APOD 2.6

This is a picture of the moon as it rose on December 10 in Iran. A total lunar eclipse was already going on. This single image is the compilation of hundreds of images taken over and hour and a half. The red moon and blue landscape are both a result of the eclipse. The umbra of the eclipse results in the shadowed landscape, and the moon is also shadowed in red light. The atmosphere scatters the red so it s not visible on the earths landscape.

APOD 2.5

This is a picture a great many star trails using a long exposure. The picture was taken in Croatia, at the Medvednica mountain. The North Celestial Pole is right off of the center of the picture. This picture was not recorded using a digital camera, but colored film. The lighted clouds are illuminated from the lights below.

APOD 2.4

This is a picture of the emissions from a nebula. This specific nebula is nicknamed the pelican nebula, and has this visible ridge of over 10 light years. The picture was created using data of sulfur, oxygen, and hydrogen atoms to form colors such as red and blue. The black spots are stars that have put out cold gas as they formed. The nebula is about 2000 light years away.

APOD 2.3

This is a topographical picture of the moon that shows the elevation differences on the moon. The different colors correspond to different ranges of heights. They range from white to purple which are heights from highest to lowest respectively. The large purple area near the bottom is a huge impact basin which is one of the largest in the solar system. It is 2500 km across and 12 km deep.

APOD 2.2

This is a picture of the wizard nebula, whose formal name is NGC 7380. There is gravitation strong enough to create stars and stellar winds that create towers of gas. It is nicknamed the wizard nebula because the 8000 light year away nebula looks like the description of a medieval sorcerer. It is about 100 light years across and the stars being formed may outlive our sun.

Apod 2.1

This is a picture of the galaxy M83 that is 12 million light years away. It is located near the southeastern tip of the constellation hydra. The picture was made using the Hubble archives and is nicknamed the southern pinwheel because of the bright blue stars around its spiral arms. It is also called the thousand ruby galaxy because of its many reddish stars. It is around 25,000 light years across.

John Flamsteed Bio

John Flamsteed was born in Denby, Derbyhshire, England on August 19, 1646. Flamsteed grew up and went to school there while his father held a malting business nearby. Flamsteed was well educated in Latin from Derby School, and therefore was able to read the literature of the day. He also had a passion for history. He left Derby school around May in 1662. He then tried to attend Jesus College in Cambridge but was unable due to a previous health condition. During this time, Flamsteed began to pick up his love for math and astronomy. He was absolutely fascinated by a partial solar eclipse he observed in 1662. This peaked his interest enough to cause him to embrace the subject. While he was at home with his father, his father taught Flamsteed how to do arithmetic and handle fractions. He began reading books about astronomy, all the while picking up more mathematics. Flamsteed then became to make local friends that were astronomers. He talked to William Lichford who had astronomical books and data. The astronomical tables he was able to look at fascinated him and only encouraged him to pursuer astronomy further. At age nineteen, Flamsteed wrote his first essay called Mathematical Essays. This essay explained about the construction and use of an astronomical quadrant. He attended Jesus college for a short while and was able to hear Isaac Newton speak. He was later invited to London to be commissioned as the British Royal Astronomer. He moved on to the Greenwich Observatory and worked there until 1684. His final years were spent as a priest until he died in 1719. Flamsteed’s work included predictions of solar eclipses which he accurately predicted in the 1660’s. He is also credited with some of the first sightings of Uranus, even though he mislabeled it as a star. Although unknown to Flamsteed, he sighted the most recent supernova in the galaxy and cataloged it as a star. He titled the star Cassiopea 3. However, astronomers today find that the position he observed of the supernova may have just been a miscataloged star.  He created star catalogs that ended up tripling the number of entries as Tycho Brahe. However, Flamsteed was in fear of presenting data that was not verified. His work was published by Isaac Newton after being stolen by Newton. After his death, Flamsteed’s crowning achievement, Historia Coelestis Britannica, was published. It had almost 3000 stars cataloged, and was extremely accurate. His achievements in life were rewarded with several honors. He was made the first British Royal Astronomer, a fellow of the Royal Society, has a crater on the moon named after him, an asteroid named after him, and many schools in his hometown have been named after him. 

APOD 1.6

This is a picture of the starburst galaxy M82. It has a superwind and is also called the cigar galaxy. There is a continuous outflow of material caused by supernovas and massive winds from stars. The composite highlights filaments of atomic hydrogen in reddish lines.  This is 12 million light years away.

APOD 1.5

This is a picture of a sunspot with earth illustrated in the back round. Called AR-1302, it is currently coming around to view as the earth rotates. It is visible without a telescope and should be visible for a few more days. The sunspot has resulted in geomagnetic storms and aurora activity on earth.

John Flamsteed sources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Flamsteed
http://www.nndb.com/people/727/000096439/
http://messier.seds.org/xtra/Bios/flamsteed.html

APOD 1.4

This is a picture of the sun with a sunspot included. Boiling granules that look like kernels of corn across the top. It was taken in 2002, using the Swedish solar telescope on the Canary Island of La Palma. The image was made using adaptive optics, digital image stacking, and more that counters the blurring effect of earth's atmosphere.

APOD 1.3

This image is the NGC 352, a spiral galaxy that is 35 million light years away. It is in the general direction of the constellation Leo. It is visible in the night sky using small telescopes. However, it is often overlooked in favor of M66 and M65. It spans over 50,000 light years. There are regions in the galaxy that can be seen forming stars. There are also bubble-like shells that are tidal debris from stars undergoing mergers with the galaxy in the distant past.

Podcast 2

Johannes Kepler was born with poor eyesight because he was premature about a month. He therefore became an astronomical theorist. He spent his early astronomical years by traveling to Tycho Brahe in order to use his data for mathematical theory. Kepler established his three laws where orbits are eliptical, planets sweep out equal distances in equal times, and that the period squared equals the distance cubed. These were absolutely revolutionary theories that fit with math that had been established. The deferents and epicycles were deemed obsolete and Kepler's elipse made the most sense. Thus Kepler gifted the astronomical world with mathematical observations and proof of planets orbits and predictability for planets.

Podcast 1

Galileo began his life as the oldest of six children, and was encouraged to be a priest. He instead studied medicine but ended up moving on to mathematics. He began observing with telescopes all about the planets and was able to prove first that the sun was not the center of the universe. He could make out what he described as Saturn's handles. Galileo found the moons of Jupiter and thus proved that earth could not be the center of all orbits. He also used the phases of Venus. He went against the church however, and it made it difficult for him. The church was sort of with his theories however, but the way he handled the observations made it difficult. He was rather ostentatious. He described forces even though forces were unheard of.

Apod 1.2

This is a picture taken by the robotic cassini spacecraft as it orbited saturn in 2006. When saturn eclipses the sun, its rings are lit up very brightly except for the part of the rings that are on the far side of saturn from the sun. New rings were able to be seen because of how bright they appeared. Saturn's E-ring is very visible and is created by the ice fountains of the nearby moon of Enceladus. One can see earth as a pale blue dot on the left.

Apod 1.1

In greenland, an aurora stretched across the sky as viewed from a scientist's expedition campsite. In the center of the aurora, Ursa major and the Big Dipper are visible.