bye bye spirit rover. over and out.

i'm a little sad to report that today, humans will stop trying to contact one of my favorite robots, the mars rover named spirit.

the last signal NASA received from the cute little roving robot was over a year ago, on march 22, 2010, and it seems that there is no longer hope of revival.

the primary mission of the robot geologist was to find clues to past water activity on mars by searching for different types of rocks and soil, and to those ends it has been quite successful. my favorite discovery, though, was the martian blueberries!

anyway, while it's sad to say goodbye, we can still be amazed to remember that when spirit landed on mars on the 3rd of january 2004,, it was scheduled for a mission of only three months, and instead it lasted SIX YEARS! thats pretty amazing, especially considering spirit's twin rover opportunity is still truckin'!

here's some more info from our sixty symbols video on mars:

pluto, the previous planet: a song

a couple years ago i was walking to the bus stop with the song "rudolph the red nosed reindeer" stuck in my head, much to my frustration! in order to maintain my sanity, i started singing alternative lyrics based on the phrase that popped into my head: pluto the previous planet! i've been wanting to record this song and post it for the public ever since, but had never really been inspired.

so yesterday during the hack day portion of dotAstronomy meeting, i gathered a few fellow conference participants: astronomers, a great pianist, and an enthusiastic director.... and off we went!

so without futher ado... pluto, the previous planet!!

Pluto, the previous planet from carolune on Vimeo.

as much as i like the song as it is, the last verse might lead one to believe that i would like to reinstate pluto as a planet. i want to state for the record that this is NOT the case! i'm pleased that astronomers have decided on a definition of a planet that is based on some actual physics! the song is just fun and i hope people enjoy it.

with all this in mind, we also developed an accompanying website with a special message from pluto:

"First of all, thank you everyone for your concern, but really, I’m happy in my new role as the original dwarf planet! And there’s no need to worry, nothing physically happened to me to cause my reclassification. In fact, Charon’s been jealous for years that I was considered a planet, while we’ve been dancing around each other in our joint orbit around the sun. And don’t forget about our other two small satellites: Nix and Hydra! They may be small, but they’re important to me. And your Earth only has one Moon, so I feel special..."

here's the website: http://youpiter.org/pluto/

hope you enjoy!

if jupiter orbited the earth...

Scale from Brad Goodspeed on Vimeo.

perseids and planets: evidence

did anyone get out to see the perseid meteor shower or the planets last week? in case you were clouded out or just not lucky this time around, you can see a nice 2010 perseids photo gallery, from which i've chosen a couple to share.

this is a shot by david harvey from mount lemmon in arizona, USA on august 12, 2010:


this capture comes from amir abolfath, from the alamut castle in iran, august 14, 2010:



today's APOD shows a lovely view of the current planetary alignment from a beach in portugal.


here's a key they provide so you can keep an eye out over the next few evenings! :)

martian rock names

alexander trevi, pruned on flickr, compiled the NASA-listed names given to lots of rocks around the pathfinder's site. i think these two snapshots are interesting, but the full panorama is pretty amazing as well.



makes me wonder what i would name rocks on mars if i got the chance?

planets and the perseid meteor shower

tonight and the next few nights, the solar system treats us to the lovely sights of the perseid meteor shower. go outside and enjoy nature's display of meteors as the earth passes thru the interplanetary debris left by comet swift-tuttle.


you can also see where other people on earth have seen perseid meteors fly across the sky, or report your own sightings, via twitter, to help with the online project meteor watch.

even if you don't want to relax peacefully waiting for the meteor shower, you can pop out to see some excellent planetary alignments over the next few nights as well. venus is the super bright object in the west, and a bit to the south. mars hangs just above to the left and saturn above to the right. the sliver moon passes below this planetary triangle tomorrow night, aug 12th and to the left of the group on the 13th.

planets in the sky on july 4th

happy independence day to all folks from the US!! as the sun sets on your BBQs and you get ready for the fireworks to begin, take a moment to glance up in the sky at the natural firestorms glowing in other parts of our galaxy!

the planet venus is the very bright object visible in the west, which will set over the horizon as the sun says its goodbyes. if you follow up and to the left of venus, you'll spot the star regulus, mars, and saturn. this is roughly what the planet-heavy western sky will look like at 9:30 pm tonight from most of the US.


below shows a sky map for july 10, 2010 (from earthsky.org), as venus creeps closer to regulus in the sky. the two will reach a conjunction on july 10th, appearing extremely close in the sky for one night only!


for more info on any of these astronomical objects, i recommend you check out the site lookUP which provides interesting images of astronomical objects at different wavelengths, links to recent astronomy blog posts about them, finder charts, and much more. lookUP represents one of the many useful tools for the astronomically inclined recently developed by stuart at the astronomy blog.

happy hot dogging and planet hunting!

"the case for mars," a song

the youtube contributer melody sheep has created another interesting song and video using snippets from different scientists like carl sagan, robert zubrin, brian cox, and penelope boston.



more videos can be found at symphony of science.

sixty symbols: mars

we discuss out neighbor mars in the latest video from sixty symbols:

hola mars

right now our neighbor mars is as physically as close as it ever gets to us, a position called opposition. mars is the bright orange speckle rising in the eastern sky.


to get ahold of mars' position in our sky for the next couple months, look up a bit after sunset on friday, the 29th of january, and see our nearly full moon sitting just next to mars in the sky for the evening.

spaceship to mars

gene vincent sings spaceship to mars in 1962!

block island

such a serene scene of the seaside...


but wait, no its NOT! its a photo taken by the opportunity exploration rover on MARS! the robust little rovers are still alive on the surface of mars, even though they were scheduled to parish many many sols ago.

the future is looking pretty grim for the spirit rover which is currently stuck in a ditch of soft sand. there remains little hope for movement, even though many tests are being performed on earth to figure out how to rescue it :(

opportunity keeps trucking along, though, and recently found the rock pictured above! NASA scientists call it "block island" and it very well might be a meteorite that has landed on the surface of mars after millions of years of traveling around our solar system. its interesting that it has no crater around it?! several such rocks have been found by the rovers on mars, but its too difficult to determine their true origin from available data.

42 meter diameter telescope

sometimes telescopes are named after famous scientists, or people who donate loads of money to build them, or an acronym relating to the type of science it will do, etc... as this sixty symbols episode on the diameter of telescopes illustrates, we are severely lacking in creative new telescope names, considering the big one they talk about is the ELT which stands for "extremely large telescope!"



so on twitter, a friend suggested that if we name the ELT something a bit more attention-grabbing for current times, maybe we could guarantee funding! he suggested OBAMA, and like any good scientific name, we have been trying to turn OBAMA into an acronym!! mine is OBAMA: Overwhelmingly Big Aperture Measures All!

NASA recently had a contest to name a new Mars rover. the winner was a 12-year-old girl from kansas who suggested possibly my favorite name for any tool of astronomy: curiosity.

can you think of any good names for telescopes or other universe explorers?

the moon, mercury, jupiter, and mars over australia

mike salway gorgeously captured the early morning planetary line up of the moon, mercury, jupiter, and mars over australia!


unfortunately, he was also clouded over last night, so didnt image comet lulin or saturn :(

night sky august 2008

this month provides many nice planetary alignments and the perseids meteor shower: usually the best of the year!

five planets will be visible with the naked eye this month: mercury, venus, mars, jupiter, and saturn!! starting on august 11th, we'll be able to see mercury, venus, and saturn approaching each other low on the western horizon. they'll be challenging to see since they are settling early with the sun, but all the planets are bright so they should be spottable... venus will be the brightest at magnitude -3.9, the mercury at -0.6 and saturn will be the faintest of the three at 0.8. mars hangs above the trio and jupiter shines brightly in the southern sky (see full night sky maps here).

august 13th provides a closeness between venus and saturn of less than a degree in the sky. if you hold out your arm at full length, your pointing index finger (one degree across) will easily block both planets! also on this night, the bright planet jupiter in the south will be 3 degrees north of the moon!

on august 16th, there will be a partial lunar eclipse visible from much of the world, best in africa and europe. since we just saw such a brilliant total solar eclipse due to the tight alignment of the sun, the moon, and the earth as the moon passed between the larger orbs, it's not surprising that the three are still aligned so tightly as the moon swings around the opposite side of the earth and passes thru our shadow!


after mid-august, saturn sinks in the sky each night, while mercury and venus rise higher. venus will shine brightly after sunset for the rest of the year, returning to its status as the "evening star." on august 20th, mercury and venus will be less than a degree apart, and both very bright!

the perseids meteor shower occurs between august 11-13th this year, peaking before dawn on august 12th for north american viewers. look below the sideways "W" of cassiopeia in the northeast to find the direction from which all the meteors will be shooting across the sky: the radiant. in reality, if you stand outside under the dark sky for a little while, you'll most likely see one bright streak or more overhead per minute after the gibbous moon sets at 1:30 am EDT.


enjoy!!

water on mars!

this is too cool... phoenix has found water on mars! it cant be salt... it must be H20 water ice!

the skies of june 2008

TONIGHT, the nearly full moon and the bright star, antares line up.

WEDNESDAY, june 18th, reveals june's full moon!

THURSDAY night, june 19th, begins the ascent of the moon near jupiter. the two rise above the south-eastern horizon late in the evening with the very bright jupiter to the left of the moon. jupiter reaches opposition on july 9th (when the sun, earth and jupiter line up with earth in the middle), so it is very bright in our sky these days! this would be a great night for some late-night binocular or telescope viewing! try to find the 4 galilean moons of jupiter and guess which is which!


FRIDAY marks the summer solstice and the longest day of the year for those of us in the northern hemisphere. this (early solstice) is the day the sun is as far north in the sky as it will get all year. those in the southern hemisphere celebrate their winter solstice as they begin to welcome longer days each day of the rest of the year!

SATURDAY, june 21st, is the first official day of summer in the north.... but it has been a brutually hot spring in this part of the world so i'm not really thrilled about the official hot season just beginning now!

SUNDAY night, look to the west just at sunset to see a beautiful trio of saturn, the star regulus, and the planet mars (upper left to lower right) with saturn being the brightest!

enjoy!

saturn, mars and the moon in june

if you saw the crescent moon in the sky last night after sunset, you saw the star regulus and planet venus just above it and the planet mars off to the right. tonight, the moon shoots past regulus and saturn to the left, providing a nice alignment of all these objects.



pay attention over the next month as mars approaches saturn in the sky as it moves along the ecliptic more quickly than the ringed planet. next month, when the moon passes by these planets, they will be within a few degrees of each other, culminating in a less-than-one-degree-separation of the two planets on july 10th!

the moon, mars, and gemini

did anyone catch how gorgeously the moon lined up next to bright orange mars last night?

tonight the moon slides down and over a little to perch right between mars and the twins of gemini, pollux [PAUL-ux] and castor [CASS-ter]. the moon is bright and the alignment will occur practically overhead after sunset, but you'll be able to see the filling-up moon for most of the afternoon!

the moon and mars

the half-full, first quarter moon sits to the west of the pleiades star cluster tonight. the waxing moon approaches mars and passes very close by the bright orange planet for the next several nights. friday night provides the closest approach this month, as shown below.




the moon slowly fills with sunlight over the next week, and will pass right thru earth's shadow, what we call a total lunar eclipse, next wednesday night! stay tuned!