December 2015 - Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

Re: [Utah-astronomy] Last night's lecture
by Joe Bauman 11 Dec '18

11 Dec '18

Brent, speaking of the ISS, I have wondered if it could be put into an orbit that continuously cruised between Earth and Mars. When it swung by Mars it could drop off and retrieved crews. I don't see how the radiation would be any worse than the ISS crews are already exposed to. ------------------------------ On Wed, Feb 25, 2015 8:18 AM MST Brent Watson via Utah-Astronomy wrote: >I attended the lecture last night on trajectories. It was really a good, stimulating talk. Thanks for passing the word along. >There were some interesting side comments made about our launch capabilities and the Mars One effort. Mr. Adamo was not at all enthusiastic about the Mars One effort. His opinion is that the effort is doomed because there is not really a way to assure that folks going there would be safe - primarily from radiation. He has done some work with a former flight surgeon on designing a spacecraft to go to Mars. Their result is that in order to get sufficient shielding (using a water jacket), the spacecraft's mass would be around 380 metric tons. That is for a small crew, probably only about 5 members. For a point of comparison, the ISS mass is 400 metric tons. He made the comment that an astronaut who made this trip could only go to space once in this craft, and then he would be at the limit of radiation exposure for his life. The NASA limit is an increased risk of developing cancer of 5%. >That brings us to our current launch capability. Our latest heavy lift rocket - the one we are currently developing - will have the capability to lift 130 metric tons to a very low earth orbit. So low, in fact, that it would burn up at perigee. The Apollo 17 Saturn 5 rocket lifted 140 metric tons into earth orbit -- higher than the new rocket will go. (I am sorry, but my mind will not allow me to recall the name of our currently being designed rocket.) Recall that it took several dozen shuttle launches to assemble the ISS. The Mars One vehicle would require either a hugely more massive launch rocket or a similar effort to build the craft. >As I mentioned, it was a very intellectually stimulating lecture and did involve several ordinary differential equations. They were nicely explained in English by Mr. Adamo. This was the first time I have seen some real math put to Kepler's laws. There were many charts showing what it takes to leave the earth and go to the moon or Mars. It was a very well done lecture. >The above is my recollection of the lecture, and may not actually represent the opinions of Mr. Adamo. It is only my interpretation of what he said. He knows his stuff, that is apparent. Thanks Patrick and Dr. Sohl for passing the word along. >_______________________________________________ >Utah-Astronomy mailing list >http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy > >Send messages to the list to >Utah-Astronomy(a)mailman.xmission.com > >The Utah-Astronomy mailing list is not affiliated with any astronomy club. > >To unsubscribe go to: >http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/utah-astronomy >Then enter your email address in the space provided and click on "Unsubscribe or edit options".

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The serendipitous discovery of a possible new solar system object with ALMA
by Dave Gary 18 Dec '15

18 Dec '15

Have you guys seen or heard anything about this? It’s pretty weird. On the right-hand side of the page under “Current browse context” if you hit “next” there’s another article related to this. > http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.02650?context=astro-ph.SR <http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.02650?context=astro-ph.SR> Dave

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The serendipitous discovery of a possible new solar system, object with ALMA
by John M. Craig 18 Dec '15

18 Dec '15

Pretty wild. It's hard to imagine that something as big and relatively close as that would have been missed by the IR satellite telescopes that have surveyed the sky. But given the options that the abstract offers for the possible distances (haven't had time to look at the whole paper), it's kind of hard to know what to think. Next thing to do would might be to have Arecibo bounce a radar signal off it. If the ALMA team's size estimate isn't wildly off, then that should be possible and that'd nail down the distance neatly. If there's no return signal, then it's got to be farther away than 25 AU, doesn't it? Given the proper motion they've identified, at least they won't likely lose track of it! It'll be interesting to see what follow-up observations are able to reveal. John

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Sky Safari 5 Pro on sale
by Joel Stucki 17 Dec '15

17 Dec '15

If you do not have a planetarium software for your phone yet, Sky Safari 5 Pro is on sale for 50% off at $19.99. This is for IPhone but there is a android version likely on sale also. Well worth every penny.

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Planetary Discovery
by Joan Carman 17 Dec '15

17 Dec '15

Looks legit http://centurylink.net/tv/3/player/vendor/CNN/player/cnn/asset/cnn-closest_…

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Southern Hemisphere Objects
by Brent Watson 13 Dec '15

13 Dec '15

Now that I have a telescope and am in the southern hemisphere, I am starting a "bucket list" of objects to observe here. So far, here is my list:NGC253NGC216947 TucanaeLMCSMCTarantula NebulaCoal SackAlpha CentauriOmega CentauriCentaurus AEta Carina I am soliciting additions to this list. Please think of the objects that sound interesting to you but you can't see from North America. Add to this list so that I can observe them for you. I am also interested in objects some of you may have seen while you were in the more southerly climes. Wayne Sumner, this means you - among others. BTW, my scope is a 10 inch f4.7 Sky Watcher collapsible dob. I'll cross post this to Facebook also, so don't get too upset if you see it twice. Thanks,Brent

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Orion Nebula 12 December 2015
by Dave Gary 13 Dec '15

13 Dec '15

Took this last night with a new little camera I purchased, the ZWO ASI120MC-S. It’s a little lunar/planetary camera. There weren’t any planets worth photographing at 21:00 last night, so I swung the 80mm scope over to something bright, the Orion Nebula. It was a little tricky to achieve any reasonable focus with the camera attached to such a small-aperture scope, but I figured it out, eventually. I’ll use the camera with one of my larger-aperture scopes next time. You can just barely make out the Trapezium in this photo. This was a 15-second exposure, no stacking, adjust-the-edit-sliders-in-iPhoto sort of affair. Hopefully, when I get the included software figured out, I’ll be able to get some good shots with this camera. Of course, I may be long dead before that happens. The photo after this one (in my photostream on Flickr) is the first-light photo I shot of Moon on 3 December. Dave > https://www.flickr.com/photos/78046474@N06/23638902191/in/dateposted-public/ <https://www.flickr.com/photos/78046474@N06/23638902191/in/dateposted-public/>

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Southern Hemisphere Objects
by baxman2＠q.com 12 Dec '15

12 Dec '15

Could we see some photos of these Southern Hemisphere viewed astronomical wonders.

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pre-dawn sky
by Richard Tenney 08 Dec '15

08 Dec '15

Anyone else notice the fabulous colors in the pre-dawn sky this morning (I was looking just after 7 here in Utah County). The light cast on the ground from the high, pink clouds looked surreal. Anyway, happy Tuesday everyone! /R

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Powerful telescope
by Kay Hargis 07 Dec '15

07 Dec '15

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