Steve’s Virtual Planet

Star names & their origin - part one

This is going to be a reference post that can help you get started into a very deep subject. There are so many different paths one could take when exploring the history of star names and their respective constellations so I’ll try to just set you up and you can take it from here. This post covers what I call more “classical” star names since many of the names we use today come from this tradition. I’ll have more posts in the series in the coming months covering the less well known star names.

Even though there is a lot of literature covering what I would call the classic star name history (Greek and Arabic especially), one should also look to the Chinese and Indian cultures for some very early developments. You could also look to the Anglo Saxon times for connections to the sky from places like Stonehenge. Then, travel west across the Atlantic and examine the rich culture of the Meso Americans like the Maya. Finally, there are also a number of great star stories, myths and traditions throughout North America, such as the native pueblo Indians like the Hopi, and the Pawnee of the great plains. All of these cultures have contributed their own names for the star in our sky.

I have begun reading more about the Southwest American Indian cultures such as those that lived in the 7th through the thirteenth centuries. I hope to follow that thread more in the future in what I hope will be a section on American Archeoastronomy. I’ll have a future post on this coming soon. Here is a useful link on archeoastronomy if you’re interested in a primer on the subject.

The Wikipedia links below are a good starting point for researching star names from the Greek, Latin and Arabic traditions. And watch for the upcoming posts in this series.

Wikipedia: Star observation history

Wikipedia: History of the constellations

Wikipedia: Star Names - Their lore and meaning

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Hercules and it’s mythology

The sky has been painted for centuries with creatures and symbols alike and we can enjoy this history through the mythology of the heavens. Constellations reveal patterns in the sky that have been interpreted by many societies and peoples near and far. The stories of the ancient Greeks are perhaps the most familiar to us and their myths encompass a whole family of characters.

One of the great mythical figures is Hercules, although, his legend stems from stories originally crafted by the Babylonians. In any case, you can follow up on his great adventures and his many labors at the link below. Like all of the great constellations, the story of Hercules has many angles depending on which part you’re reading and which society it came from.

Follow the link below to begin your journey into the Greek mythology of Hercules. And check out the hyperlinks within the page to other famous characters in the pantheon of superheroes!

Wikipedia - Hercules

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Winter Colors

This time of year is always a little bit of a challenge when it comes to listing good targets for public observation sessions. The last of the globular clusters have moved off, the galaxy scene is sparse and if the moon isn’t up all you can hope for is a nice big fat planet. Aside from the planets, what does one do to tickle the imagination of the public?

One way I have found is to use color as a theme. It’s a tricky topic since our eyes don’t perceive color very well in the first place. But then again, this is always a good opportunity for teaching a little physiology. I use my standard short explanation of how our eyes work to explain how to better enjoy the view through the telescope, regardless of the color we perceive.

Major stars like Aldebaran in Taurus and Betelgeuse in Orion are a good start. Most people see a bit of orange in both of these big stars. Rigel is in the immediate area in lower Orion, so it can serve as the quintessential “bright white” star (not to mention a bonus companion that makes it a double!). Then, by merely tilting the telescope down about 5 degrees into Lepus and navigating slightly west, we get to Hind’s Crimson Star. See my recent post on this lovely red carbon star.

The Orion Nebula is another possibility even if you don’t have a large aperture ’scope. I usually have my laptop running a program like Stellarium so I can show an image in color to augment the actual view through the telescope. Through the 36 inch cassegrain, I sometimes pick up a little color and some of the yonger visitors also do. In any case, I usually promote the idea of investigating this wonderful nebula online, since it’s probably the most photographed object in space. But this helps get the point across that even with the limitations of our eye biology, we have great resources for images to pick up where our eyes leave off.

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The Magnificent Orion Nebula

When it comes to deciding what objects are the most spectacular in the Winter sky, it’s difficult to understate the beauty of the constellation of Orion, The Hunter. Regardless of whether you are observing just casually or more seriously, naked eye, binoculars or telescope, there is so much to offer at a wide range of magnifications. And of course, when one begins to tour the great expanse, you’re likely to end up spending a lot of time on the Orion Nebula. This grand target in the sky is also known as M42, one of the objects in the Messier catalog, and it’s approximately 1500 light years from earth!

This nebula is one of the most observed and photographed places in the night sky all year ’round. It’s not far from the belt of Orion and I find that it is quite satisfying at magnifications from 10 power through binoculars to upwards of 150 power through a telescope of any size. At low power, with a wide field of view, the entire expanse of the Sword of Orion stretches out to include several significant clusters and other nebulae. When viewed at higher power, you can zoom in on the wonderful structure of the nebulae and pick out some of the individual stars.

To me, any chance to visit the Orion Nebulae at the telescope is always rewarding. But, it’s also interesting to look on the internet for the hundreds of images taken by amateurs and professionals alike. The long exposure views of this complex object reveal so much structure and color that we don’t see with the naked eye. Also, read up on the statistics and astro physics of this object and you will see that it is really in our neighborhood of the Milky Way. Studying the images and the stats will help to further enhance the next live view when you get the chance to see it yourself at the eyepiece. Regardless of the instrument or the preparation, you will always be willing to look at the magnificent Orion Nebula again when you have the chance.

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Hind’s Crimson Star

Really colorful stars are popular during outreach events. They typically get some good reactions due to their uncommon nature. Some are well know but others are also worth checking out and adding to your repertoire.

In the Winter time, one good telescopic target is Hind’s Crimson Star. Otherwise know as R Leporis, it is a Mira type variable star in the constellation Lepus, the Hare. It’s claim to fame is it’s gorgeous red color, hence it’s nick name. It’s one of several so-called carbon stars, which all have this characteristic deep color. It’s color comes from an effect whereby the star’s light is filtered by carbon in the star’s atmosphere, and its more pronounced when the star is at it’s dimmest.

It’s close to the border with Eridanus and almost exactly at 5 hours RA. It can be found by referencing stars close by in Orion. Draw a line from Mintaka, the right most star in Orion’s belt, through Rigel, and go almost the same distance. The magnitude varies (it’s a variable!) from 5.5 down to 11.7, so you may want to further investigate it 427 day period before you go off hunting. My Fernbank colleagues and I were so impressed by it’s color, we gave this beauty our own nickname - Heinz Ketchup Star!

For more details and some tips on getting the best from this colorful target, check out the additional links on the Wikipedia page.

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SkyViewCafe Tip #1 - Catching the GRS

One of my favorite tools on the internet is Sky View Cafe (SVC). Its a Java applet that runs in a browser session and its free to use online. It’s so useful that I hope to publish the occasional tip for using it. So here is the first tip, using SVC to plan your GRS viewing. I’ll leave it to you to follow the link above and poke around with it for a while. There is online help available via the “More” button.

Notice that there are several “tabs” visible. I’ve used the tab called “Moon/GRS” a number of times in the last few months to find the GRS. Since the planet us higher in the sky now and we are occasionally getting some better, if not decent, seeing conditions, I’ve been trying to catch the GRS whenever it’s around the front of the planet.

On this occasion, Halloween 2010, I had help by following the shadow of Io, which was right next to the GRS. I was able to see that distinct high contrast dot and I knew the GRS was right next to it. My goal that evening was to catch the GRS using different planetary filters. That’s another story all together, but I was able to find the GRS easily with the SVC printout on hand.

Here is a partial clip of what the SVC display looked like for the event. Click on the image to get a larger view.

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Winter Solstice Introspective

Well it’s the day after the Winter Solstice 2012 … and … hey … we’re still here! All that talk about the world coming to an end?!?! Pah! Fortunately many of us just waved off that kind of stuff but it was still a lot of fun. I was already expecting the typically punditry about the event, but what was most exciting was to see how extensive the celebrations were in different parts of the world.

Stonehedge always has a big event during the Solstice but this year was even bigger. All the extra publicity must have drawn even more people to Salisbury Hill for the party. This site in England has long been a place that we associate with the changing of the seasons as determined by watching the motion of the sun. And this year was no different .. except bigger!

What was really amazing though was the celebration in Mexico and in the Yucatan in particular. The ancient Mayan sites were just alive with joy and celebration. This was in a sense like the New Year for the Mayan people, but even more special since it was the new baktun, number 14 to be exact, in the base 20 system of the Mayan calendar! It’s one of the inner cycles of their calendar, comprised of 144,000 days, about 394 years.

So for at least a little while, here in modern time, people all over the world were paying attention to the motions of the heavens. We used to do that a lot over the eons as we tried to make our calendars work. The Druids and Mayans did this in spectacular fashion of course.

The seasons “go ’round and ’round in the circle game” .. reminding us where we live in the grand scheme of things. The celebration of the Solstice is a celebration of Astronomy!

Clear skies!

originally posted on Dec 22, 2012

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Europa’s Shadow - Dec 13

Another fun night at Fernbank Observatory spending time with Jupiter. New moon that night and a nice crowd of fellow sky lovers. The GRS was up later so we would miss it but Europa was going to pop into view at 21:52. I had already noted the time using SVC. This would be another chance to show that we can predict these events quite easily.

Sure enough, it was there right on time! It only took a short time for the full brightness of the moon to make it pop out very clearly. The shadow of Europa was visible immediately inside the limb of Jupiter, small but very distinct, as the shadows normally are with good seeing. The sight of Europa emerging right after the egress was quite exciting since there were still a few die hard sky fans up in the observatory. So, we could get all four Galilean moons that night before closing up. It was good fun for all.

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Jupiter’s Great Red Spot - Dec 6

Jupiter is really showing it’s beauty now that it has climbed higher in the sky in the last few weeks. As always when the king of planets comes around, I am always eager to get a look at the Great Red Spot (GRS). The view from Fernbank Observatory on December 6th, 2012 was really special and I was able to share it with quit a few people.

The GRS was not very bold or even a distinct color that evening. In fact, the color was quite pale but the outline was very distinct. For some reason, the seeing that evening was better than normal and the view was certainly better than expected. We had a chance to show off the GRS to a number of people that night that had probably not seen it before. I explained where to look and the shape and color, and people were able to see it right away. I had known for two days it would be there so it was great to see it shine through!

Since Jupiter’s rotation is on the order of 10 hours, the GRS isn’t always out front so if you plan ahead you can determine when the GRS is visible. I use the online tool Sky View Cafe, and with SVC it’s easy to get a chart of Jupiter’s moons and the GRS in advance. Check out some of the other posts on Sky View Cafe and give it a try yourself. Jupiter is around in the evening sky until April, so there are still plenty of chances to got Spot Hunting!!

Clear skies!!

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What planet, where planet?

When you plan your upcoming sky viewing, it’s always a good idea to check what planets are going to be visible. There are a number of ways to layout a plan for the constellations and because they are regular and predictable, it’s easy to get prepared. “Well”, you might say, “planets are regular and predictable, too.” Yes, true, but our solar system neighbors have their own rhythms that don’t coincide with Earth’s yearly cycle.

After searching the internet for some time, I have found a very useful tool for planning your planet watching called AstroViewer. This is an online tool and it is found at www.astroviewer.com. There is a free interactive version of the program that can be used as long as you have a live internet connection. There is also a download version and a license key that can be purchased for about $15US. Chances are you are planning weeks or even months in advance, so the online version should be adequate.

When you go to the web site, you will see a group of tabs across the top of the main page. Click the second tab marked “Interactive Night Sky Map”. It takes a few minutes after that, but you will soon see a grey button appear that says “Start AstroViewer”. (If you don’t see the button, refer to my notes at the end). Click that button and you will get a new browser window with the actual tool inside. The main display will appear with an easy to use sky map that’s very intuitive to use. There is also a view of the solar system in the second tab which you may wish to check out, but the point of this post is on the third tab - “Planets’ Visibility”.

The display may look a little odd at first but when you study it for a moment, you’ll see it’s a 24 hour timeline with a horizontal line for each planet and the moon. Notice the scale below the planet lines; this is the time of day. You will need to set the location over in the left hand side control panel to be in sync. But once you do that, you can then determine when each planet will be visible in relation to the time of day. The view defaults to the current time, but if you adjust the dates using the controls to the left, the real usefulness of this display becomes apparent. You can use the control panel to skip forward in time by weeks or even months or years to see when you favorite planet is up. You will still need a planetarium program or online tool to see exactly where the planet will be, but you will know when to look.

Enjoy!

Notes: AstroViewer relies on Java and need to have an addin for your browser for the tool to work. That’s really beyond the scope of this post, but if Java is missing, your browser will likely prompt you to download the addin. Java is a very useful component and has it’s own internal security so you shouldn’t worry about adding that to your browser.

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