Solar Activity

Using helioviewer.org our Y10 students imaged the Sun in multi-frequencies last week. We're looking out for solar activity, hopefully a CME heading our way, ready for our trip to seek out the Northern Lights in two weeks.

Yasmin shared this video:

We are hoping for good solar activity and the magnetic field Bz aligning south. More at http://rossellet.com/aurora_tracker.htm

Water on Ceres

Scientists using the Herschel space observatory have made the first definitive detection of water vapor on the largest and roundest object in the asteroid belt, dwarf planet Ceres.

"This is the first time water vapor has been unequivocally detected on Ceres or any other object in the asteroid belt and provides proof that Ceres has an icy surface and an atmosphere," said Michael Küppers of ESA in Spain, lead author of a paper in the journal Nature.

More at http://www.nasa.gov/press/2014/january/herschel-telescope-detects-water-on-dwarf-planet/

Winter solstice

Happy solstice at 15:11 UTC.

Miss H.

Size

Potentially Hazardous Objects

NASA Maps Dangerous Asteroids That May Threaten Earth

If you've seen films like "Armageddon," you know the potential threat asteroids can be for Earth. To meet that threat, NASA has built a map like no other: a plot of every dangerous asteroid that could potentially endanger our planet … at least the ones we know about.

NASA released the new map of "potentially hazardous asteroids" in a post to its online Planetary Photojournal overseen by the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The map shows the orbital paths of more than 1,400 asteroids known creep too close to Earth for comfort. None of the asteroids mapped pose an impact threat to Earth within the next 100 years, agency officials said.

"These are the asteroids considered hazardous because they are fairly large (at least 460 feet or 140 meters in size), and because they follow orbits that pass close to the Earth's orbit (within 4.7 million miles or 7.5 million kilometers)," NASA officials explained in the image description.

 

http://www.space.com/22369-nasa-asteroid-threat-map.html?cmpid=514630_20131201_15043144

We are all made of stars

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world." - RIP Nelson Mandela

Jupiter in the sights of Year 10 Astronomers

A keen Y10 student has produced her first stacked image of Jupiter. The equatorial belts are clearly visible. Well done.

Thanks HS.