March 2015

Financials:

  • Feb. 1 opening balance $1744.67

  • 2 dues paid $40.00

  • Ending balance Feb. 28 $1784.67

  • Upcoming payment: Charity renewal, with check for $15.00.

Number of people who attended this meeting March 2: 30!!!

Virgil’s astronomy report

  • ESO (European South Observatory) VLT (Very Large Telescope)—sees 2 galaxies that the Hubble can’t find. Has 99% of the resolution power of the Hubble.

  • Ceres: Dawn craft will orbit Ceres later this month. Do two visible dots mean ice volcanoes??

  • Saturn’s moon Triton—model for liquid methane molecules?

  • Hubble: Found a very large quasar (giant black hole) 420 trillion times as bright as the sun, formed less than 10 million years after the birth of the universe

Astronomy Club picture of the Month: Yellow Moon by Jim Vogh

Kane Elementary visit: Reschedule for some time later. Would be for the whole school, grades 1-5, anticipated to be fore 150 people including parents.

Potential scout project: Webelos scout troop, grades 5-6, less than 10 Scouts, one telescope, give a talk. Hilary Kamplain is the Scout organizer.

Plan a hands-on session for astrophotography—use Tri County Tech facilities again

Girl Scout Camp April 18-19: Denise will get more information on that

Main program: Introduction to Astrophysics by Jennifer Walker

Jennifer is working on a B.S in astrophysics degree and plans to do graduate work for a PhD. Current course work (on the math side) includes calculus and differential equations. She told us that to study astrophysics you need to have a broad understanding of chemistry, physics and math.

She prepared a comprehensive, survey presentation for us on what astrophysics is about. I was able to get this from her—it is attached.

Astronomy = observation and measurements of bodies in the universe

Astrophysics = application of physics to these measurements and observations in order to form theories

Her presentation was very inclusive of everything in the universe!!

You can view her presentation here.