Re: The Astronomy Thread : Tue Dec 22, 2015 4:43 pm  

Not a new video, but a well-put together animation by the American museum of Natural History that gives a short but fantastic insight into the immenseness of the known universe, it is based on the world's most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas. As for aliens knowing of our presence, if we assume that the speed of light is a speed limit then the bubble shown at 2:38 is the furthest that the very earliest radio transmissions from Earth have got into space. You will see, nowhere at all, really. Not even to 99.99% of our own galaxy. In this still, I have highlighted this bubble with an arrow. that's it, that's as far as any of our signals have ever got. Watching it is quite a humbling experience if you think about it, but amazing too. https://youtu.be/17jymDn0W6U

Not a new video, but a well-put together animation by the American museum of Natural History that gives a short but fantastic insight into the immenseness of the known universe, it is based on the world's most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas. As for aliens knowing of our presence, if we assume that the speed of light is a speed limit then the bubble shown at 2:38 is the furthest that the very earliest radio transmissions from Earth have got into space. You will see, nowhere at all, really. Not even to 99.99% of our own galaxy. In this still, I have highlighted this bubble with an arrow. that's it, that's as far as any of our signals have ever got. Watching it is quite a humbling experience if you think about it, but amazing too. https://youtu.be/17jymDn0W6U

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Tue Dec 22, 2015 8:54 pm  

TheButcher wrote: Clicky Try this link for the Android version. Thanks squire, I'll give it a pop. And FA, as ever, that's mind blowing!

TheButcher wrote: Clicky Try this link for the Android version. Thanks squire, I'll give it a pop. And FA, as ever, that's mind blowing!

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Wed Dec 30, 2015 3:29 pm  

Mugwump wrote:

Probably the best option. Barring any catastrophes I'll sort it out this evening and PM you.

If not it'll be done in the next day or two.

Ta muchly.

Sorted. I'm short on time ATM so have a word with the other mods regarding technical details.

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Wed Dec 30, 2015 5:25 pm  

Food for thought - NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter captured this beautiful view of Earth from the spacecraft's vantage point in orbit around the moon. Doesn't look that troubled a place from 250,000 miles, does it?

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Wed Dec 30, 2015 5:46 pm  

I've been following the progress of a bunch of amateur enthusiasts who have taken some of the millions of images from the Cassini mission and animated them in full 4k resolution. The images are stunning, and the film they are making is called 'In Saturn's Rings'. Here's a quick vid of the things we can expect from the full imax release. If you can, stick it on 4k and fullscreen to be blown away by the scenes... Youtube vid

I've been following the progress of a bunch of amateur enthusiasts who have taken some of the millions of images from the Cassini mission and animated them in full 4k resolution. The images are stunning, and the film they are making is called 'In Saturn's Rings'. Here's a quick vid of the things we can expect from the full imax release. If you can, stick it on 4k and fullscreen to be blown away by the scenes... Youtube vid

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Thu Dec 31, 2015 3:47 pm  

That is a good find Butcher! The sheer volume of astonishing images from the Pluto mission is overwhelming, but I especially love this mosaic of images - Zigzagging across Pluto: This high-resolution swath of Pluto (right) sweeps over the cratered plains at the west of the New Horizons’ encounter hemisphere and across numerous prominent faults, skimming the eastern margin of the dark, forbidding region informally known as Cthulhu Regio, and finally passing over the mysterious, possibly cryovolcanic edifice Wright Mons, before reaching the terminator or day-night line. Among the many notable details shown are the overlapping and infilling relationships between units of the relatively smooth, bright volatile ices from Sputnik Planum (at the edge of the mosaic) and the dark edge or “shore” of Cthulhu. The pictures in this mosaic were taken by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) in “ride-along” mode with the LEISA spectrometer, which accounts for the "zigzag" or step pattern. Taken shortly before New Horizons’ July 14 closest approach to Pluto, details as small as 500 yards (500 meters) can be seen. NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute http://astronomy.com/news/2015/12/new-f ... -its-moons

That is a good find Butcher! The sheer volume of astonishing images from the Pluto mission is overwhelming, but I especially love this mosaic of images - Zigzagging across Pluto: This high-resolution swath of Pluto (right) sweeps over the cratered plains at the west of the New Horizons’ encounter hemisphere and across numerous prominent faults, skimming the eastern margin of the dark, forbidding region informally known as Cthulhu Regio, and finally passing over the mysterious, possibly cryovolcanic edifice Wright Mons, before reaching the terminator or day-night line. Among the many notable details shown are the overlapping and infilling relationships between units of the relatively smooth, bright volatile ices from Sputnik Planum (at the edge of the mosaic) and the dark edge or “shore” of Cthulhu. The pictures in this mosaic were taken by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) in “ride-along” mode with the LEISA spectrometer, which accounts for the "zigzag" or step pattern. Taken shortly before New Horizons’ July 14 closest approach to Pluto, details as small as 500 yards (500 meters) can be seen. NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute http://astronomy.com/news/2015/12/new-f ... -its-moons

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Thu Dec 31, 2015 5:13 pm  

The pluto images are simply spectacular. The sheer quality and detail is amazing.

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Fri Jan 15, 2016 11:10 am  

Continued study of a supernova first detected last June leads astronomers to believe it is the most powerful supernova ever detected, at its peak shining with 570 BILLION times the brightness of our Sun. The BBC article is full of incredible info, such as the object may be powered by a "magnetar", approx. the size of London, spinning at the rate of 1000x per second It's another good result for the All Sky Automated Survey for SuperNovae (ASAS-SN), but just mind-boggling stuff.

Continued study of a supernova first detected last June leads astronomers to believe it is the most powerful supernova ever detected, at its peak shining with 570 BILLION times the brightness of our Sun. The BBC article is full of incredible info, such as the object may be powered by a "magnetar", approx. the size of London, spinning at the rate of 1000x per second It's another good result for the All Sky Automated Survey for SuperNovae (ASAS-SN), but just mind-boggling stuff.

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Fri Jan 15, 2016 11:35 am  

Live feed of Tim Peake's spacewalk today, (Friday 15) the 1st by a UK astronaut http://astronomynow.com/2016/01/15/watc ... walk-live/

Live feed of Tim Peake's spacewalk today, (Friday 15) the 1st by a UK astronaut http://astronomynow.com/2016/01/15/watc ... walk-live/

Re: The Astronomy Thread : Sun Jan 17, 2016 6:32 pm  

Anyone interested, here's the live launch of SpaceX latest rocket. It goes in 15 mins! http://www.spacex.com/webcast/

Anyone interested, here's the live launch of SpaceX latest rocket. It goes in 15 mins! http://www.spacex.com/webcast/