Tailed Holmes?

Look at this picture from SpaceWeather.com. It’s a composite image of Comet Holmes taken by Sebastian Voltmer of Germany and it shows faint blue tail.

[Well, click the link to open the picture ;)]

Ephemeris 

3D orbit+ 

No Sunspots

In November 16 last year, a big sunspot was seen on the surface of the sun through the fog in early morning and I made a quick look into it through the telescope. Although you should not be doing this without proper filtering, I prompted at doing it as the fog had made the sun almost invisible. It was a really beautiful thing when I saw it. I had posted a drawing of it in another blog. Nearly one year later the sun seems to be so calm, no any sunspot is seen.

November 16 last year:

Here’s the link to the post http://theastraljournal.blogspot.com/2006/11/new-sunspots.html

Cosmology@Home — our team

Kirk has just started a team for (all the) SEDS (members around the world) at the Cosmology@Home website. Just go to http://www.cosmologyathome.org and download the BOINC software. When prompted enter http://www.cosmologyathome.org. Don’t forget to join the SEDS team on the website (of course after signing up first).

Here’s the SEDS Cosmology@Home page: http://wiki.seds.org/index.php/CosmologyAtHome

Cosmology@Home is a computer application that runs in background when the computer is not in use. The goal is to search for cosmological models that describe our universe and agree with available astronomical and particle physics data.

The application working on its own, calculates the observable predictions of millions of theoretical models with different parameters. These predictions are then compared with actual data:

1) the fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background (observed from space by the WMAP and soon the Planck spacecraft, as well as from ground based and balloon based experiments),

2) the large scale distribution of galaxies and clusters of galaxies,

3) measurements of the current expansion speed of the Universe by the Hubble space telescope,

4) the acceleration of the Universe as measured by observations of supernova explosions,

5) observations of primordial element abundances in distant gas clumps, and

6) gravitational lensing data, when it becomes available.

[http://www.cosmologyathome.org/wandelt_letter.php]

Tiny Aakash Gangas

Oops! I got it wrong and had to re-edit this post. Well, I’ve decided to write here even though I may not be able to create the pdf ezine anymore (at least for some period of time).

I just read that there exists more dark matter dominated tiny galaxies surrounding our own Milky Way than previously thought. Since these ‘invisible’ galaxies are difficult to find, the theory that these should exist around big ones was more a mystery until this new find. The find came from astronomers Dr. Marla Geha and Dr. Josh Simon at W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii by studying previously discovered dwarf galaxies. They closely observed 814 stars in eight such dwarf galaxies first discovered with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.

Read about this at http://www.keckobservatory.org/article.php?id=147

My say: “The cold dark matter theory is heading North! “

Hindu Calendar Reform

This news article from The Kathmandu Post reports recent effort by some astrologers to reform the prevalent Bikram Era calendar to fix the dates of festivals that have altered in the past two thousand years due to precession of equinoxes. The news article is not, however, totally right. Don’t believe a word said in the first paragraph.

Calendars behind by 23 days

BY PRABHAKAR GHIMIRE

KATHMANDU, June 22 – Are your getting married? Are you observing your father’s or mother’s death anniversary? Be careful, the astrologers’ advice on auspicious dates for conducting such rituals are all wrong, if a report presented by the Festival Reforms National Taskforce (FRNT) to the government Friday means anything.According to the report, the earth’s rotation around its axis at an inclination of 23.5 degrees has resulted in a gain of one day every 72 years. There has been no adjustment for this in calendars since the past 1,656 years. This means that the calendars are behind by 23 days.

Conducting rituals on auspicious dates and at auspicious hours is a widespread tradition in Nepal. Since the calendar our astrologers use to suggest such days and hours is flawed, we have been celebrating even our important festivals on the wrong days, claimed astrologers in the report presented to Minister of Culture,Tourism and Civil Aviation Prithvi Subba Gurung.

FRNT, a 19-member committee, was formed by the ministry on December 12 last year following a controversy over the accuracy of calendars in use. The taskforce, headed by Jal Krishna Shrestha, joint secretary at the ministry, comprises astrologers and religious figures, among others.

SEDSIC-2007 and Site Updates

VIT University Chapter of ‘Students for Exploration and Development of Space’ (SEDS) is planning to hold an SEDS International Conference (SEDSIC’ 07) on 22nd and 23rd of September 2007 at the University premises in Vellore, Tamil Nadu, India.

Events during SEDSIC-2007:
Moon Rover Design Competition, Astro-Expo Exhibition, Cosmo Guide (carrer talk), Rocket Design Competition, Ham Radio, Star Party

Kosmandu.com updates
Kosmandu.com has been updated with a new forum, a good news section, sky alerts section and many more, updated almost everyday and new features being added every day…
Login to read this month’s article or to post on to our forum.
www.kosmandu.com

Other new sites under kosmandu.com:
New astronomy blog
http://blogs.kosmandu.com/astronomy

Social Service blog
http://blogs.kosmandu.com/helpme/

The Astral Journal fourth edition soon available at www.kosmandu.com

Blue Moon

Blue Moon doesn’t actually mean a blue colored moon. The second full moon in Solar calendar is called Blue Moon, like it happened May 31st this year. The saying ‘Once in a blue moon’ comes from this very phenomenon.

Read this sky and telescope article

and this

Welcome to Kosmandu’s Astronomy Blog

Well, I am writing the first post on this blog.

Jestha sky: excerpts from article

Well, I have sent my second article to the magazine Science and Future. Here’s an excerpt

…Saturn, Venus and Mercury are getting closer……..These three planets will stay close for the rest of the month. On 22nd Jestha, Mercury (0.9) is a bit higher and is still lining up with the other two (…there’s a map in the article)… Jupiter is also climbing higher everyday, and is very bright (mag -2.6) for the month….On 23rd, it will be at opposition…
14 JESTHA: Waxing Gibbous Moon close to Spica (0.98, Virgo)
17 JESTHA: Moon near Antares (0.96, Scorpius)
18 JESTHA: Full Moon (rises at 7:28pm)
Morning (before twilight): Antares-Moon within 3 degrees
Evening: Jupiter-Full Moon-Antares triangle
25 JESTHA: Last Quarter
28 JESTHA: Crescent Moon and Mars rise together before 2 am, both in Pisces constellation
1 ASHAD: New Moon

Interests

We are calling student teams from wide range of fields including Physics, Engineering, Electronics, Robotics and Geology to participate in workshops and bring their ideas about any possible student-based research projects on Astronomy and Geophysics. We have not yet fixed dates for all this however.

These include the topics of interest:

1. Radio Astronomy Projects: Cosmic Ray detection (Muni Shakya, Lok Narayan Jha)
2. LASER based Communication (Kathmandu Engineering College)
3. Solar: Development of Magnetometers, etc
4. Exoplanet Search
5. Aerospace/Aviation/Rocketry: Remote Control UAV and scientific payload
Launch rockets/RC aeroplanes with experimental/scientific payloads, payload recovery for data processing/analysis
Experimentation on propellants/rocketry
6. Archaeoastronomy: Trekkings to remote villages to excavate and learn from ruins of ancient chhatedhunga, etc.
7. Atmospheric sciences, environmental sciences, meteorology
8. Preparation for the 2009 Total Solar Eclipse, Path of totality crosses eastern region of our country