|
ALASKANS SAMPLE LUNAR
LIFESTYLE: By coating the countryside with
gritty, abrasive, electrostatically-charged volcanic ash, Mt. Redoubt
is giving Alaskans an unexpected taste of what it's like to live
on the Moon. Get the full
story from Science@NASA.
BLANK SUN:
The face of the sun is so blank, renowned sun-photographer Greg
Piepol no longer bothers to show it in his photos. Even with the
surface blanked out, however, there is still something to see:
"Thank goodness for prominences!" says Piepol
who took the picture on April 3rd from his backyard observatory
in Rockville, Maryland. "They are one form of solar activity
that seems to continue even during a Deep
Solar Minimum."
It's true, clouds of hydrogen dance along the solar
limb throughout the 11-year solar cycle. Yesterday, Piepol counted
three, and
today there are four.
The "prominence number" is much larger than the sunspot
number, giving solar astronomers reason to keep looking at the sun.
"To photograph the prominences, I used a brand
new type of H-alpha scope, the LS100THa from Lunt
Solar Systems," adds Piepol. "These images are the
very first light through the scope."
more images: from
Eric Roel of Orion Observatory, Rancho La Compañía, México;
from
Steve Rismiller of Milford, Ohio; from
Guenter Kleinschuster of Feldbach, Styria, Austria
ISS MOON TRANSIT:
The International Space Station has grown so big and bright, you
can see it even when it is directly in front of the Moon. Oscar
Martin Mesonero of Salamanca, Spain, took this picture on April
1st:
"I recorded the transit using my 8-inch
Celestron telescope and a Canon
EOS 50D," says Mesonero. "The ISS was much brighter
than the lunar background."
His snapshot caught the space station passing over the Sea of Nectar
(Mare Nectaris). Just to the north of the transit path is the Sea
of Tranquility where Apollo 11 astronauts landed 40 years ago. The
ISS seems so close to lunar soil that the crew could hop out for
a visit of their own. In fact, the Moon is about 384,000 km away
from the Earth-orbiting spacecraft. Astronauts won't be truly close
to Nectar until
2020.
The ISS will join the Moon in the evening sky again this weekend.
Check the Simple Satellite Tracker for viewing
times.
more images: from
Thorsten Boeckel of Fuerstenfeldbruck, Germany; from
P. Nikolakakos of Nafplio, Greece; from
Joe Westerberg of Palm Springs, California; from
Oscar Martin Mesonero of Salamanca, Spain
March
2009 Aurora Gallery
[previous Marches: 2008,
2007, 2006,
2005, 2004,
2003, 2002]
Explore
the Sunspot Cycle
|
