Q&A with SpaceFest! Astronomer Ted Williams

Thursday, January 12 10:32 am

© NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

On January 15, the Museum celebrates all things space with SpaceFest!, a day of festivities, activities, and performances devoted to the universe. Join astronomer Ted Williams throughout the day to learn about seasonal constellations, use digital apps to understand other planets, and take a virtual tour of the sky in StarLab, the Museum’s portable planetarium. Below, Williams answers a few questions about what he’ll be presenting and offers some tips for the warmest ways to stargaze during the coldest months.

What is StarLab?

StarLab is a traveling portable planetarium that inflates to become a large dome on which we project the night sky. It can show us apparent motions of the sky along with the location of some 88 constellations visible from Earth. Our presentation will be an interactive experience where visitors explore the night sky together using handheld lasers to find constellations and planets in a more personal setting than the larger dome of the Hayden Planetarium.

What will you be teaching visitors at SpaceFest! about finding constellations in the winter sky?

We will have visitors find winter constellations such as Orion and Taurus and compare seasonal constellations with circumpolar constellations, which are always in the sky. We’ll also demonstrate some free apps available for cell phones and other devices that can be used to find Jupiter and Saturn, explore what Venus looks like below its clouds, and observe the Moon with a detailed map of terrain and landing sites of lunar missions.

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”Fly Me to the Moon” Guest Andrew Chaikin on the Moon and the Museum

Wednesday, October 19 2:00 pm

The Rose Center for Earth and Space. © AMNH/D. Finnin.

With the conclusion of NASA’s shuttle program and the upcoming launch of the latest Mars rover, the future of space exploration is once again a hot topic—and humans’ first steps on the Moon are all the more important to revisit.

On October 25, join Apollo historian Andrew Chaikin and the Museum’s Director of Astrovisualization Carter Emmart for October’s Astronomy Live program, Fly Me to the Moon. The evening begins at 6:30 pm and includes a flight simulation to Earth’s nearest celestial neighbor using the latest data from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, along with mapping photographs taken from lunar orbit by the Apollo astronauts 40 years ago.

Chaikin recently answered a few questions about his passion for space exploration.

You spent years interviewing the Apollo astronauts for your book A Man on the Moon: The Voyages of the Apollo Astronauts. What are some of the lessons of the Apollo missions?

In some ways, the most important lesson from Apollo is that when we tackle the difficult challenges of exploration, we reap unanticipated benefits. One of those benefits is heightened awareness. The astronauts who went to the Moon found that it was the Earth that made the greatest impression on them, with its spectacular beauty and inexplicable sense of fragility. Through their eyes, we can see our planet as a world to be protected and cherished. It’s no surprise that Apollo jump-started the environmental movement in this country. Read more »

Marking the Winter Solstice of 2010

Monday, December 13 1:56 pm

Astronomer Joe Rao and colleagues will be celebrating the final night of the autumn season at the Hayden Planetarium Winter Solstice Party on Monday, December 20, with observations of celestial objects on the Arthur Ross Terrace and a preview of the total lunar eclipse in the Hayden Planetarium Space Theater. Below, Rao shares a few interesting facts about this year’s winter solstice.

This year offers a rather special coincidence of two celestial events occurring on the same date. Early on Tuesday morning, December 21, the full Moon will pass through the shadow of the Earth, producing one of nature’s most beautiful sky shows: a total eclipse of the Moon.

Then, about sixteen hours later, at 6:38 pm EST, the Sun will reach the point where, at that moment, it will appear to shine farthest to the south of the equator — directly over the Tropic of Capricorn and just to the south of the island of Tongatapu, in the southernmost island group of Tonga in the South Pacific Ocean — marking the moment of solstice, when winter officially begins in the Northern Hemisphere while summer arrives in the Southern Hemisphere.

Locally, the altitude of the midday Sun has been lowering since June 20, as its direct rays have been gradually migrating to the south. From New York, the Sun’s altitude above the horizon at noontime is 47 degrees lower now compared to six months ago, and there is also six fewer hours of daylight.

The ancients had no understanding of any these phenomena. They were always fearful that this celestial machinery might break down someday, and the Sun would continue heading southward and ultimately disappear beyond the horizon, never to return. The lowering of the Sun was, therefore, cause for fear and wonder. When they saw the Sun stop and slowly climb to a higher midday location, people rejoiced: here was a promise that spring would return. Read more »

Mike Shara Discusses Next 50 Years of Space Flight

Thursday, September 30 12:05 pm

Museum Curator Mike Shara of the Department of Astrophysics will lead SciCafe: The Next 50 Years of Space Flight at the Museum on Wednesday, October 6.  He recently answered some questions about his upcoming discussion.

Where do you see our space program in 10, 20, and 50 years into the future?

Suborbital space tourism will almost certainly be a reality in 10 years, and orbiting hotels are quite possible in 20 years. The Chinese are likely to have a lunar base in 20 years. Humans will have landed on Mars, and perhaps set up a science base in 50 years. We will know with certainty, by then, if there is microbial life on Mars and Europa.

Where would you like to see NASA send a manned mission next: the Moon, Mars, or an asteroid?

All three. There is much valuable science to be done at each.

What do you see in the future for suborbital tourism?

Falling costs and rising numbers of tourists. Dozens the first year, hundreds the third year, then tens of thousands of people annually. I can hardly wait.

You’ve undertaken a survey to inventory all 10,000 presupernova stars in the Milky Way. Why?

This is a test of stellar evolution theory, something as basic to astrophysics as Darwinian evolution is to biology.  This theory predicts that “Wolf-Rayet” stars, which are so luminous that they are evaporating themselves, must give rise to supernova explosions. By finding every one of these stars in the Milky Way — and in nearby galaxies, too — and by getting a spectrum of every one of them (i.e., their “DNA”), we will know, when the next supernova explodes, if our evolution theory has predictive power or if it must be modified.

What have you learned from this?

That searching for a needle in a field full of haystacks is hard. There are 100,000,000,000 stars in the Milky Way. Only one in 10 million is a presupernova star. But we’ve got a list of 400 confirmed stars and thousands more candidates.

What is a stellar collision and what have you learned about them?

Stars actually crash into other stars in the centers of the densest star clusters. These collisions can be destructive or amalgamative and make some of the rarest stars in the universe.

Neil deGrasse Tyson on the 10th Annual Asimov Debate

Wednesday, March 10 9:08 am

The 10th annual Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate— Moon, Mars and Beyond: Where next for the manned space program? — will take place at the American Museum of Natural History on March 15, 2010 and is presented, in part, in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the opening of the Frederick Phineas and Sandra Priest Rose Center for Earth and Space and the 75th anniversary of the opening of the original Hayden Planetarium.

Where to go next is one of the hottest topics for NASA’s manned program. Should we proceed straight to Mars, should we return to the Moon, or should multiple destinations be the goal? Central to the debate are thorny issues that relate to science, launch hardware, international competition, national security, shrinking budgets, and political will. The Obama administration’s recent decision to indefinitely delay the next voyage to the Moon while simultaneously planning a new launch vehicle makes this Asimov Debate particularly topical and newsworthy.

Moderated by Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and Frederick P. Rose Director of the Hayden Planetarium, this year’s Asimov Memorial Debate will include panelists Kenneth Ford (Institute for Human & Machine Cognition), Lester Lyles (United States Air Force), Paul Spudis (Lunar and Planetary Institute), Steven Squyres (Cornell University) and Robert Zubrin (Mars Society).

RSVP to the 10th Annual Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate on Facebook.