Volume 15 • Issue 1 January 2016 ISSN 1712-4425 peterboroughastronomy.com twitter.com/PtbAstronomical The Reflector Newsletter of the Peterborough Astronomical Association How Will We Finally Image the Event Horizon of a Black Hole?
Ethan Seigel ne hundred years ago, Albert Einstein first put forth his theory of Gen- Oeral Relativity, which laid out the relationship between spacetime and the matter and energy pres- ent within it. While it successfully recovered Newtonian gravity and predicted the additional preces- sion of Mercury’s orbit, the only exact solution that Einstein him- self discovered was the trivial one: that for completely empty space. Less than two months after releas- ing his theory, however, the Ger- man scientist Karl Schwarzschild provided a true exact solution, that of a massive, infinitely dense object, a black hole. One of the curious things that popped out of Schwarzschild’s solution was the existence of an event horizon, or a region of space Image credit: NASA/CXC/Amherst College/D.Haggard et al., of the galactic center in X-rays. that was so severely curved that Sagittarius A* is the supermassive black hole at our Milky Way’s center, which normally nothing, not even light, could emits X-ray light of a particular brightness. However, 2013 saw a flare increase its luminosity escape from it. The size of this by a factor of many hundreds, as the black hole devoured matter. The event horizon has yet to be revealed. event horizon would be directly proportional to the mass of the have an event horizon the size of a orbit around the sun. At a distance black hole. A black hole the mass of planetary orbit. of 26,000 light years, it’s the larg- Earth would have an event horizon Our galaxy has since been dis- est event horizon in angular size less than a centimeter in radius; covered to house a black hole about visible from Earth, but at just 19 a black hole the mass of the sun four million solar masses in size, micro-arc-seconds, it would take would have an event horizon just with an event horizon about 23.6 a telescope the size of Earth to re- a few kilometers in radius; and million kilometers across, or about solve it — a practical impossibility. a supermassive black hole would 40 percent the size of Mercury’s See “Event Horizon” on page 16 2 • peterboroughastronomy.com President’s Message Letter From the New President ecember 31, 2015, marks the suc- thanks to our executive members and to cessful completion of another our past President, Rodger Forsyth, whose year for the Peterborough Astro- efforts were directly responsible for moving nomicalD Association (paa). Once again, our the paa forward to achieve our goals. organization has achieved our goals in a Also, I want to thank you for letting me variety of ways, e.g. guest speakers, public be a part of this wonderful organization. I observations sessions, public displays at the recognize and value the expertise of each library, issuing our monthly news letter, of you, and support the contribution that “the sky this month”, sharing our expertise this organization makes to our community. with members and with the public, help- I will work hard to fill the gap that Rodger ing Trent students with their light pollu- leaves on his departure as President of paa, tion project, etc. This is only a sample of but I am confident, that with your support, activities of the paa over the year. And not we can continue doing great things at paa to forget the job behind the scenes of our for the year(s) to come. President, Vice-President, Secretary, Trea- On January, at our Executive meeting, we surer, Reflector Editor, Member Director, will have the opportunity to review, modify Web Master, Librarian, and Publicity and and set our goals for 2016 and make a plan lpa Director, and Members at Large. to achieve them. I am committed to work This success was possible thanks to you, with you, to continue achieving our organi- our members, who have demonstrated zational goals. Let’s make of 2016, another their expertise, commitment, hard work successful year for paa and continue doing and enthusiasm to spread paa’s voice to the what we enjoy most: astronomy! community. Thank you to our paa mem- Jaime Morales bers, volunteers, sponsors, new members PAA President and friends that make this possible. Special Happy New Year t is with great joy that we welcome a So, onward into 2016 and all the celestial new Peterborough Astronomy Associa- events before us. I tion president. Congratulations, Jaime Phillip Chee Morales! Editor, The Reflector This month John Crossen has been busy. He has a couple of articles about New Horizons and the genius of the humans behind the space exploring robots that have encountered comets, asteroids and dwarf The Reflector planets. John also compares our Sun and some really big stars. The Reflector is a publication of the Peterborough Astronomi- cal Association (P.A.A.) Founded in 1970, the P.A.A. is your local Rick Stankiewicz reports on the consulta- group for astronomy in Peterborough and the Kawarthas. tions he and Mark Coady did with a pair of www.peterboroughastronomy.com • [email protected] Phone: 705.748.2038 Trent University student researchers look- Club Mailing Address Jaime Morales, President ing into light pollution abatement strate- Peterborough Astronomical Association gies for the university. 1587 Redwood Drive Peterborough, ON K9K 1N9 Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 3 The Reflector What’s Up in January’s sky? Plenty! John Crossen hristmas has wound down and the last New Years streamer has floated silently to the now-empty danceC floor. But overhead the party rocks on, all night every night. Meteor shower enthusiasts will enjoy viewing the Quadrantid display during the post-midnight hours of January 3 and 4. The shower emanates from the direction of the constellation Boötes and can produce up to 40 streakers per hour. Orion, the Mighty Hunter, has now taken centre stage in the southern sky. Behind him are his two faithful hunting dogs, Ca- nis Major and Canis Minor, also known as January 2016 M0rning Sky. Early risers (about 75 min- utes prior to Sunrise) will enjoy a gorgeous view of the the Big and Little Dogs respectively. Taurus planets as the sky goes from dark blue to salmon pink. the Bull precedes Orion and his pooches along with the Seven Sisters who are now Canis Major is also home to one of the high in the sky and nearly overhead. largest stars currently known. Its name is Before rushing into the list of characters VY Canis Majoris. VY This behemoth is so cavorting on the celestial dance floor, let’s large that if you replaced our Sun with this single out one for a closer look. The constel- red hyper-giant star, it would extend out lation in our spotlight is Canis Major and past Jupiter’s orbit. Despite having a diame- it’s home to the brightest star in the night ter that is 1,976,640,000 km, VY Canis Major sky. The star’s name is Sirius, which in is not visible to the unaided eye due to be- Greek means “scorcher.” Colloquially it is ing a mere 46,357,579,315,645,920 Kilometers also known as “the Dog Star” and it marks from Earth — whew! the spot in Canis Major where the dog’s Lunatics will have to wait until January collar should be. Sirius also signaled the ris- 16 to get a view of the First Quarter Moon. ing of Nile River in ancient Egypt and has New Moon (no Moon) is on January 9 and come to mark the hottest days — the dog Full Moon arrives on the 23rd of the month. days — of summer so it is also known as the This is the first Full Moon of the new year Dog Star. and is known as the Wolf Moon because Sirius is roughly double the mass of our hungry wolf packs would howl at it. The Sun and 25 times its luminosity. Sirius also Third Quarter phase awaits insomniacs in has a white dwarf companion star known as the wee hours of January 31st. Sirius B. At a distance of just 8.6 light-years, Viewing Uranus will require binoculars the Sirius star system is one of our closer or a telescope. Uranus is too dim and dis- neighbours. That’s if you can call 86 trillion tant for the naked eye. Uranus takes up resi- kilometres close. dence in Pisces the Fish during January. Sirius A and Sirius B orbit each other The morning sky continues its planetary over a period of 50 years. It’s a very tight parade with Jupiter, Mars, Saturn and Ve- elliptical orbit, so seeing Sirius B with the nus strung out like a glittering necklace of naked eye is virtually impossible. diamonds. 4 • peterboroughastronomy.com Behind Every Successful Robot is Human Genius
New Horizons Lift off Nine years and 9 billion kilometres from lift off New Horizons rendezvoused with Pluto and snapped its images right on time. John Crossen is human planning and coordination that ot since 1969 when mankind has made it happen. first stepped on to the Moon’s The New Horizon’s mission took 9 years rocky surface have astronomers to reach Pluto and then zipped by in 3 days experiencedN a year such as 2015. imaging the planet and its moons with 7 The adventure to Pluto brought with it a cameras. It whistled past Pluto at 58,500 bowser bowl filled with mind-boggling data km/h, gathering images with three opti- that will change the way we will think about cal cameras and four more data gathering the dwarf planet forever more. devices. It must have been a good year for dwarf New Dawn’s journey to dwarf planet planets, because another robotic encounter Ceres required the same kind of precision came in the form of orbiting Ceres with its timing and planning. It also returned a mysterious white spots. mountain of data and a big question about Coolest of all was the European Space the two bright spots on its surface. But the Agency’s journey to Comet 67P, known as European Space Agency’s (esa’s) Rosetta the Rosetta Mission. It gave us our first Mission to land on Comet 67P/Churyumov- close-up images of this visitor from our Gerasimenko takes top marks in my books. early solar system and has also flown along What astronomers found was beyond ex- side the comet imaging it as it rounded the pectation. The fact that the Rosetta Mission Sun. succeeded was a tribute to the human factor But impressive though the data returned in any robotic space mission. by each of the robotic missions has been, it See “New Horizons” on page 15 When it Comes to Moons, Jupiter Outshines Them All
Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 5 The Reflector Robot Explorers are Making the News Again
Mars Rovers. Evolution of the species — Mars rover style.
John Crossen surface. According to scientists evidence of he New Horizons Mission may craters being buried and mountains being only have had an hour or so to study formed is the direct result of geological ac- Pluto, but the images and data it is tivity beneath the planet’s mantle. The am- Tsending back have already changed many monia can lower the viscosity of water ice of our ideas of the outermost planet. by a factor of 100,000. This would allow for Instead of a barren, frozen and dead the geologically active and vigorous Pluto world we have learned that it is geologi- seen in the New Horizon images. cally alive and changing. Latest on the list While we’re still on Pluto, its collection of of mind blowers is the evidence of cryovol- moons is titillating astronomers. Unlike the canoes (ice volcanoes) that have spewed rest of the moons in our solar system they slurry composed of ammonia-water down are not locked into position facing their their sides. Unlike volcanoes on Earth that host planet. Instead Pluto’s moons are spin- are the result of tectonic plate movement, ning and wobbling erratically. Many sus- immense heat and pressure, cryrovolcanoes pect that the 5 moons currently in Pluto’s are probably created by tidal forces within retinue are the result of collisions that have the planet. left them spinning wildly, though still orbit- Two such mountains (Wright Mons and ing the dwarf planet. Piccard Mons) show evidence of spills simi- In all astronomers have about 40 new lar to volcanoes on Earth. This has also led discoveries to think about. Any one of them to speculation that there could be an ocean would be considered dramatic. But having of the solution beneath portions of Pluto’s See “Rovers” on page 15 6 • peterboroughastronomy.com Meet the Biggest Stars in the Milky Way Galaxy
Sun vs VY Canis Majoris. The Sun may be a million times larger than Earth, but VY Canis Majoris reduces it to quibbling squirt when placed side-by-side.
John Crossen was careful not to say “universe” sight. The Pistol Star lives in the Quintuplet in the headline because the universe Star Cluster nearly 25 thousand light-years is just too big to see all of it. There are distant. In size it would stretch out to the alsoI some biggies like Eta Carina and who orbit of the Earth if it were placed at the G64 but they are outside the Milky Way. So centre of our solar system. When it comes we’ll stick close to home; our Milky Way. to luminance, the Pistol Star out shines our Let’s start off with a small scale compari- Sun by about 1.6 million times. son — the Earth verses the Sun. One familiar Red Giant is the star Betel- Our solar furnace is one million times the geuse in the constellation Orion. It marks size of Earth. But if that makes you feel a the location of the Great Hunter’s right tad puny, consider this — our Sun is classi- shoulder. Put Betelgeuse at the centre of our fied as a Yellow Dwarf star. That’s right, on solar system and its girth would stretch out a cosmic scale the Sun is just a little gaffer. past the orbit of Jupiter. Thanks to its im- And indeed, it is dwarfed by a few other mense size Betelgeuse is nearly one thou- stars that are classified as Giants, Super Gi- sand times the Sun’s luminescence. ants and Hyper Giants. But Betelgeuse is just number ten on the Near the centre of our galaxy is a Cool list of largest stars in our galaxy. It’s time to Giant Star called the Pistol Star. It takes its start rubbing shoulders with the top three name from the shape of the gaseous nebula biggies, beginning with Mu Cephei. that surrounds it and hides it from our See “Big Stars” on page 13 Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 7 The Reflector Weird Facts of Life on the International Space Station John Crossen
et me start by shattering one common misconception. The astro- nauts are not in zero gravity. Instead theyL are floating around in micro gravity. The difference is this: If you drop an apple on Earth, it falls at 1g. If an astronaut on the space station drops an apple, it falls too. It just doesn’t look like it’s falling. That’s be- cause they’re all falling together: the apple, the astronaut and the station. But they’re not falling towards Earth, they’re falling around it. Because they’re all falling at the same rate, objects inside of the station ap- Chris Hadfield and HIs Guitar. Canadian astronaut pear to float in a state we call “zero grav- takes the honour of being the first cosmic crooner. He also brought space flight down to Earth via hundreds of ity” (0 g), or more accurately microgravity tweets to high schools from Low Earth Orbit (LEO). (1 × 10-6 g.) I won’t get into the details on going potty. Fresh fruit such as apples and bananas Those maneuvers have been shared over or carrots and candy bars might be the only and over again in dreadfully infinite detail. edibles that don’t require any special con- Rather I choose to reveal some of the less sumption regalia. But watch out for that obvious tweaks to daily life that living in mi- guy with the peach, it can squirt. And ditto cro gravity requires. goes for the lady with the grapefruit behind Something as simple as getting a haircut him. calls for a second pair of hands applying Given all of the aforementioned compli- vacuum suction. After all, you don’t want cations you might expect that taking a hot someone else’s newly shorn tresses drift- shower would be impossible — and it is. In ing across the cabin and getting into your its place you have a warm, moist hand cloth mouth (yetch), to say nothing of the mil- to scrub yourself down with each week dur- lions of dollars worth of equipment aboard. ing your months-long tour of duty. Oh, for a I wonder if the same reasoning applies long and lingering hot shower to wash away to the age-old habit of “pick-and-flick” and the stress of your 14-hour day. And boy, do I nostril grooming? I hope so otherwise this hope you packed your deodorant! astronaut will be wearing a face mask as Something else that you can file in your part of his daily attire. memory banks is the fact that the uniform Trimming your nails is another typical patch for Chris Hadfield’s expedition 34/35 daily habit that calls for some untypical was made in the shape of a guitar pick. It’s means. Again vacuum power come into a fitting tribute to the man who tweeted play, though this time it’s via a vent built space travel down to millions of Earthlings. into the cabin wall. Somehow pinky trim- The first woman in space was Valen- mings don’t qualify as appetizers so it tina Tereshkova. On February 16, 1962 her makes you glad your food comes in a sealed Vostok 6 rocket left Earth and she suc- packet and you have to suck it out. See “Astronauts” on page 13 8 • peterboroughastronomy.com Photo Gallery
Do You Want a Comet
Hi Everyone, Do you want a comet to celebrate the New Year? Well here is Comet Catalina C/2013 US10, in a close-up tracking on the comet’s nucleus for 60 minutes. You can see the several ion tails on the top, and the bottom right the dust tail. Photographed using a QHY8 Cooled Color CCD camera, on my home-made 16-inch diameter fork-mounted Newtonian scope, 12 × 5 minute subs, tracking the comet’s nucleus. The comet is shining at about 5th magnitude, an easy binocular object. Look for the green fuzzy ball between bright stars Arcturus ans Spica all this week and next. I observed it Sunday morning with binoculars at my observatories in Yellow Springs, Ohio.
I captured this image early Sunday morning 20 December 2015 from 10:22 utc to 11:22 utc. Cold at 27 °F and per- fectly clear all night, then at 5:00am when the comet was high enough to see in the south east, then cloudy cirrus came in, forcing me to shoot through terrible high thick cirrus clouds. Dogging clouds, by pausing auto guiding, until they passed, or waiting for open holes. It is not my best, but I managed to clean it up somewhat. Also took some wider field shots through the 5½-inch Newtonian and DSLR’s lenses too. Those will come later this week. Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 9 The Reflector
to Celebrate the New Year?
Dress warm, and get out with a pair of binoculars or telescope, look east to see the Comet Catalina, on the morn- ing of the New Year, 5:30am, 1 January 2016. Go out at look at the bright star Arcturus in Boötes. Looking due east the comet will be right next to Arcturus (a bright golden/orange colored star). Within a half of a degree of Arcturus will be the Comet Catalina, a green fuzzy ball. You may even see both dust ans ion tails. It will look great in a telescope or binoculars.
Happy New Year to you all! John Chumak www.galacticimages.com 10 • peterboroughastronomy.com Mars Could Grow a Ring and More News From Space
Ring Around Mars. Like Saturn, Mars could sport a beautiful ring in a just 20 million years.
John Crossen far we have seen human faces, skulls, apes, ur solar system could end up Babylonian-style structures and a replica with two ringed planets. In addi- of Stonehenge when viewed from straight tion to Saturn, scientists think that overhead. What’s all this about? OMars may also sprout a ring. The reason is There’s a word for it called Pareidolia. It the orbital decay of Mars’ tiny moon Pho- stems from the human need to see things bos. we can relate to. Pareidolia is the name for Phobos’s composition is already known seeing a face in a cloud floating past or any to be porous. So as it draws closer and other object seen in a cloud structure or a closer to Mars, Phobos could be torn apart shadow. In short it’s a perfectly normal and by Mars’s gravity. The end result could not scary hallucination brought on by your become a ring around Mars. This scenario imagination. Aside from the book The Mouse is supported by data learned from nasa’s on the Moon, which I found hilarious, there Cassini Mission as it orbits our other ringed are no critters scampering across other planet, Saturn. planets. On the other hand, if Phobos holds A few people still harbour the idea that together it will eventually slam into Mars’s the giant meteor impact 65 thousand years surface creating a gigantic crater. If there’s ago spelled the instant end of the dinosaurs. still a Mars colony, it could mean a heads up Not so, the extinction of the dinosaurs took for an incoming. Or, seeing as how this isn’t place over the years after the impact. Here’s expected to happen for about 20 million what scientists think happened. years, humankind may have moved farther Only a few dinosaurs were killed at out into deep space and have left Mars ground zero of the impact, which took place behind. off the coast of Mexico near the Yucatan While we’re on Mars, let’s talk about mice Peninsula. At the time dinosaurs inhab- and men. The latest in our discoveries is ited every continent of the Earth. Massive a structure that resembles a mouse. Thus See “Extinction” on page 13 Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 11 The Reflector A Constellation’s Name Depends on Where You’re From John Crossen ere in North America we tend to be a bit insular when it comes to constellation names and what they Hrepresent. To many of us the Big Dipper is known as the same thing, the world around and that’s that. Well, not quite. Many ancient cultures could see the whole constellation which is correctly called the Great Bear. But it’s only the seven The Great Bear. Once all the stars are revealed it’s easy to see the Great Bear. Our idea of the Big Dipper is just brightest stars in the Great Bear that we the seven stars that bring up her behind. see as the Big Dipper. A good dark sky site with a clear view of the horizon and a bit of Hop over to Europe and the name chang- imagination will be required to see all the es again, along with what object the group- stars in the Great Bear during autumn. The ing of stars represent. In Rome you will First Nations People had those dark skies welcomed to the Horse and Cart. and built a legend up about the Great Bear. What you and I are familiar with as our According to the Iroquois, there are three Dipper’s cup now becomes a cart. Stretch- hunters following the bear. The first was ing forward from it is no longer our Dip- the bow hunter. The second, a double star per’s handle, but the tongue of a wagon. known as Alcor and Mizar represented the Simply hitch the horses up to the wagon’s hunter with the cooking bowl on his back tongue and away you go. But oops, where and bringing up the rear was the man with are the wagon’s wheels? I’ve never heard the firewood. These three stars are in the an explanation, so I guess the unfortunate handle of what we call the Big Dipper. owner of the cart parked overnight in Peter- The hunters follow the bear up the sky in borough and the wheels went missing cour- winter, across the top of the sky in spring- tesy of Five-Finger Wholesale Unlimited. time and down the sky during summer. But The grouping of stars is known as Sapta- in autumn when the bear is closest to the rishi or the Seven Sages in Hindu. In China, horizon the hunter fires an arrow into the Japan and South Korea they become The bear and the bear begins to bleed. That, ac- Seven Stars of the North. Coming closer to cording to legend is why the leaves turn red home, the Lakota people refer to them as in the fall. But let’s get back to that group- Wičhákhiyuhapi, or the Bear. ing of seven stars we call the Big Dipper. So what you see all depends on where In England the Big Dipper is known as you’re from and what era of history you’re the Plough. It doesn’t take a lot of imagi- in. From religion to mythology, the history nation to see what North Americans call of human kind is rife with tales of this celes- the handle of the Dipper as the handle to a tial “Group of Seven.” Bundle up, go out and horse-drawn plough with what we call the look up towards the north. Wičhákhiyuhapi dipper’s cup as the ploughshare that cuts will be waiting for you. through the field. 12 • peterboroughastronomy.com The Greening of Trent, One Light at a Time
ne of the more exciting things there will be future initiatives that will add to happen this past year in regards to this study or at least monitor its recom- to light pollution and its abate- mendations and build on this success. At Oment, was when on November 11th, I got press time, I have been informed that Trent an e-mail addressed to me, as the paa’s will be initiating a plan to retrofit lights on Light Pollution Abatement (lpa) Director. It campus, but this will be taking place over was from a fourth year student (Genevieve the next few years. Thompson) who was planning to do a term In this case, it is a good thing that there paper on a particular aspect of how to appears to be “light at the end of the tun- “green” some of Trent University’s infra- nel.” Trent appears to have an appetite on structure. This student and her research campus to start addressing the issue of partner (Adam Fyfe) wanted to tackle the poorly directed lighting and from an energy issue of light pollution on campus and look standpoint, converting to led illumination. into abatement issues and associated en- Hopefully, over-lighting will be address at ergy concerns. the same time, as led light sources can be This was an ambitious project, but one overpowering due to their efficiency and that was long overdue and a great opportu- intensity. Trent’s future looks bright, but nity for the paa to input to the work of these hopefully not too bright. keen young researchers. The paa welcomed A copy of this referenced term paper has the invite to participate in such a noble been added to the paa library and is avail- cause and besides sharing knowledge, able electronically upon request. experience, opinions and ideas; we also lent Keep looking up, the students our Sky Quality Meter (sqm) to Rick Stankiewicz (lpa Director) take readings that allowed them to quantify their efforts. I had several meetings with them and even the club’s past lpa Director, Mark Coady, was able to be involved and share his wisdom. Their paper, Light Pollution Abatement: The Feasibility of Light Retrofitting for Trent Uni- versity, was submitted by mid-December. Upon reviewing the finished paper it was gratifying to see how good a job had been done with such a complex topic. From the initial discussion as to what light pollution is and its effect on the environment and human health, it was clear these students had done some research. Besides capturing some sqm readings for future reference, there are even photographs that will docu- ment the state of many over-lit areas on campus. This study is an excellent bench- mark for the university. With any luck, Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 13 The Reflector continued from page 10 continued from previous page 6 Extinction Big Stars though it was, the impact was only a local This star is located in the constellation event. What wasn’t so local was its after- Cepheus and has a radius 1,650 times that math. of our Sun. This would have Mu Cephei The impact was gargantuan sending mol- stretching out well past the orbit of Jupiter ten rock and earth up into space. Over the were it to replace dear old Sol. Speaking of course of the following months that cloud which, Mu Cephei is also one of the bright- of matter so dimmed the sunlight that the est stars in our galaxy at 38,000 times the growth of vegetation on Earth and her seas luminosity of the Sun. virtually subsided. Without vegetation the The second largest star also resides in the leaf-eating dinosaurs weakened and be- constellation Cepheus. It is called VV Ce- came easy prey for the meat eaters such as phei A. Despite its highly forgettable name, T-Rex. But that food source quickly expired, this whopper lays down some remarkable too. It may have taken months, perhaps specs. For starters it is nearly 1,900 times years, but eventually all the gigantic forms the radius of our Sun or 950 times its di- of life starved to death leaving smaller crea- ameter. That’s farther across than Jupiter’s tures including the newly arrived species orbit and headed towards Saturn! known as mammals to populate our planet. I’ve saved the biggest for last. Its name is VY Canis Majoris. It’s a Red Hyper Giant continued from page 7 that lives close to home, just 4,900 light- Astronauts years from Earth. VY Canis Majoris takes its cessfully completed 48 orbits of the home name from the constellation Canis Major or planet. Due to regulations Valentina was “Big Dog.” In keeping with our “Big” theme, made an honourary member of the Soviet it is maxed out at 2,100 solar radii. In down- Air force before she could become a Cos- to-Earth terms, that’s about 1,050 times the monaut. 1n 2013 she volunteered to join the diameter of our Sun. Given its size VY Canis one-way Mars mission to establish a colony Majoris would stretch from our Sun’s loca- on Mars. She was the first and only female tion to the orbit of Saturn. in the male-dominated Russian space pro- There you have the current list of the gramme. biggest of the big. But stars can expand and Let’s jump ahead to July 20, 1969. That’s contract over the decades, so future find- when Apollo 11 set down on the Moon. The ings may differ. But it does bring home the u.s. had won the space race by landing the fact that our Sun is just one small potato in first humans on the Moon. The late Neil a very large field. Armstrong was the first to set foot on dear old Luna and Buzz Aldrin was right behind. Astronaut Michael Collins remained aboard the orbiting command module and would eventually rendezvous with the moon-walk- ers for the return to Earth. The first joint U.S.-Soviet space mission came about in 1975. It was an open showing of the new detente between the U.S. and So- viet Union. Dubbed the Apollo-Mir mission it was the culmination of a team design for the docking mechanisms that would allow the last Apollo spacecraft to dock with the Mir Space Station. 14 • peterboroughastronomy.com
The Sky this Month
Mercury is well placed in the evening sky from the 1st to the 9th and reaches inferior conjunction on the 14th. Moves to the morning sky from the 20th to the 31st. Venus is bright in the morning sky and in close conjuction with Saturn on the 9th. Mars rises around 2 AM in Virgo and moves into Libra on the 17th. Jupiter rises in the late evening in eastern Leo. Begins retrograde motion on the 8th. Saturn is in the dawn sky in Ophiu- chus and will remain there the whole year. Quadrantid Meteor Shower peaks at 3 AM on the 4th.
Moon Phases Last Quarter 12:30 AM January 2 New Moon 8:31 PM January 9 First Quarter 6:26 PM January 16 Full Moon 8:46 PM January 23 Vol 15 • Issue no. 1 • January 2016 • 15 The Reflector continued from page 4 continued from page 5 New Horizons Rovers For starters the Rosetta team succeeded so many is simply incredible; and all of the making a rendezvous with the comet — a data isn’t in yet! relatively small object, about 4 kilometres Skipping blithely to Mars’ moon Phobos, in diameter, moving at a speed as great as scientists examining photos of the minute 135,000 kilometres per hour at a distance world have discovered that it is gradually of 6.4 billion kilometres. That was miracle falling inward towards Mars. Currently only number one. The second topped even that. 6,000 kilometres above the Red Planet, it is From that distance they actually maneu- falling inward at the rate of 2 metres every vered the Philae Lander aboard Rosetta to a 100 years. As it does so; Mars’ gravity is successful touch-down on a rotating target. gradually pulling it apart. Even though the bouncy landing didn’t First evidence of this is the streaks or go precisely as planned, Philae managed “stretch marks” on Phobos’ surface. As to identify 16 organic compounds, four of Phobos falls closer towards Mars the stretch which were never associated with comets. marks will become fractures. Eventually Plus its second touchdown was on a much Phobos will be pulled apart. As a result, harder type of surface. So we received data future scientists may see a litany of new from two different spots on the comet. craters on Mars. But don’t hold your breath; Since then Rosetta has tagged along with it’ll take from 30 to 50 million years. the comet as it rounded the Sun. This has Until we meet again keep outdoor lights allowed astronomers to study what happens aimed down and dimmed down. You’ll save on the comet’s surface as it warms up. money and our Kawartha night sky. All of the aforementioned robotic mis- sions would not have been successful without human ingenuity, split-second execution and a mind-boggling amount of planning. Behind every successful robot is a team of human geniuses. 16 • peterboroughastronomy.com continued from page 1 Event Horizon But all hope isn’t lost! If instead of a sin- gle telescope, we built an array of telescopes Articles located all over Earth, we could simultane- Submissions for The Reflector must be received by the date listed below. E-mail submissions ously image the galactic center, and use are preferred (Microsoft Word, OpenDoc, ASCII the technique of vlbi (very long-baseline and most common graphic formats are accept- interferometry) to resolve the black hole’s able). If your article contains photso or graphics, event horizon. The array would only have please provide a separate file for each. Typed or the light-gathering power of the individual hand-written submissions are acceptable pro- vided they are legible (and not too long.) Copy- telescopes, meaning the black hole (in the righted materials will not be published without radio) will appear very faint, but they can written permission from the copyright holder. obtain the resolution of a telescope that’s Submissions may be edited for grammar, brev- the distance between the farthest telescopes ity, or clarity. Submissions will be published at in the array! The planned Event Horizon the editor’s sole discretion. Depending on the volume of submissions, some articles may be Telescope, spanning four different conti- published at a later date. Please submit any ar- nents (including Antarctica), should be able ticles, thoughts, or ideas to: to resolve under 10 micro-arc-seconds, im- [email protected] aging a black hole directly for the first time Next submission deadline: and answering the question of whether or January 27 2016 not they truly contain an event horizon. What began as a mere mathematical solu- tion is now just a few years away from be- ing observed and known for certain! Note: This month’s article describes a project that is not related to nasa and does not suggest any relationship or endorsement. Its coverage is for general interest and educational purposes.
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Meetings The Peterborough Astronomical Association meets every first Friday of each month, except July and August, at the Peter- borough Zoo Guest Services and Rotary Educa- tion Centre (inside the main entrance at the north end of the Zoo) at 7 p.m. P.A.A. general annoucements will begin each meeting with the guest speaker starting at 7:30 p.m.