... Way back-in-the-day, S&T had and article regarding Hartmann's lunar mapping work (with the Lunar Planetary Lab?). It included pictures of the projection...
I was visiting a family reunion at the Sunny Hill golf resort in Greenville, about 45 minutes south and west from Albany. I was rather disconsolate about the...
I think it could be done but the problem is whether you project "through" or "on." Projecting "through" would require one to draw on paper that is unsupported...
We got past the elemental calculations on another group (see below), and concluded that a two arc second separation at 160 light years indicates a *minimal*...
This is a case where using parsecs for the units of distance makes sense, since you can go directly to AU rather than tiny fractions of light-years, and you...
Brian Skiff
bas@...
Jul 6, 2007 4:20 am
19855
Brian, do you prefer using light-years instead of parsecs when giving distances to various astronomical objects? A light-year has one universal constant (the...
Greg, I guess that the 0.17 LY refer to the distance between the two pairs and the 0.0017 LY are the projected separation of the components of EACH pair from...
... I agree that the parsec is a silly unit of measurement, but there is other similar odd stuff in astronomy. In the scientific literature, of course, about...
Brian Skiff
bas@...
Jul 6, 2007 6:53 pm
19858
15480 Empire Rd. Benson, AZ 85602 hm ph: 520-586-2244 Correct, Mattias, for the widely separated pair! If you use the nice relation that Brian supplied: Actual...
... Brian earlier made the mathematical case for considering distances in parsecs, which presumably is why it is preferred in the scientific literature. ...
Thanks Brian for the tutorial and thank you Matthias for some reason I assumed that the .17 figure referred to the components not the separation of the two...
My excitement last night was "not" seeing Nova Cygni 2006, a nova I expected to be around 8-9th magnitude. Has anyone seen it the last several evenings? I was...
... You might need to be a bit more specific, Kent. If you mean V2362 Cygni, the nova in Cygnus from April of 2006, then it is currently near magnitude 15.5 . ...
... is easy to find now! I just estimated him at mag 7,6. Almost at zenith in the region above the Pole star. Fairly giant, it looks weak, but easily spotted....
... Thanks for the report, Greg. Conjunctions are among my favourite events in astronomy, I try to catch every one that I can ... I've even been known to set...
I forgot to mention, on Saturn's behalf, that you can throw in the angular area of Titan into the Calculation, which I did see in the 102mm in spite of the...
Bruce: Sky Map Pro gives this for Saturn on that day: Equatorial diameter: 16.66" Polar diameter: 14.86" Ring System Information: Major axis: 37.8" Minor axis:...
... Thanks. I had simply calculated the disc of Saturn as if for a sphere of the equatorial diameter, not accounting for its oblateness. D-oh. So a proper...
Bruce: Well maybe if we push it farther someone else will feel inspired to work it out "in detail." It certainly would make a nice trig question. Without...
Here's the only picture of which I am aware. Maybe S&T has one? The photographer was using an 80mm achromat! (I incorrectly remembered the link as having...
... "jug handles" to be approximated by two isosceles triangles at the edge of the Saturnian disc I get (10.5h x 4.5w)*1/2 for the area of the triangle x2...
Now is a good time for us deep-sky observers to look at Pluto. The dwarf planet lies in the same medium power field of view as two planetary nebulae, NGC 6439...
Hmmmm. What will Pluto do in my new fangled spectroscope thingie? A faint gray streak like other stars? and are these PNs stellar or do they have some...
Hi Kent, ... I saw it with my 6" at 400x three years ago from dark South of France. I used a 10" from a co-observer to confirm it. Next week I'll be in the...
Hi Greg Let me know how your spectroscope does. I tried mine on Vesta and am happy to report it was a faint gray streak too! Knowing Kent, these planetaries...
... Like Vesta, Pluto would show only an ordinary stellar spectrum nearly identical to the Sun. There are methane absorption features and such, but they are...
Brian Skiff
bas@...
Jul 11, 2007 3:22 am
19877
The night of 22-23 July C/2006 VZ13 LINEAR is going to run over M3. The dance is going to be delicate between the moon and the M3/VZ13 duo's decline to the W,...
Most of you probably know the "Catalog of Compact Groups of Galaxies" by Paul Hickson, short the Hickson Catalog. Jim Shields has a very nice compilation of...
Sue French and I observed C/2006 VZ13 LINEAR last night. It is indeed brighter than some had expected, about 7th or 8th magnitude, and visible in an 8x50...
