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A big week for astronomy March 30, 2009

Posted by sarah in: science . 1 comment so far

100hastronomy

This week, starting 2 April, one of the biggest events in the International Year of Astronomy will take place. 100 Hours of Astronomy, one of the year’s Cornerstone programmes, will get thousands of people looking through a telescope at the skies, just like Galileo did 400 years ago, over the course of 5 nights. Tons of great events are taking place, from star parties organised by local astronomy organisations around the world to global webcast events.

The webcast events look particularly fun. The first, called Live Science Centre, will allow anyone with a weblink to participate in discussions about space and astronomy throughout history with scientists in places as far-flung as Germany, South Africa and the US. The Science Centre webcast takes place on 2 April at 17:00 UTC (follow the link to see the time at your location). Around the World in 80 Telescopes is a really cool continuous 24-hour webcast, starting on 3 April at 09:00 UTC that hops around 80 world-class telescopes scattered around the globe and in space to follow live what astronomers are up looking at.And yes, that does include the space telescopes like Hubble, Spitzer and the newly launched Kepler!

This is really one of the big highlights of the IYA and it will be well worth your while to take a peek. So follow the jump over to the website to see what’s happening in your area and mark the webcasts in your diaries. You can also get updates via twitter (@100Hours and @telescopecast). If you own a telescope, take it out onto the street and get your neighbours out.

Celebrate the XX March 10, 2009

Posted by sarah in: science, women . Add a comment

Yesterday, 8 March, was International Women’s Day. I hope many of you enjoyed and celebrated it. A ton of events took place yesterday and throughout the month of March, check out the official website for information.

As it’s also International Year of Astronomy, IWD marked the launch date of one of the IYA’s cornerstone project, She is an Astronomer. The project aims to bring female astronomers into the spotlight, encourage more girls and women to get involved in astronomy, and to remove misconceptions about gender in this great science.

An extra special shout out to fellow women astronomy and space bloggers, Amanda, Nicole, Emily, Pamela, all the women blogging in Cosmic Diary and Cosmic Variance and all the women scientists out there on the internet. And check out an exciting new blog carnival on Diversity in Science.

 


Image credit: IYA2009/She is an astronomer

Tell Hubble where to go! January 28, 2009

Posted by sarah in: science . Add a comment

Are you fed up with seeing images from the Hubble Space Telescope of objects just just don’t care about? Think it’s all a big scam? Now is the time to speak up, as NASA have opened up Hubble’s observations to democracy. As part of the IYA initiative 100 Hours of Astronomy, you can vote for Hubble’s target of observation until 1 March, from the following objects:

Personally my vote would go to the targets most likely to be very active, i.e. star forming region or the pair of interacting galaxy (I say this without reading anything about the particular objects so forgive me if I’m wrong). But Hubble’s never looked at any of these objects before so the observation is bound to produce a pretty picture, if not some great science. The winning image will be released in early April.

For voting and more background info from the Hubble folks go here.

Posts by Phil and Stu here and here.

IYA: Yours to Discover! January 2, 2009

Posted by sarah in: science . Add a comment

iya_logoThe International Year of Astronomy is here, yay! Check out the website to find out about the activities taking place in 2009, and follow the links to your country’s IYA webpages to see what’s happening near you. Here’s some of the projects I like:

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Star spotting in Britain December 16, 2008

Posted by sarah in: science . Add a comment

final4c1

So you thought Britain was rubbish for stargazing? Think again! The Campaign for Dark Skies, part of the British Astronomical Association,  produced this cool map, highlighting areas of low light pollution and a good number of clear nights. There’s plenty of spots for great starspotting.

And while I’m on the topic, The Guardian ran this nice article today about the best places and organised events for stargazing around the country, including the Royal Observatories of Edinburgh and Greenwich which are both great to visit. There was a great plug for the International Year of Astronomy too. Good stuff.

Image credit: BAA