Asmaa.s.Aziz
Astronomy International Year
Asmaa.s.Aziz.
If you looked at the sky Friday between 8 and 9 p.m., you would have seen a breathtaking scene — the marriage of the crescent moon and Venus, the Greek love goddess.
The Pierce College Astronomy club had its first meeting of the semester Friday at 7:30 p.m. in Business 3200.
Speaker Carolyn R. Mallory of the Pierce College Astronomy Society started the meeting by talking about the “Orbiting Carbon Observatory.” Different topics will be discussed in future meetings.
She also mentioned that 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy (IYA2009), which coincides with the world celebration of the 400th anniversary of the first recorded astronomical observation with a telescope by Galileo Galilei.
The Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) was a NASA satellite that was intended to provide global, space-based observations of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). It was lost in a launch failure Feb. 24, 2009, when its payload of the Taurus rocket carrying it failed to separate during ascent .
The added mass of the fairing prevented the satellite from reaching orbit .It subsequently re-entered the atmosphere and crashed in to the Ocean near Antarctica .Wikipedia Encyclopedia
The evening was very interesting especially for a romantics to spend an evening watching slides about a dark sky full of shinny stars and comets like shinny diamond.
Mallory talked about the goals and the partner ships of how the world are going to celebrate this event,she also talked about Galileo telescope and how he accidentally aimed his telescope towered the sky when he was watching the ships on the shore .
In addition to Mallory, was Amy Mainzer a research scientist Jet Propulsion Lab , showed slides about why the earth is so special and about where the plant come from and the giant plants,the terrestrial plants the ice world the dwarf planets and how the formed from out of the collapse of a molecular cloud.
Do you know that all objects radiate energy according the Planck Formula which depends on the object’s temperature ,according to Mainzer .She also said that the earth when was a mere 500myr old, something very bad happened to it, it got hit by something large about the size of Mars .
The Pierce College Astronomy club was established five years ago and has about 50 members .It is open to everybody, said Carolyn .
As part of the celebration of the International Year of Astronomy there will be an event at Griffith Park Planetarium March 14 which will it be free for students to look at the sky and have a good time hiking and just relaxing and have a big potluck dinner ,it always a lot of fun ,according to Carolyn.
About 25 persons attended the meeting whom in the end asked questions and the Carolyn and Mainzer answer them , it was really very interesting evening I myself enjoyed it .
sources :
Wikipedia the free Encyclopedia / the internet
Carolyn R.Mallory /Pierce College Astronomy Society /phone : 8188897460, mallorcr@ pierce college.edu
The headlines
Year 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy /The Earth 500myr was hit by something very large as Mars