Here’s your November map of fun objects to check out with your Galileoscope.  This map will be useful near a latitude of 45 N from about 8-10pm.  This map is designed to be held over your head, with the N toward north (toward Polaris, which can be found using the pointer stars of the big dipper; see the map).  The circle will then show the approximate sky above your horizon, with a few easy-to-spot constellations and the location of great things to view with your Galileoscope.

Good things to look at with your Galileoscope in November 2009

Orion Nebula:  The Orion Nebula is what appears to the naked eye as the middle star in Orion’s sword.  If you take a peak with your Galileoscope, you’re in for a treat!  This is a huge cloud of gas and dust that is actively forming hundreds, if not thousands, of stars!

Don’t forget to take a peak back at Jupiter and Albireo.  They’ll both be up at the same time as the sun for the next 6 months or so, meaning we won’t see them again for a while.

The moon:  Don’t forget the moon!  Looking at the craters and maria on the moon is a truly spectacular sight.  A good lunar calendar is available at http://stardate.org/nightsky/moon/.

Here’s your December map of fun objects to check out with your Galileoscope.  This map will be useful near a latitude of445 N from about 8-10pm.  This map is designed to be held over your head, with the N toward north (toward Polaris, which can be found using the pointer stars of the big dipper; see the map).  The circle will then show the approximate sky above your horizon, with a few easy-to-spot constellations and the location of great things to view with your Galileoscope.

Greats things to view in December with your Galileoscope!

Brand new in the sky this month is the bright, yellowish point of light in the southeast, Mars:  The 4^th planet from the sun, Mars has polar ice caps, volcanoes and canyons.  The geologic activity appears to have ceased millions of years ago, leaving the solar system’s largest volcano, Olympus Mons.

We return to Orion this month, but this time, we’ll focus on his belt.  If you face south, so that his sword appears to hang down from his belt, the right-most star in the belt is Delta Orionis, or Mintaka.  The left-most star in the belt is Zeta Orionis, or Alnitak.  Both of these naked-eye stars are multiple star systems, when viewed through your Galileoscope!  Delta Orionis (the right-most) is a quadruple star system while Zeta Orionis (the left-most) is a triple star system, with a blue supergiant as the primary star.  Through your Galileoscope, you will probably see only two stars in each system, but large, research-grade telescopes have discovered the fainter additional companions.

The moon:  Don’t forget the moon!  Looking at the craters and maria on the moon is a truly spectacular sight.  A good lunar calendar is available at http://stardate.org/nightsky/moon/.

Here’s your October map of fun objects to check out with your Galileoscope.  This map will be useful near latitudes of 45 N from about 8-10pm.  This map is designed to be held over your head, with the N toward north (toward Polaris, which can be found using the pointer stars of the big dipper; see the map).  The circle will then show the approximate sky above your horizon, with a few easy-to-spot constellations and the location of great things to view with your Galileoscope.

Good things to check out with your galileoscope this month.

Things to check out this month:

Jupiter and its moons:  With any of the Galileoscope eyepieces, you should be able to pick out 4 small pinpoints of light, all in a line appearing to extend out from Jupiter’s equator.  These are Jupiter’s largest moons, the Galilean moons, so named because Galileo discovered them in 1610, using a telescope much like yours!  The moons, Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, are fascinating objects.  Io is covered in volcanoes, induced by Jupiter’s strong gravity.  Europa is covered with ice, which has cracked and refrozen countless times.  Ganymede and Callisto are covered with craters, much like our moon.

Double Cluster in Perseus:  This spectacular sight is perfect when viewed with your Keplerian eyepiece (the eyepiece with the larger hole).  To find it, number the stars in Cassiopeia from 1-5, then draw an imaginary line from star 3 to star 2, and extend that line twice the distance 3 and 2 are apart.  At that point, if it’s dark, you may pick out a fuzz with your naked eye.  This fuzz is actually several hundred stars, in two clusters.  The two clusters are along the same line of sight and are not bound to each other, but the stars in each cluster are all gravitationally bound to each other.  With your telescope, many of the stars will become clear.

Andromeda Galaxy:  Using the second set of stars in Andromeda as a guide, follow the line they create up about the same distance they are apart, and there you will discover the Andromeda Galaxy, a spiral galaxy about 5 million light-years away from us!  Together with the Andromeda Galaxy, the Milky Way, our home galaxy, make up most of the stellar mass of our local group of galaxies.

The moon:  Don’t forget the moon!  Looking at the craters and maria on the moon is a truly spectacular sight.  A good lunar calendar is available at http://stardate.org/nightsky/moon/.

A sky map for about 8-10pm at 45 N.

Each month we will be posting a map and short descriptions to help you find some great objects to view with your Galileoscope.  We’ll highlight a few sights, along with a map of the sky as it will appear at about 9pm, at a latitude of about 45 N.  It will be useful anywhere in Wisconsin for an hour or so before or after 9pm.  If you would like to see the sky at a different time or latitude, check out www.stellarium.org.

The map is designed to be held over your head, with the N toward north (toward Polaris, which can be found using the pointer stars of the big dipper; see the map).  The circle will then show the approximate sky above your horizon, with a few easy-to-spot constellations and the location of great things to view with your Galileoscope.

Things to check out this month:

Mizar and Alcor: Mizar is the second star from the end of the big dipper’s handle.  Alcor is its fainter (sometimes visible to the naked eye) companion.   These two stars are a visual binary, meaning they appear close, but are not actually orbiting each other. Both Mizar and Alcor are true binaries.  When you view this system with your Galileoscope, you will see 4 stars, two sets of two stars!

Jupiter: Jupiter is a spectacular sight with the Galileoscope, the brightest ‘star’ in the southern sky.  You can view the 4 Galilean moons, first discovered by Galileo 400 years ago!  Next month we’ll talk more about the moons.

Hercules cluster: The Hercules cluster, also known as Messier 13 (M13), is a globular cluster that can be found one third of the way between the north-western pair of stars in Hercules (if you picture him as a man, it’s in his right armpit).  A globular cluster is a group of about 100,000-1 million stars that are all gravitationally bound to each other and orbit a common center of mass.  They are billions of years old, and were all born from the same giant cloud of gas and dust.

Albireo: Albireo is the head of Cyngus the swan, about halfway between Vega and Altair, two of the bright stars in the summer sky.  This is one of the most spectacular things to observe with your Galileoscope!  To the naked eye it appears as one star, but your G’scope will separate into two components.  It is a wide binary system, comprised of a blue star and a yellow-orange star.

The moon: Don’t forget the moon!  Looking at the craters and maria on the moon is a truly spectacular sight.  A good lunar calendar is available at stardate.org.

http://www.spaceplace.wisc.edu/planettrek.htm

Join students from the UW-Madison Chemistry Department for hands-on experiments and activities.

Space Place family workshops are offered every Saturday at 10 a.m. for children ages 6-10 and their parents. The workshops are free and open to the public. No registration is required for any of the workshops.

Friday, March 20 • 7:00-9:00 pm

Join us at 7:00 pm for a presentation on how we can preserve the night sky. Our featured “star” for the evening will be Donald Sanford, Midwest Outdoor Lighting Solutions and member of International Dark Sky Association. Don will discuss light pollution and steps that you can take to preserve a dark sky. Following the program, refreshments will be served and we will set up telescopes on our rooftop deck (weather permitting). The program will take place, even if it is too cloudy to observe with the telescopes.