Forthcoming Event: Brian Cox Internet Lecture 28th June

Star Lectures
by Brian Cox, physicist, recent presenter of BBC's "Wonders of the Solar System"





On Monday 28 June 2010, University of Manchester Physicist Professor Brian Cox will be delivering a lecture aimed at GCSE/Key Stage 4 Science pupils that will be broadcast live via webcast. Professor Cox will be discussing the "Big Bang", the origins of the universe and the importance of science to our modern civilisation.

Live Webcast

Where: on our live webcast page - a link will be posted on 28 June

When: Monday 28 June

Time: 1.30pm - 2.30pm BST

**If you want to see this video live, it will be shown at the Drama Studio at 1.30pm Monday (Arrive earlier. No admittance after form time bell goes!!) [update: cancelled due to technical problems. DVD of event will hopefully available to view in a similar session at a later date (hopefully before the end of term!)]

(If you miss the lecture on Monday, you can always catch it later on YouTube )

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.

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