Science 9 Astronomy: April 2010

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory

The Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory began operating in 1960 at White Lake near Penticton, The creation of the dominion was by Carlyle Smith Beals is an astronomer who wanted to advance the field of astrophysics in Canada.

In 1962, a second radio telescope was put in place. Fully operational in 1964

the radio telescope was primarily used between 1965 and 1969 during a period when solar spots were at minumum .

In 1968, the 25.6-metre radio telescope at Penticton it was the first successful long distance interferometry experiment ever conducted. Today, the synthesis array radio telescope has seven 8.5-metre parabolic antennas that operate continuously 24/7.

The telescope was mainly used in the Canadian Galactic Plane Survey, there goal was to map a large part of the milky way.

They also did a task of gathering data on the Sun’s radio flux, variations in its energy output at radio wavelengths it was transferred to the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory at Penticton. The observatory is now under responsibility of the national research council of Canada’s herzberg institute of astrophysics.

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Lloyd in Space

Lloyd in Space was created by Joe Ansolabehere and Paul Germain (creators of Recess). Lloyd Nebulon is a teenager who lives on a space shuttle with a bunch of other aliens and some humans. The show was first interduced in 2001 than cancled in 2006. 40 episodes in total were showed to North America, Asia and Europe. Only 39 made it to North America because of Picture Perfect, it is still 'lost'. The message that they try to get kids to get of it is be resposible, look out for your friends think before you act and to have fun with what you got.

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Monday, April 26, 2010

Sergei Krikalev

Sergei Krikalev is a cosmonaut who was born on August 27, 1958, in Leningrad, Russia.

Krikalev became a cosmonaut in 1987. He has spent over 461 days in space aboard 2 spaceflights. . In 1991, Krikalev flew a second time on Mir. During this stay, Krikalev made an unprecedented 6 spacewalks where he did space construction. He flew on the first Station assembly mission on Space Shuttle Discovery. He tested space flight equipment, developed space operations methods, and participated in ground control operations.

old.spaceonline.tv/iss/1st_crew/krikalev.jpg

Valentina Tereshkova

Valentina Tereshkova was born in the Yaroslavl Region of Russia on March 6, 1937. She became interested in the cosmonaut program, it was her and four other woman in it. Only she completed a space mission. Tereshkova was launched aboard Vostok 6 on June 16, 1963 and became the first woman to fly in space. During the 70.8 hour flight, Vostok 6 made 48 orbits of Earth. Upon her mission Tereshkova was honored with the title Hero of the Soviet Union. She never flew again, she became a spokesperson for the Soviet union. On November 3, 1963, Tereshkova married astronaut Andrian Nikolayev and than got divorced in 1980.

www.wired.com/.../valentina_tereshkova_500px.jpg

The Red Spot

The Red Spot was first observed by Giovanni Cassini in the late 1600. It wasn't observed up close until NASA's Pioneer 10 spacecraft made its flyby in 1974.

The Red Spot on Jupitar is a high storm that has been swirling around Jupiter for hundreds of years, it also had brown and white oval storms, that are smaller and un named storms, the white ones are cooler than the otheres.

Astronomers think the spot is red because it pulls up darker compounds from deeper down in Jupiter. There is a new formed Oval BA (Red Spot Jr.) is getting larger and starting to turn red as well. The storm is large enough to be seen through earth based telescopes.

The oval object rotates counterclockwise in a period of 6 days. The storms can last for hours, days and centuries.

www-atm.physics.ox.ac.uk/.../redspot_false2.jpg

Clyde Thombaugh

(1906-1997) Clyde Thombaugh was the first discover of pluto he died, he had suffered from congestive heart failure and was on oxygen for the last several years when he was 91, He was born in Streator. Clyde built his own telescope in 1925 it was the first of more than thirty telescopes he was to build over his lifetime.

Clyde discovered Pluto on February 18, 1930, over the next 13 years he would rearch the skies. He also discovered several clusters of stars and galexies, studied the apparent distributon of extragalatic, alos he made observations on the following planets, Mars Venus Jupitar Saturn and the Moon.

In 1932 he discovered a nova in Corvus that had exploded a year earlier. Clyde was dismissed from Lowell in 1945 for financial reasons. Ten years later he founded the astronomy program at New Mexico State University.

www.physics.ku.edu/.../tombaugh/youngtom.jpg