Four Nebulae taken by GCSE Astronomy class

Four very beautiful nebulae taken by Uplands GCSE Astronomy students:

Sky Object Name: Trifid
Taken By: Uplands Community College
When taken: Apr 20, 2010 14:58:27 UTC
RA: 18h02'20"
DEC: -23°03'10"
Filter: H-alpha
Exposure time: 100 secs.
Instrument: EM01

The Trifid Nebula (catalogued as Messier 20 or M20 and as NGC 6514) is an H II region located in Sagittarius. Its name means 'divided into three lobes'. The object is an unusual combination of an open cluster of stars, an emission nebula (the lower, red portion), a reflection nebula (the upper, blue portion) and a dark nebula (the apparent 'gaps' within the emission nebula that cause the trifid appearance; these are also designated Barnard 85). Viewed through a small telescope, the Trifid Nebula is a bright and colorful object, and is thus a perennial favorite of amateur astronomers.

Sky Object Name: Trifid
Taken By: Uplands Community College
When taken: Apr 20, 2010 14:54:41 UTC
RA: 18h02'20"
DEC: -23°03'10"
Filter: RGB
Exposure time: 50 secs.
Instrument: EM01

Sky Object Name: Eagle
Taken By: Uplands Community College
When taken: Apr 20, 2010 14:47:31 UTC
RA: 18h18'52"
DEC: -13°49'42"
Filter: RGB
Exposure time: 50 secs.
Instrument: EM01

The Eagle Nebula (catalogued as Messier 16 or M16, and as NGC 6611) is a young open cluster of stars in the constellation Serpens, discovered by Jean-Philippe de Cheseaux in 1745-46. Its name derives from its shape which is resemblant of an eagle. It is the subject of a famous photograph by the Hubble Space Telescope, which shows pillars of star-forming gas and dust within the nebula.

Sky Object Name: Dumbbell
When taken: Apr 20, 2010 14:40:17 UTC
RA: 19h59'40"
DEC: 22°43'01"
Filter: RGB
Exposure time: 90 secs.
Instrument: EM01

The Dumbbell Nebula (also known as Messier 27, M 27, or NGC 6853) is a planetary nebula (PN) in the constellation Vulpecula, at a distance of about 1,360 light years.

"Where in Orion is the Afterlife?"

This was one of the questions a curious Yr 6 girl asked former students at Ticehurst Primary School last friday.

Two Yr 11, Ex-Astronomy GCSE students - Robbie Bramall and Connor Lynch - accompanied Mr Pert to the local school to demonstrate Faulkes Telescope. For the last two days Hawaii had been battered by poor weather, but amazingly the skies cleared just in time for the booked slot, where they could remotely control the 2m telescope!

The first image was picked at random from objects, listed once control was taken, available in the sky at the time:

M87

M87

The heart of the galaxy known as M87 is a place of unimaginable violence. A black hole up to seven billion times as massive as the Sun sits at the galaxy's center -- one of the most massive black holes ever measured. As gas spirals into the black hole, it's heated to millions of degrees, so it produces enormous amounts of X-rays. Some of the hot gas around the black hole shoots back into the galaxy in powerful jets that span thousands of light-years.

M87 is at the center of the Virgo Cluster, a collection of thousands of galaxies that move through space together. It is a giant elliptical galaxy, so it's shaped like a fat, fuzzy watermelon. M87's diameter is only a little bigger than the Milky Way's, but because the galaxy is thicker than the thin disk of the Milky Way, it encompasses a much larger volume. As a result, M87 contains many more stars and is perhaps 10 times as massive as the Milky Way.

The next three objects had been researched by Robbie:

Sombrero Galaxy

Sombrero Galaxy

Why does the Sombrero Galaxy look like a hat? Reasons include the Sombrero's unusually large and extended central bulge of stars, and dark prominent dust lanes that appear in a disk that we see nearly edge-on. Billions of old stars cause the diffuse glow of the extended central bulge. Close inspection of the bulge in the above photograph shows many points of light that are actually globular clusters.

The spectacular dust rings harbor many younger and brighter stars, and show intricate details astronomers don't yet fully understand. The very center of the Sombrero is thought to house a large black hole. Fifty million-year-old light from the Sombrero Galaxy can be seen with a small telescope towards the constellation of Virgo.

Whirlpool Galaxy

M64



Aren't they great? :-D The best we've had yet!!




So...Where in Orion is the Afterlife?

....Well, apparently it's in 'Aries'

:-D

Viewing a comet

A level class took pictures of a comet for external research reasons. This provided a good start to the A level Cosmology section of the course:

When taken: Feb 10, 2010 10:50:07 UTC
RA: 9h35'19"
DEC: 12°25'10"
Filter: H-alpha
Exposure time: 60 secs.

When taken: Feb 10, 2010 10:46:56 UTC
RA: 9h35'19"
DEC: 12°25'10"
Filter: Blue
Exposure time: 60 secs.

When taken: Feb 10, 2010 10:44:44 UTC
RA: 9h35'19"
DEC: 12°25'10"
Filter: Green
Exposure time: 60 secs.

When taken: Feb 10, 2010 10:42:50 UTC
RA: 9h35'19"
DEC: 12°25'10"
Filter: Green
Exposure time: 60 secs.

When taken: Feb 10, 2010 10:40:01 UTC
RA: 9h35'19"
DEC: 12°25'10"
Filter: RGB
Exposure time: 60 secs.

When taken: Feb 10, 2010 10:33:43 UTC
RA: 9h35'19"
DEC: 12°25'10"
Filter: Green
Exposure time: 60 secs.

The trouble with viewing stars in the daytime...

Faulkes Telescope North

Many of us have looked up at the night sky and wondered what's out there. We can see the stars - lots of them - and we see the moon and, if we're lucky and have a little knowledge in which direction to look, we can spot a planet or two.

If we want to look deeper? Learn a little more about our solar system or what's between those twinkling little lights? Well, for years, at Uplands, there has been our GCSE Astronomy class (now held on a Tuesday), and locally there is the Wadhurst Astronomical Society, which meets on the third Wednesday of the month in the Methodist Church, Wadhurst (details on the website).

However, unless there's an event such as a solar eclipse, actual space viewing is difficult in the daytime, because the light from the sun prevents the observation of dimmer objects. Although there are some activities we can, and will, do at school (eg observing and recording sunspots) for studying more distant suns and galaxies we need further assistance...

...and this is where the Faulkes Telescopes come in.

Two large (2m) telescopes have been made available for educational use. In the northern hemisphere, Faulkes Telescope North (FTN) is in Hawaii (Haleakala Observatory ) and in the southern hemisphere, Faulkes Telescope South (FTS) is in Australia (Siding Spring Observatory). The best thing about these two telescopes is they are in nighttime during our daytime, and we can obtain full and exclusive use of them for our half-hour (previously booked) sessions.

As long as there's access to a computer and the internet, the telescopes can be robotically remote controlled from anywhere (I've heard that someone even used an iphone when he couldn't get computer access!) to locate any visible astronomical object of interest (with limits on the brightness), which can then be photographed. The image can then be downloaded for use from the Faulkes Telescope website.

We have now tried out the telescope a few times.

The first trial was a bit of a flop, because there was a glitch in the system and we couldn't get the telescope to take pictures. The second effort was more successful and, using FTN, we managed to take images of the Ring Nebula in Lyra (M57) with colour filters and the hydrogen alpha filter (dark splodges on images are dust on telescope):

FT North:Tue 9 June, 2009 10:30 UTC

M57 (Ring Nebula in Lyra): RGB (Red, Green and Blue) filters

M57 (Ring Nebula in Lyra): H-alpha (hydrogen) filter

as well as a these two interacting galaxies:

NGC 6621: RGB (Red, green, blue) filters

and a cluster of galaxies:

NGC 6027: RGB (Red, green and blue) filters

This year we will be introducing the telescope to all year 7 groups as part of their 'Forces and Space' course, as well as hopefully visiting local primary and secondary schools. More news on this to follow...

We are hoping to get one of these digital planetariums for loaning out to students:

Meade My Sky

Just Point and Shoot - The easiest way to explore the night sky


The new Meade mySKY is a revolutionary way to explore our universe. Not a telescope, mySKY instead is a fun, interactive, hand-held, point-shoot-and-identify multimedia travel guide to our universe that will guide you through the night sky better than if you had your own private astronomer standing next to you. This hand-held electronic guide to the heavens locates, identifies, and describes 30,000 celestial objects in the night sky – every object visible to your unaided eye, as well as many thousands you’ll need a separate telescope to see. (Know many astronomers who can locate and identify 30,000 celestial objects on their own?) Featuring a full-colour LCD screen and the added ability to control a Meade computerized telescope, the Meade mySKY is clearly unlike anything else on the market.
mySKY is the ultimate in simplicity to use. No knowledge of the night sky is needed. Just turn it on and mySKY does the rest. It incorporates full GPS Auto Alignment using a 12-channel GPS receiver which aligns itself on the sky without any input from you.

Point it at a celestial object and pull the trigger to identify planets, stars, nebulas, galaxies, constellations, and more – over 30,000 objects. Or select an object to locate from the 30,000 in its memory and mySky will lead you right to it. mySKY even takes you on guided tours of the best objects visible in your sky to your unaided eye – tours that are tailored to your time, date, and location.

Fun, huh?

Long Exposure Photography

These two pictures were taken by Amy, while a GSCE Astronomy student in Yr 10. She kept the camera very still (on a tripod) and kept the shutter open for a long time.

The length of the sidereal day was calculated using these photos. Knowing the length of the exposure, and measuring the angle through which the stars have moved (actually how much the Earth has rotated), gave a value for the sidereal day. It should be 23 hours 56 minutes. The main uncertainty in this experiment is measuring the angle correctly.

The Meade 4504 Newtonian telescope

This is one of our telescopes, used by the GCSE Astronomy class, and on open evening. We are hoping to make it more available to other students. We are thinking about whether or not there would be interest in loaning it out on the same basis as the MySky...

This is the Meade 114mm F8 reflector designated either 114-DH4 or 4504. It's NOT the short-tube version but a straight Newtonian. It It uses a 494 Autostar controller for full goto capabilities.

Astronomical Telescope f70070 - for loan

Last summer Uplands received an astronomical telescope to be used by students of the school. We have decided the best way for as many students as possible to take advantage of this equipment is to loan it out to folks who are interested on a first come first served basis.

Hopefully GCSE Astronomy students will be the first in line, but it would be great to see other students interested in taking a closer look at the stars...

If you are interested, please see either Mr Pert (often to be found in Lab 8) for further details

Small print:
Product Name：telescope
Product Model：F70070
Aperture:114mm(4.5″)
Focal length:700mm,f/10
Hybrid diagonal:90o
Metal tripod with slow motion control rod for easy vertical micro adjust ment.
Most height:125cm
Standard 1.25″accessories include:
Eye piece:SR4mm,H12.5mm,H20mm 3X barlow lens,1.5X Erector

Faulkes Telescope Tue 14 July, 2009 14:30 UTC

Around a few months ago, we (the astronomy group) got to use the Faulkes Telescope to get our own pictures of the universe. In the end…we were left with 3 pictures.

lc 5146: RGB (Red, Green, Blue) filters

mgc 7686: H-alpha (hydrogen) filter

M15: RGB (Red, Green, Blue) filters

To get these pictures, we did this:

First we chose which stars/galaxies/clusters we wanted to look at. This was done simply with Stellarium, which gave us the coordinates of what we wanted to look at. It also proved useful as we could also see what would and wouldn’t be visible on the day we used the telescope.
For the next part, we chose which out of the stars we wanted were best and then planned which order to photograph them. This was to save time when the telescope had to shift position between images. With Mr. Pert helping us, this was quickly done.
Finally we could use the telescope. For this, all we needed to do was input the coordinates of the star we wanted and wait for it to be photographed. When Mr.Pert had put in the coordinates, we got a live feed of the telescope moving. In the 30 min time frame, we got the 3 images you see above.
Overall, it was a fun experience that I learned a lot from. If I got the chance to do it again, I would.

by Connor Lynch (Yr10)
Badge Winner

Year 7 observations

Year 7 class took these as part of space topic.

Sky Object Name: M57
Taken By: Uplands Community College
When taken: Jun 16, 2009 14:44:45 UTC
RA: 18h53'36"
DEC: 33°02'00"
Filter: RGB
Exposure time: 25 secs.
Instrument: EM01

Sky Object Name: M27
Taken By: Uplands Community College
When taken: Jun 16, 2009 14:39:31 UTC
RA: 19h59'36"
DEC: 22°43'00"
Filter: RGB
Exposure time: 90 secs.
Instrument: EM01