May 2014

Treasurer’s report:

April 1 opening balance 1632.74

2 new members 40.00

Donation 0.26

Expenses Sunfest booth registration fee -30.00

Ending balance April 30 1643.00.

New members: Kristi and Derrick Herrman and Kelly Fox

Sunfest: May 30-June 1

Volunteers to man our booth are Steve Plank, Phill Lorenz, Daryl Doughty, John Grismore, Karen Cruse, Diane Dixon, Gary Nelis, Duane Perkins and Denise Gregg

Next meeting: June 2

Daryl’s report:

Solar activity--

April 9: tiny spots

April 16: more spots

April 22: some spots

May 2: some spots

Blood moon eclipse—April 15. Had beautiful pictures of the eclipse cycle.

Saturn and moon very close to each other—May 14

New meteor shower, Camelopardalids—May 24, appx. 3-4 am

Presentation on Radio Astronomy by Mike Maloney

Radio astronomy began in the 1930s; it was started by Karl Jansky with Bell Labs. He built a very large array of radio telescopes in the New Mexico desert.

Web site: nrao.org

Grote Reber, an electrical engineer, built an antenna in the shape of a parabolic disk, 9.5 meters in diameter, in his back yard.

Gradually larger and larger scopes were built with better synchronization to get better resolution. Beam width is a function of wave length of radio signals.

One radio telescope in New Mexico can out-perform the Hubble in resolution.

In 1956, a facility was built in West Virginia that was designated as a radio wave quiet zone. As radio telescopes can get interference from radio noise. telescopes must be built in a quiet area with no use of cell phones, microwave ovens, etc. This West Virginia site was designated as such a zone. Lowering the temperature of a reflector can also reduce thermal noise. These telescopes have a wider frequency range. They have even located sugar molecules in space.

VLA radio telescope study completed in 1980: each antenna of these telescopes 90 feet tall, 52 feet in diameter. Built in a Y pattern. Invisible light captured by these telescopes reveals the birth of stars and black holes. There is now a VLA expansion project using a supercomputer, the correlator, created by Canada. Increases capacity more than 2000-fold. The telescopes are moved every 4 months; each captures a different aspect of space.