Discussion about precession motion on 27th June,2007

Last Wednesday,we discussed two different topics put forward by Aniket. At the end of discussion, Aniket suggested 3 topics for upcoming Wednesdays. The topics are :
1. Comparison of different Stellar populations
2. Initial Mass Function
3. Stellar occultation due to small KBOs.

So this time, i.e. on 27th June, I had got information on 1st topic while Salil had got information on 2nd topic. But unfortunately, there were hardly 7-8 people due to heavy rains. As we didn't want all to miss this discussion, we postponed it to next Wednesday. Instead of that, I gave some pointers for the 1st topic to all so that we can discuss with more and more information next time when everyone comes filled in with some information regarding this topic. Salil said Initial Mass Function can be discussed only after 1st topic is done.

Without wasting time, we started discussing few other fundamental doubts we all had...some related to spectroscopy of the stars and some related to basic physics! Meanwhile, Dilip Joshi came up with a nice topic regarding Earth's precession motion. The question was when a top spins, its rotation and its precession are in same direction where as in Earth's case the direction for either of them is opposite to another. Why? Any guesses? Try it... I shall put answer in my next blog! :-)

Discussion at Sion on 20th June 2007

Last Wednesday at Sion, we discussed about two recent discoveries. One is about the newly found oldest star which is 13.2 billion years old. Todays accepted age of the universe is 13.7 billion years. And another discussion was on the heaviest star found which is about 114 solar masses.



The oldest star named as HE 1523 is dated by the method of Radioactive decay. The star contains very rare radioactive elements like Uranium and Thorium which have very high half life period for the decay. Scientists photographed high resolution spectrum of the star through which they found out the ratio of these two elements and calculated the age. The radioactive substances are thought to be introduced in it by the nearby nebula at its birth.

The second topic of discussion was on the 114 solar masses star. This star named as A1 is found in ngc 3603 and has a companion star of 84 solar masses. There is an upper limit on the mass of a stable star called as Eddington limit and is of 120 Solar masses. Though A1 is below the limit it is an exceptional star as no other star was found to exceed 90+ solar mass.

Aniket Sule and Sukhada Palav gave the information of these two discoveries. There were 15-20 people present.
Aniket Sule has given following 3 topics for the coming Wednesdays:
1 Comparison of Different Stellar Populations (for next wed.)
2 Initial Mass Function
3 Stellar Occultations By Small Kuiper Belt Objects

Discussion on Blue Moon on 13th June, 2007 at Sion Unit

Well, this wed we continued with same discussion on Blue Moon. I actually sought for correct definition for Blue Moon.

And the correct definition is like this :
"Usually there are 3 full moons in every season. Sometimes, though it might happen that there come 4 full moons in one season. In that case, the third full moon out of those four full moons will be regarded as a Blue Moon"

So we see that, the definition stated by an amateur astronomer James Hugh Pruett as Blue Moon is 2nd Full moon occurring in the same calendar month(Sky & Telescope article, 1946) is Wrong!

Well,it was in 1999, when Phillips Hiscock corrected the mistake made by Pruett, in his article published in May 1999, Pg. No. 36-38.

But the actual credit goes to a group of 3 journalists...Roger W. Sinnott,Donald W. Olson & Richard Tresch Fienberg who were the first ones to take an objection to the old definition! Also they were the ones who found out how exactly the blue moon dates can be calculated, something which Pruett failed at!

After we were done with this discussion, Aniket took over and gave few questions to be solved by next wed.

Choose your topic of interest under Astronomy and Built database for the same

We can make good compilation for any topic under astronomy. History of Astronomy is one of the topics we cover under our " Basic Course in Astronomy" It's further divided in two groups one is Western Astronomy and second is Indian Astronomy.

I feel we should start using multimedia for our courses. effective use of multimedia is only possible if we have good database on the specific subject. Its my appeal for everyone to create such database with co-ordination. so there will be less duplication of topics and we can share the links about subject/Subjects. It will definitely help us to simplified the astronomy for everyone.

Today the study of astronomy requires a deep understanding of mathematics and physics. It is important to realize that Greek astronomy did not involve physics. read further article on following link

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Greek_astronomy.html

This link consist full list of Greeks Mathematicians/Astronomers/philosophers and their contribution.

http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Indexes/Greeks.html

Link for Indian Astronomy

http://www.crystalinks.com/indiastronomy.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_astronomy

Evolution of Science with respect to Astronomy-General lecture-Sunday 17, June 2007

Today at Talent Foundation-Mr. Pravin Herlekar delivered a lecture on "Evolution of Science with respect to astronomy" This was first lecture in this series. Mr. Herlekar will be taking additional lectures in upcoming Sunday's.

Around 20 people were present during the lecture. Namely Mr. & Mrs. Chonakar, Pritesh, Prathamesh, Abhishek,Mayur, Shreyas, Mr. Devodhar, Yogita, Prachi, Hrishikesh, Pratik.

Are we alone in the Universe-Discussion at Dombivali Unit

Last two Sunday's at Dombivali Unit Shri. Dinkar Shinde initiated the discussion on " Are we alone in this Universe" This discussion will continued on upcoming Sunday.

some interesting links for the topic

http://www.firstscience.com/site/articles/rees2.asp

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/309/5731/88

http://www.universetoday.com/am/publish/are_we_alone.html

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1272/is_2716_133/ai_n8688117

http://www.activemind.com/Mysterious/Topics/SETI/drake_equation.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fermi_paradox

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SETI

10-15 people were present for the discussion

Sunday 10, June 2007 Badalapur Unit- Talent Foundation

Pramod Ocharmal had taken lecture on "Probability" it lasted for 60 minutes. he is last year engineering student. second lecture was on Observational Astronomy by Hrishikesh Herleker. he is 12th std. student. he had explained the constellation of " Hercules" it lasted for 10-15 min. Third lecture was by Shreyas Pande. (Std. 9th) He talk about "Space Travel" which covers the Rockets, Space suites, and other components of space travel.

There were Ten people present to attend these lectures. Most of them non-members.

lectures scheduled on 17th Jun 2007 at Badalapur Unit
"Space Science" by Karmel Studies Students
"Cosmology" by Pritesh Randive
"Observational Astronomy" by Hrishikesh Herleker

Wednesday 6 June 2007 Sion Unit- Disccussion

Wednesday 6 June 2007

Sukhada had initiated the discussion about the concept of blue moon. This topic will be discuss in next Wednesday so please get some info about the concept of Blue moon how it started. The basic information on this topic could be found on Sky and Telescope website. Link for the website - http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/objects/moon/3304131.html
Please collect some more information on the concept of the blue moon. you can use following guidelines to collect the data. Please don't forget to write source of the information

How to define the Blue moon
How the concept evolve.
Miss-conception about the concept
Importance of the Blue moon with respect to astronomy

Salil has raised the question regarding How we can define the "Mass" concept. The discussion was lasted about 40-45 min.

following members were present during the discussion.
Anup Surlaker, Rohan lahane,Gourang Vador,Anurag Shevade,Anand Ghaisas,Piyush Garud,
Shri. Bhide,Shailesh Sansare,Ninad Vartak, Smita Bhise.+ 6 non-members.

Intro

Hi guys. I am Sandesh Kulkarni. I am doing TY B.Sc. with Physics as a major subject from Ruparel College. I joined KM in Dec. 2005, i.e. I am with KM for about one and half year. In this short period I gained lot of knowledge and got good exposure. I have attended almost all the public sky observation program since I joined KM. I am now familiar with some main constellations and deep sky objects. I got telescope handling experience even with the giant 8 inch in public programs as well as in special observation sessions conducted for volunteers. I did one incomplete messier marathon in Vangni and spotted more than 35 messier objects through 5 inch tele. Also because of KM and Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education (HBCSE) I got an opportunity to work as a student guide in the last years International Astronomy Olympiad which was held in India. I also presented one slide show on the topic “Our Sun” in Vangni and in TCS program. I also went for the outside programs of KM.

My email id:
sandy_kul2005@yahoo.co.in