STEM Education, Astrophysics Research, Astrophotography, and Outreach located at 24 Park Ave., Bridgewater MA. You'll find us on the two outdoor balconies on the 5th floor, and you'll find our official website here: https://www.bridgew.edu/center/case/observatory .
150 posts
Latest Posts by bsuobservatory - Page 5
Young Stars, Stellar Jets via NASA https://ift.tt/mUE9hQK
The 2023 Partial (Annular) Solar Eclipse as seen from Nevada // Brian Fulda
Wed. Oct. 25: The observatory will be closed tonight due to clouds. We'll try to run our Halloween event tomorrow instead, 7:00 - 8:30 pm.
2023 October 18
Dust and the Western Veil Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Jiang Wu
Explanation: It’s so big it is easy to miss. The entire Veil Nebula spans six times the diameter of the full moon, but is so dim you need binoculars to see it. The nebula was created about 15,000 years ago when a star in the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus) exploded. The spectacular explosion would have appeared brighter than even Venus for a week - but there is no known record of it. Pictured is the western edge of the still-expanding gas cloud. Notable gas filaments include the Witch’s Broom Nebula on the upper left near the bright foreground star 52 Cygni, and Fleming’s Triangular Wisp (formerly known as Pickering’s Triangle) running diagonally up the image middle. What is rarely imaged – but seen in the featured long exposure across many color bands – is the reflecting brown dust that runs vertically up the image left, dust likely created in the cool atmospheres of massive stars.
∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap231018.html
Make your Halloween pumpkin shine bright like a star observed by the James Webb Space Telescope! 🎃
The 8-point diffraction spikes are a signature look in Webb’s images of bright objects in the universe. Download the stencil or any of the other Webb patterns: https://webbtelescope.pub/46HNvPV
Skyshark
Man sees what he wants to see, and so it is with the Dark Nebula LDN 1235. This collection of dust in the constellation Cepheus is very reminiscent of a shark. At just 650 light years away, it is just around the corner.
Object type: Dark nebula
Constellation: Cepheus
Total exposure: 720 minutes
Image data:
- RGB 144 x 300s / Gain 100
- 25 flats
- 25 Bias
- 25 Darks
Setup:
- Skywatcher 150/750 F5 PDS
- Omegon 571C
- Skywatcher EQ6R Pro
- Two Asi 178mm as guide cam
2023 October 17
PDS 70: Disk, Planets, and Moons Image Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO); M. Benisty et al.
Explanation: It’s not the big ring that’s attracting the most attention. Although the big planet-forming ring around the star PDS 70 is clearly imaged and itself quite interesting. It’s also not the planet on the right, just inside the big disk, that’s being talked about the most. Although the planet PDS 70c is a newly formed and, interestingly, similar in size and mass to Jupiter. It’s the fuzzy patch around the planet PDS 70c that’s causing the commotion. That fuzzy patch is thought to be a dusty disk that is now forming into moons – and that had never been seen before. The featured image was taken in 2021 by the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) of 66 radio telescopes in the high Atacama Desert of northern Chile. Based on ALMA data, astronomers infer that the moon-forming exoplanetary disk has a radius similar to our Earth’s orbit, and may one day form three or so Luna-sized moons – not very different from our Jupiter’s four.
∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap231017.html
The 2023 Annular Eclipse as seen from Albuquerque, NM // Jordan Martin
Our Halloween event is Wednesday, Oct. 25 from 7:00-8:30pm, weather allowing! Check in the early afternoon that day to see if the weather will allow it to go on.
If not, we have a rain date planned for Thursday (and a 2nd rain date for Monday if neither work out).
So far, we think the sky will cooperate enough for us to see tomorrow's eclipse! We'll be handing out eclipse glasses around DMF tomorrow, and some other locations on campus from 10:30 am - 2:45 pm. Check back one more time in the morning about the weather.
Interacting galaxy
Interacting galaxies (colliding galaxies) are galaxies whose gravitational fields result in a disturbance of one another. An example of a minor interaction is a satellite galaxy’s disturbing the primary galaxy’s spiral arms. An example of a major interaction is a galactic collision, which may lead to a galaxy merger.
A giant galaxy interacting with its satellites is common. A satellite’s gravity could attract one of the primary’s spiral arms, or the secondary satellite’s path could coincide with the position of the primary satellite’s and so would dive into the primary galaxy (the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy into the Milky Way being an example of the latter). That can possibly trigger a small amount of star formation. Such orphaned clusters of stars were sometimes referred to as “blue blobs” before they were recognized as stars.
Colliding galaxies are common during galaxy evolution. The extremely tenuous distribution of matter in galaxies means these are not collisions in the traditional sense of the word, but rather gravitational interactions.
Colliding may lead to merging if two galaxies collide and do not have enough momentum to continue traveling after the collision. In that case, they fall back into each other and eventually merge into one galaxy after many passes through each other. If one of the colliding galaxies is much larger than the other, it will remain largely intact after the merger. The larger galaxy will look much the same, while the smaller galaxy will be stripped apart and become part of the larger galaxy. When galaxies pass through each other, unlike during mergers, they largely retain their material and shape after the pass.
Galactic collisions are now frequently simulated on computers, which use realistic physics principles, including the simulation of gravitational forces, gas dissipation phenomena, star formation, and feedback. Dynamical friction slows the relative motion galaxy pairs, which may possibly merge at some point, according to the initial relative energy of the orbits.
Astronomers have estimated the Milky Way galaxy, will collide with the Andromeda galaxy in about 4.5 billion years. It is thought that the two spiral galaxies will eventually merge to become an elliptical galaxy or perhaps a large disk galaxy.
Source
Image credit: NASA/ESA & Hubble (procesed by: Steve Byrne & Judy Schmidt)
Animation
We'll be closed tonight, Wednesday Oct. 11. We expect up to 70% cloud coverage depending on which forecast you believe, and the satellite images look terrible.
HOWEVER keep an eye out this Saturday for the solar eclipse! If the weather is clear, we'll start giving out information and eclipse glasses around classes at 10:30 am and set up some solar telescopes on the observing decks. The eclipse lasts from12:18 to 2:34 pm. In the case of clouds, we'll only stream the eclipse in the lobby on the first floor.
2023 October 4
IC 2118: The Witch Head Nebula Image Credit & Copyright: Abdullah Alharbi
Explanation: Does this nebula look like the head of a witch? The nebula is known popularly as the Witch Head Nebula because, it is said, the nebula’s shape resembles a Halloween-style caricature of a witch’s head. Exactly how, though, can be a topic of imaginative speculation. What is clear is that IC 2118 is about 50 light-years across and made of gas and dust that points to – because it has been partly eroded by – the nearby star Rigel. One of the brighter stars in the constellation Orion, Rigel lies below the bottom of the featured image. The blue color of the Witch Head Nebula and is caused not only by Rigel’s intense blue starlight but because the dust grains scatter blue light more efficiently than red. The same physical process causes Earth’s daytime sky to appear blue, although the scatterers in planet Earth’s atmosphere are molecules of nitrogen and oxygen.
∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap231004.html
We're Open Tonight!
The observatory will be open tonight, Sept. 27, 7:30 - 9:00 pm! We expect mostly clear skies, and to see Saturn, the Moon, the Ring Nebula, globular cluster M13, the Andromeda Galaxy, the Double Cluster, and the binary star systems Albireo and Mizar.
Here's a a nice picture of the Double Cluster in the constellation Perseus (we didn't take this picture, but it's similar to what you'd see through our telescopes - you won't see a lot of those dim background stars, though). [Image Credit and Copyright: Greg Polanski | Source: Astronomy Picture of the Day].
Please, forecast, be right about tomorrow night.
(For where we live, that's clear).
The Hidden Galaxy, IC 342 // Ondřej Pešák
We were extremely fortunate to have Jocelyn Bell Burnell as a virtual guest in a women in science class! She was a pleasure to listen to and continues to be an inspiration.
Navigating Deep Space by Starlight
On August 6, 1967, astrophysicist Jocelyn Bell Burnell noticed a blip in her radio telescope data. And then another. Eventually, Bell Burnell figured out that these blips, or pulses, were not from people or machines.
The blips were constant. There was something in space that was pulsing in a regular pattern, and Bell Burnell figured out that it was a pulsar: a rapidly spinning neutron star emitting beams of light. Neutron stars are superdense objects created when a massive star dies. Not only are they dense, but neutron stars can also spin really fast! Every star we observe spins, and due to a property called angular momentum, as a collapsing star gets smaller and denser, it spins faster. It’s like how ice skaters spin faster as they bring their arms closer to their bodies and make the space that they take up smaller.
The pulses of light coming from these whirling stars are like the beacons spinning at the tops of lighthouses that help sailors safely approach the shore. As the pulsar spins, beams of radio waves (and other types of light) are swept out into the universe with each turn. The light appears and disappears from our view each time the star rotates.
After decades of studying pulsars, astronomers wondered—could they serve as cosmic beacons to help future space explorers navigate the universe? To see if it could work, scientists needed to do some testing!
First, it was important to gather more data. NASA’s NICER, or Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer, is a telescope that was installed aboard the International Space Station in 2017. Its goal is to find out things about neutron stars like their sizes and densities, using an array of 56 special X-ray concentrators and sensitive detectors to capture and measure pulsars’ light.
But how can we use these X-ray pulses as navigational tools? Enter SEXTANT, or Station Explorer for X-ray Timing and Navigation Technology. If NICER was your phone, SEXTANT would be like an app on it.
During the first few years of NICER’s observations, SEXTANT created an on-board navigation system using NICER’s pulsar data. It worked by measuring the consistent timing between each pulsar’s pulses to map a set of cosmic beacons.
When calculating position or location, extremely accurate timekeeping is essential. We usually rely on atomic clocks, which use the predictable fluctuations of atoms to tick away the seconds. These atomic clocks can be located on the ground or in space, like the ones on GPS satellites. However, our GPS system only works on or close to Earth, and onboard atomic clocks can be expensive and heavy. Using pulsar observations instead could give us free and reliable “clocks” for navigation. During its experiment, SEXTANT was able to successfully determine the space station’s orbital position!
We can calculate distances using the time taken for a signal to travel between two objects to determine a spacecraft’s approximate location relative to those objects. However, we would need to observe more pulsars to pinpoint a more exact location of a spacecraft. As SEXTANT gathered signals from multiple pulsars, it could more accurately derive its position in space.
So, imagine you are an astronaut on a lengthy journey to the outer solar system. You could use the technology developed by SEXTANT to help plot your course. Since pulsars are reliable and consistent in their spins, you wouldn’t need Wi-Fi or cell service to figure out where you were in relation to your destination. The pulsar-based navigation data could even help you figure out your ETA!
None of these missions or experiments would be possible without Jocelyn Bell Burnell’s keen eye for an odd spot in her radio data decades ago, which set the stage for the idea to use spinning neutron stars as a celestial GPS. Her contribution to the field of astrophysics laid the groundwork for research benefitting the people of the future, who yearn to sail amongst the stars.
Keep up with the latest NICER news by following NASA Universe on X and Facebook and check out the mission’s website. For more on space navigation, follow @NASASCaN on X or visit NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation website.
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!
Comet Nishimura Credit: Peter Kennett
The Black Eye Galaxy. Image Credit: Shane Johnson | Jamie Kern | BSU Observatory.
Imaged in luminance and photometric R, V and B filters. Total exposure time ~25 minutes.
The Black Eye Galaxy (M64) is a relatively nearby spiral with an extraordinary amount of dark dust partially obscuring its nucleus. Red hues peeking out in these dust lanes are caused by reddening when the dust scatters the bluer light from stars embedded within it. The color difference between the center and spiral arms is due to an average age difference between the stars in these locations--blue stars have short lives, so as the star population ages the overall color appears more red.
Top Study Tips from NASA
Study smarter this school year! We asked scientists, engineers, astronauts, and experts from across NASA about their favorite study tips – and they delivered. Here are a few of our favorites:
Study with friends
Find friends that are like-minded and work together to understand the material better. Trading ideas with a friend on how to tackle a problem can help you both strengthen your understanding.
Create a study environment
Find a quiet space or put on headphones so you can focus. You might not be able to get to the International Space Station yet, but a library, a study room, or a spot outside can be a good place to study. If it’s noisy around you, try using headphones to block out distractions.
Take breaks
Don’t burn yourself out! Take a break, go for a walk, get some water, and come back to it.
Looking for more study tips? Check out this video for all ten tips to start your school year off on the right foot!
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!
Our first public event this Fall occurs Sept. 27, 7:30 - 9:00 pm, weather allowing! (Check the day of the event to see if we're on).
A lot will be happening in the eastern sky! The nearly-full Moon, Saturn, the Double Cluster, and the Andromeda Galaxy will be rising in the east. High in the southwestern sky we'll have the Ring Nebula and globular cluster M13. We'll also have the Big Dipper and the double star Mizar, the central star in its handle.
The bright Moon will wash out dimmer, fuzzier objects, but the Moon itself will be lovely!
2023 September 18
The Red Sprite and the Tree Credit & Copyright: Maxime Villaeys
Explanation: The sprite and tree could hardly be more different. To start, the red sprite is an unusual form of lightning, while the tree is a common plant. The sprite is far away – high in Earth’s atmosphere, while the tree is nearby – only about a football field away. The sprite is fast – electrons streaming up and down at near light’s speed, while the tree is slow – wood anchored to the ground. The sprite is bright – lighting up the sky, while the tree is dim – shining mostly by reflected light. The sprite was fleeting – lasting only a small fraction of a second, while the tree is durable – living now for many years. Both however, when captured together, appear oddly similar in this featured composite image captured early this month in France as a thunderstorm passed over mountains of the Atlantic Pyrenees.
∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap230918.html
Fall 2023 Public Events
Our next round of public events starts in September - here's the schedule (each event is weather-dependent, so always check back to see if the event is on!):
Public Nights on Wednesdays: - Sept. 27, 7:30 - 9:00 pm - Oct. 4, 11, and 18, 7:00 - 8:30 pm - Nov. 1, 7:00 - 8:30 pm - Nov. 8 and 15, 6:00 - 7:30 pm
Special Daytime Event: Oct. 14 Partial Solar Eclipse! 10:30 am - 2:45 pm
Halloween Events! - Oct. 25, 7:00 - 8:30 pm - Rain Date 1: Oct. 26, 7:00 - 8:30 pm (only occurs if Oct. 25 doesn't) - Rain Date 2: Oct. 30, 7:00 - 8:30 pm (only occurs if both Oct. 25 and 26 do not)
During our events, we set up telescopes and find objects in the sky for our visitors to see. We talk astronomy, too! Our events are free, open to the public, and appropriate for all ages.
Take-aways:
This is a baby star imaged in stunning detail
Stars are born violently - there's hot gas striking the other gas and dust around it, making these amazing patterns
This particular baby star will one day be like the Sun 💖
Pumpkin space latte, anyone? ☕
Hubble captured this festive array of stars, Terzan 12, found in the Milky Way about 15,000 light-years from Earth. The stars in this cluster are bound together by gravity in a sphere-like shape and are shrouded in gas and dust. As the starlight travels through that gas and dust to Earth, blue light scatters, leaving the redder wavelengths to come through.
Download the full-resolution image here.
Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!
Mosaic of the Eagle Nebula, June 6, 2015. Image Credit: Adam Gustafson | Jamie Kern | BSU Observatory.
Imaged in luminance and photometric R, V and B filters. Approximately 2 hours total exposure time.
The Eagle nebula is a stellar nursery where new stars are born.
The NGC 70 Group // Michael Legary
You can schedule one of our astronomy professors to speak at your venue! More info here: https://www.bridgew.edu/.../obser.../traveling-presentations
