />
factors in the equation only one, R*, is anywhere near to<br />
being understood. It represents the number of stars and<br />
we do know that there are a lot of them - more than 100<br />
thousand million, or maybe as many as 400 thousand<br />
million in our galaxy alone. Eventually with the help of<br />
what they call the Terrestrial Planet Finder or TPF (a<br />
piece of equipment that has not yet been developed) that<br />
the researchers hope to solve the third factor in the<br />
Drake equation, n e, the number of planets with<br />
inhabitable environments. They might even be able to<br />
solve factor fl , those on which life has originated.<br />
TPF would capture the feeble light from a<br />
distant rocky planet, while cancelling out the far more<br />
brilliant light of its star. The amount of planetary light<br />
they could detect might amount to only one pixel. This<br />
minute quantity of light could then be examined for what<br />
are called the spectral signatures of, for example,<br />
oxygen, methane, ozone or some other clue to the<br />
possible presence of life.<br />
The forms of life that we know on Earth are<br />
dependent on liquid water and organic molecules, mostly<br />
made up of carbon. But even on Earth, the huge and<br />
widely differing conditions under which life can exist<br />
are amazing. Life is found in the sea and on land; in<br />
almost waterless desert conditions; in the Arctic and in<br />
the tropics; in the darkest depths of the ocean; in deep<br />
caves - and, in fact, almost anywhere. Some life forms<br />
can go without food for months and even years; some<br />
can lie dormant for great lengths of time and then<br />
seemingly revive; some can get their nourishment by<br />
dissolving rock and living off the chemicals in it.<br />
It’s also been suggested that there might be other<br />
forms of life in the universe quite unlike anything on<br />
Earth: life based perhaps on silicon instead of carbon;<br />
life that drifts in the atmosphere above a planet, and so<br />
on.<br />
A new SETI programme was initiated in 1992 at<br />
the world’s largest radio telescope at Arecibo, Puerto<br />
Rico. In 1993 the US Congress withdrew its support for<br />
the programme, but it has been continues under private<br />
sponsorship. In May 1999 the SETI@home project was<br />
set up. This harnessed the power of millions of home<br />
computers to analyse signals picked up by a detector on<br />
the Arecibo radio telescope. So far results have been<br />
disappointing in spite of 40 years of searching. On one<br />
occasion it was thought that what might be an artificial<br />
signal had been detected, but it wasn’t repeated and it<br />
couldn’t be confirmed as anything out of the ordinary.<br />
What seems to be a more promising line of<br />
investigation than the SETI programme is the search for<br />
stars, which might have planets orbiting them. In 1994, a<br />
Ph.D. student at the University of Geneva called Didier<br />
Queloz saw that a star he was observing appeared to be<br />
rocking back and forth. This phenomenon of wobbling<br />
stars has since been discovered to indicate the presence<br />
of a planet orbiting the star. With the existing technology<br />
in the nineteen nineties it was quite impossible to see<br />
such a planet, even with the most powerful optical<br />
telescopes, but it is hoped that it will become possible to<br />
mask the strong light from a star so as to enable<br />
observers to see at least its largest planets. This has been<br />
compared to seeing a firefly in the beam of a searchlight<br />
or lighthouse many miles away. By the year 2000<br />
astronomers had detected at least 22 planets outside our<br />
solar system thanks to this discovery of star wobble and<br />
their number is continually increasing as more and more<br />
are discovered. So far, only very large planets are<br />
detectable by this means: gas giants or planets with a<br />
mass much greater than that of the Earth. Researchers<br />
are calling these remote gas giants ’Jupiter’s’ after the<br />
planet of that name in our own solar system.<br />
What haven’t been found yet are rocky planets<br />
of a size similar to our planet, which is considered to be<br />
the best habitat for forms of life similar to those on<br />
Earth. Astronomers have taken to calling these<br />
‘Goldilocks Planets’. You’ll remember that in the story<br />
the little girl Goldilocks finds the house of the three<br />
bears, tries sitting on their chairs, eating their porridge<br />
and sleeping in their beds. The porridge is too hot, too<br />
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cold or just right, while the chairs and beds are too big,<br />
too small or just right. A suitable planet would have to<br />
be not too close to its star to be too hot for life; and not<br />
too far away from it to be too cold for life; not too big to<br />
have a crushing gravity; and not too small so that it loses<br />
its atmosphere. With the discovery of these other solar<br />
systems in our galaxy, more and more astronomers are<br />
becoming convinced that other planets like ours exist in<br />
the universe.<br />
A year or two ago David Bell (from<br />
Shannonside AC) gave us a lecture in which he argued<br />
the case for the view that our Earth might be the only<br />
planet on which life had emerged. He said at the time<br />
that he was taking up this position to provoke discussion<br />
and that he could equally argue for the opposite view<br />
that life was common throughout the universe. It seems<br />
that fewer and fewer astronomers are inclined towards<br />
what we might call the anthropocentric view, i.e. that we<br />
are unique in the universe and that Earth is the only<br />
planet where life has arisen.<br />
This is the kind of attitude that Galileo had to<br />
face when he said that the Earth went round the Sun and<br />
not the other way round. When you think how many<br />
countless millions of stars are in our galaxies and how<br />
many countless millions of galaxies there are in the<br />
universe, and how the building blocks of life can be<br />
detected even in deep space, it seems inconceivable that<br />
life is not to be found elsewhere.<br />
So the search for extraterrestrial life goes on. The<br />
National Geographic magazine has published a table<br />
showing the progress of this search as follows:<br />
1992: Arecibo Radio Telescope<br />
Scientists announce the discovery of planets around a<br />
pulsar. They are unlike any known planets and are<br />
almost certainly hostile to life, but they are the first alien<br />
planets to be found.<br />
1995: Haute-Provence Observatory (France)<br />
Astronomers discover a planet around a sun-like star, 51<br />
Pegasi, by tracking stellar motions. The same technique<br />
has revealed more than 130 planets.<br />
1999: STARE Project<br />
For the first time the shadow of a Jupiter-size planet is<br />
detected as the planet passes over the face of its star, HD<br />
209458.<br />
2001: Hubble <strong>Space</strong> Telescope<br />
By observing light from HD 209458 as its planet passes,<br />
astronomers see hints of a planetary atmosphere<br />
containing sodium.<br />
2003: Keck Interferometer<br />
This equipment combines light from the two existing<br />
Keck telescopes, eliminating atmospheric ‘noise’ with<br />
what’s called adaptive optics. It searches for debris disks<br />
around stars, which could indicate planet formation, and<br />
look directly for giant planets.<br />
2006: Large Binocular Telescope<br />
The twin mirrors of this telescope will search for debris<br />
disks and for newly former Jupiter-size planets.<br />
2007: Kepler Mission<br />
This space-based telescope will survey more than<br />
100,000 stars for dimming that hints at the presence of<br />
Earth-size planets.<br />
2009: <strong>Space</strong> Interferometry Mission (SIM)<br />
This will combine light from multiple telescopes to map<br />
stars and seek planets almost as small as Earth.<br />
2014-2020: Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF)<br />
A two-part space mission to detect light from Earth-size<br />
planets, and search for signs of habitability.<br />
2025: Life Finder<br />
The <strong>Space</strong>-based Life Finder will search newfound<br />
Earths for signs of biological activity.<br />
So the first part pf this challenging programme has been<br />
achieved: We know now that there are other solar<br />
systems besides our own. Other stars have planets. Now<br />
it remains to be discovered whether any of these might<br />
sustain life; what that life might be like; and last of all,<br />
whether any such life forms could be intelligent. Man<br />
has ever undertaken probably no more exciting research.<br />
This article, by Girvan, was the basis for a lecture he<br />
gave to TAS on Tuesday October 11 th . It provided a<br />
good debate afterwards, where so many avenues of<br />
discussion about the possibility of life, both as we know<br />
it, and not, and where it could exist.<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 19
Where No <strong>Space</strong>craft Has Gone Before<br />
By Dr. Tony Phillips<br />
In 1977, Voyager 1 left our planet. Its mission: to<br />
visit Jupiter and Saturn and to study their moons. The<br />
flybys were an enormous success. Voyager 1 discovered<br />
active volcanoes on Io, found evidence for submerged<br />
oceans on Europa, and photographed dark rings around<br />
Jupiter itself. Later, the spacecraft buzzed Saturn’s<br />
moon Titan—alerting astronomers that it was a very<br />
strange place indeed! —and flew behind Saturn’s rings,<br />
seeing what was hidden from Earth.<br />
Beyond Saturn, Neptune and Uranus beckoned,<br />
but Voyager 1’s planet-tour ended there. Saturn’s<br />
gravity seized Voyager 1 and slingshot it into deep<br />
space. Voyager 1 was heading for the stars—just as<br />
NASA had planned.<br />
Now, in 2005, the spacecraft is nine billion<br />
miles (96 astronomical units) from the Sun, and it has<br />
entered a strange region of space no ship has ever visited<br />
before.<br />
“We call this region ‘the heliosheath.’ It’s where<br />
the solar wind piles up against the interstellar medium at<br />
the outer edge of our solar<br />
system,” says Ed Stone, project<br />
scientist for the Voyager mission<br />
at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.<br />
heliosheath, the solar wind slows eventually to a dead<br />
stop. The slowing wind becomes denser, more turbulent,<br />
and its magnetic field—a remnant of the sun’s own<br />
magnetism--grows stronger.<br />
So far from Earth, this turbulent magnetic gas is<br />
curiously important to human life. “The heliosheath is a<br />
shield against galactic cosmic rays,” explains Stone.<br />
Subatomic particles blasted in our direction by distant<br />
supernovas and black holes are deflected by the<br />
heliosheath, protecting the inner solar system from much<br />
deadly radiation.<br />
Voyager 1 is exploring this shield for the first<br />
time. “We’ll remain inside the heliosheath for 8 to 10<br />
years,” predicts Stone, “then we’ll break through, finally<br />
reaching interstellar space.”<br />
What’s out there? Stay tuned…<br />
For more about the twin Voyager spacecraft, visit<br />
voyager.jpl.nasa.gov. Kids can learn about Voyager 1<br />
and 2 and their grand tour of the outer planets at<br />
spaceplace.nasa.gov/en/kids/vgr_fact3.shtml .<br />
Out in the Milky Way,<br />
where Voyager 1 is trying to go,<br />
the “empty space” between stars<br />
is not really empty. It’s filled<br />
with clouds of gas and dust. The<br />
wind from the Sun blows a<br />
gigantic bubble in this cloudy<br />
“interstellar medium.” All nine<br />
planets from Mercury to Pluto fit<br />
comfortably inside. The<br />
heliosheath is, essentially, the<br />
bubble’s skin.<br />
“The heliosheath is different from any other<br />
place we’ve been,” says Stone. Near the Sun, the solar<br />
wind moves at a million miles per hour. At the<br />
Voyager 1, after 28 years of travel, has reached the<br />
heliosheath of our solar system.<br />
20<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
SPACEFLIGHT<br />
News<br />
Russian <strong>Space</strong>craft Fails to Boost ISS into Higher Orbit<br />
A Russian spacecraft stopped short of boosting the<br />
International <strong>Space</strong> Station (ISS) into a higher orbit<br />
on Tuesday October 25 th when its engines<br />
unexpectedly shut down in mid-manoeuvre, Russian<br />
space officials said. After the first turn-on of the<br />
engines, they turned off spontaneously.<br />
The failed orbital manoeuvre poses no danger to<br />
the ISS or its two-astronaut crew, Expedition 12<br />
commander Bill McArthur and flight engineer Valery<br />
Tokarev, and engineers are currently studying the glitch,<br />
according to a Federal <strong>Space</strong> Agency statement. There is<br />
no forecast at the moment as to when they would try<br />
again.<br />
Russian and U.S. space station flight controllers were<br />
expected to perform two engine burns that day using the<br />
Progress 19 spacecraft’s engines evening to raise the<br />
ISS into a higher orbit. The spacecraft is docked at the<br />
aft end of the station’s Zvezda module.<br />
The engine burns, each scheduled to run 11<br />
minutes and 40 seconds, were expected to raise the ISS<br />
into an orbit that hits 224 statute miles (360 kilometres)<br />
at its highest point, a bit higher that the station’s current<br />
orbital peak of 220 statute miles (354 kilometres),<br />
NASA officials. But the Progress engines switched off<br />
less than two minutes into the first burn, NASA officials<br />
said, adding that there appeared to be a communications<br />
problem between the spacecraft's thrusters and Russian<br />
navigation computers, which shut down the engines as<br />
designed due to the data dropout.<br />
The brief engine burn did accelerate the ISS by<br />
about 1.04 feet per second (0.31 meters per second) and<br />
raised the lowest point of the station's orbit - 211 miles<br />
(339 kilometres) - by about 0.7 miles (1.1 kilometres).<br />
Other engines could be used to boost the space<br />
station’s orbit, but Russian space officials are still<br />
evaluating the glitch Tuesday’s altitude-raising<br />
manoeuvre was slated to place the station into the proper<br />
position for a second orbital boost later this year that<br />
would set up the ISS to receive an unmanned Russianbuilt<br />
cargo ship – Progress 20 – slated to launch toward<br />
the space station on December 21 st .<br />
Progress 20 will ferry vital supplies, spare parts<br />
and equipment to McArthur and Tokarev, who began<br />
their six-month tour aboard the ISS in October.<br />
Contamination cleanup continues on Venus Express<br />
orbiter<br />
European scientists are<br />
reasonably confident their Venus<br />
Express spacecraft will launch to<br />
Earth's nearest neighbour before<br />
the tight window of opportunity<br />
when the planets are aligned<br />
slams shut in a few weeks. The<br />
mission was supposed to blast off<br />
on Wednesday October 26 th , from<br />
Baikonur Cosmodrome in<br />
Kazakhstan. But contamination<br />
found on the satellite forced launch<br />
preparations to stop, putting Venus<br />
Express into an unplanned holding<br />
pattern.<br />
The spacecraft was already<br />
mated to its Soyuz rocket inside an<br />
assembly building in advance of<br />
being rolled to the launch pad.<br />
Then came the discovery of some<br />
insulation material that had come<br />
off the Fregat upper stage and was<br />
floating free inside the rocket's<br />
nose cone where Venus Express sat<br />
encapsulated for launch.<br />
Over the previous<br />
weekend, the Fregat and spacecraft<br />
still tucked inside the nose cone<br />
were detached from the Soyuz for<br />
train transport to another facility<br />
25 miles away. The shroud was<br />
opened that Monday, enabling<br />
inspections of Venus Express by<br />
technicians to determine if any<br />
damage had occurred by the<br />
insulation.<br />
"The scenario is so far<br />
very encouraging, as only fairly<br />
large particles, pieces of the<br />
insulating material initially<br />
covering the launcher's Fregat<br />
upper stage, have been found on<br />
the body of the spacecraft," ESA<br />
said in a press statement.<br />
"These have been easy to<br />
identify by naked eye or with UV<br />
lamps, and are being carefully<br />
removed with tweezers, vacuumcleaners<br />
or nitrogen gas airbrushes,<br />
according to size."<br />
The cleaning will continue,<br />
followed by re-installation of the<br />
nose cone and transfer back to the<br />
Soyuz rocket's assembly building.<br />
Although a new launch date has<br />
not been set, lift-off is expected to<br />
be targeted for sometime between<br />
November 6 and 9. Venus Express<br />
must launch by November 24 to<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 21
catch the necessary trajectory from<br />
Earth to its destination. The probe<br />
should reach Venus five months<br />
after launch. It will fire the<br />
onboard main engine to enter orbit<br />
around the planet for the most<br />
comprehensive examination of the<br />
mysterious Venusian atmosphere<br />
and new observations of its<br />
surface.<br />
Venus Express will fly in a<br />
highly elliptical orbit looping from<br />
155 miles at its closest point to<br />
41,000 miles at the most distant.<br />
The EADS Astrium-built craft<br />
carries seven instruments mostly<br />
derived from Europe's Mars<br />
Express and the Rosetta comet<br />
mission. The mission, Europe's<br />
first exploration of Venus, will last<br />
two Venusian days or 486 Earth<br />
days.<br />
Editors post-script…<br />
Just before this article was sent to<br />
print, the following was issued<br />
(taken from space.com):<br />
Russian space officials Monday<br />
set a Nov. 9 blastoff for a<br />
European probe to explore<br />
Venus after its earlier launch<br />
was postponed because of a<br />
booster rocket problem.<br />
Engineers will be able to fix the<br />
flaws by that date, the Federal<br />
<strong>Space</strong> Agency said in<br />
scheduling the launch at the<br />
Russian-leased Baikonur<br />
Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.<br />
Japanese<br />
spacecraft<br />
ready to land on<br />
asteroid Nov 12<br />
Japan’s Hayabusa asteroid samplereturn<br />
satellite is scheduled to<br />
make the first of two landings on<br />
its target asteroid on November<br />
12 th following ground controllers’<br />
conclusion that it has enough fuel<br />
to finish its job despite the loss of<br />
two of its three reaction wheels,<br />
the Japanese space agency, JAXA,<br />
announced.<br />
Under current planning, a<br />
second touchdown would occur<br />
November 25 th before Hayabusa,<br />
whose name was Muses-C before<br />
its May 2003 launch, begins a<br />
return flight to Earth. Since<br />
September 12 th , the satellite has<br />
been stationed several kilometres<br />
from the Itokawa asteroid, which is<br />
some 300 million kilometres from<br />
Earth.<br />
Hayabusa lost the use of<br />
its first reaction wheel in July. The<br />
second failed October 3 rd , forcing<br />
increased reliance on the chemicalpropellant<br />
thrusters to maintain<br />
satellite attitude control.<br />
JAXA said the Hayabusa<br />
project engineers have made “a<br />
strenuous” effort to devise a fuelconservation<br />
plan to maintain<br />
Hayabusa stably in position and at<br />
the same time provide for the two<br />
“touch-and-go” manoeuvres during<br />
which the satellite will scoop up<br />
asteroid samples.<br />
JAXA will test Hayabusa<br />
touchdown manoeuvres November<br />
4 th with what the agency calls a<br />
“rehearsal descent.” Several<br />
candidate landing sites are still<br />
being evaluated, JAXA said.<br />
Mars rover Spirit begins descent from summit<br />
Spirit, the robot on wheels that reached the top of a<br />
Martian hill this summer after an epic climb, is<br />
heading back down toward its next target for<br />
exploration. After two months at the summit of<br />
Husband Hill, the six-wheeled rover is descending to a<br />
basin where the scientific instruments it carries will<br />
examine an outcrop dubbed "home plate" because from<br />
orbit it looks like home on a baseball field.<br />
Spirit's yearlong climb to the peak was a major<br />
feat for the Mars rover, which along with its twin,<br />
Opportunity, landed on opposite sides of the Red Planet<br />
in January 2004.<br />
Last month, scientists released the first fullcolour<br />
panoramic photo of the landscape taken by Spirit<br />
from the 270-foot-high summit. It shows the rover's<br />
distinct tracks in the dust, the flat plains of the<br />
surrounding Gusev Crater region and distant plateaus on<br />
the crater rim.<br />
Spirit also has been studying rocks and using its<br />
robotic arm to sift the soil to determine how the hill<br />
formed. The leading theory is that Husband Hill became<br />
uplifted as a result of crater impact.<br />
Mission scientists say a comparison of the<br />
summit rocks reveal similar geologic features to those<br />
found on the side of the hill. In both cases, the rocks'<br />
makeup reveals they have been altered by water.<br />
It will take about two months for Spirit to make<br />
it all the way down Husband Hill, which is named after<br />
Rick Husband, the commander of the space shuttle<br />
Columbia that broke apart as it was returning from Earth<br />
orbit in 2003.<br />
Meanwhile, Opportunity is in good health again<br />
after recovering from a recent computer glitch while<br />
surveying the Meridiani Planum region.<br />
22<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>
Contributions Wanted<br />
Do you ever notice that it is the same people that<br />
submit something for Réalta? Sometimes, it can be<br />
unfair to expect the same people to keep something like<br />
this going. That is why I want you to think of a<br />
contribution, of any kind, that you would like to share<br />
with readers. It can be about something you read in a<br />
magazine somewhere, r a recap on a nights observing,<br />
‘Lecturers’ Wanted!<br />
In addition to Réalta contributions, TAS is also<br />
looking for folks to volunteer a small amount of their<br />
time to give a talk to the club. You do not need to be a<br />
professor, or have any distinct qualifications. Just the<br />
ability to stand in front of members and friends and talk<br />
telling us what you saw, or even an article you penned<br />
yourself. Variety is good, and while Réalta has had<br />
many, MANY interesting articles on its pages, it is the<br />
same few people that keep doing the good work!<br />
So have a think about it – contact details are at the<br />
bottom of this page.<br />
-Ed.<br />
about some astronomy topic that you choose. We will<br />
even help you along! Have a word with any committee<br />
member at any meeting if you “want to know more”, or<br />
e-mail the Secretary:<br />
tullamoreastronomy@yahoo.co.uk. New faces and<br />
voices are always welcome!<br />
Know someone who could use a 2006<br />
Calendar? Then why not tell them to<br />
get one of ours! You already know<br />
what it is about, but do you also know<br />
that proceeds from this go to help<br />
TAS build a public accessible meeting<br />
room/clubhouse, and refurbish its<br />
observatory? TAS relies on funding<br />
like this to get the project finished,<br />
which, when complete, will<br />
incorporate a comfortable meeting<br />
room and kitchen, as well as access<br />
to our observatory with telescope for<br />
astronomy enthusiasts and research.<br />
The Calendar is available from any<br />
committee member, or direct from<br />
Byrne’s World of Wonder (<strong>Tullamore</strong><br />
& Mullingar), priced €10.00.<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2: November/December 2005.<br />
Réalta is issued by the <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> as a community-based organisation magazine.<br />
Editor:<br />
Seanie Morris<br />
Contributors this issue:<br />
Trudy E. Bell, Darren Dempsey, John Flannery, Deirdre Kelleghan, Girvan McKay, Michael O’Connell, Tony Phillips<br />
Editorial & Submissions Address:<br />
C/o Seanie Morris, ‘ANSTEE’, Daingean Road, <strong>Tullamore</strong>, Co. Offaly, Ireland. Email: tasnewsletter@go.com. Submissions are welcome, preferably by<br />
email or on disk (MS .txt or .doc format), but submissions on paper are also very welcome. Please acknowledge any reference sources for your<br />
submission.<br />
Printed By:<br />
Aungier Print Ltd., Sackville House, Sackville Place, Dublin 1. Tel: 01-8788406/7 or Email: aungierprint@iolfree.ie<br />
All articles contained are © Réalta & <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>, and the source of the articles (if stated).<br />
© Réalta 1997-2005. All Rights Reserved.<br />
Réalta – Volume 7, Issue 2 – November/December 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong> 23
How To Find TAS’s<br />
Meeting Nights<br />
<strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong><br />
<strong>Society</strong> hold their talks and<br />
classes in astronomy on<br />
TUESDAY nights, in the Order<br />
of Malta Training Room.<br />
Meetings start at 8pm, are<br />
informal, and free to attend.<br />
Weather permitting, light<br />
observing will take place in the<br />
car park afterwards.<br />
On the dedicated Observing<br />
Nights, members meet in the<br />
car park in front of <strong>Tullamore</strong><br />
Carpets/Hire Depot at 8pm,<br />
and head out to the<br />
Observatory together.<br />
For more information, contact<br />
the club at:<br />
tullamoreastronomy@yahoo.co.uk<br />
24<br />
Réalta – Volume 6, Issue 3 – April/May 2005 – <strong>Tullamore</strong> <strong>Astronomical</strong> <strong>Society</strong>