Hi all,
Please note: send all correspondence to me only at terrymosel@aol.com
Firstly, Happy New Year to everyone! Let's hope it's very much more peaceful than 2023! And I hope we have lots more clear skies too!
1. MERCURY:
Is visible as a morning star in early January lying well below and East of Venus.
These details are for about 40 minutes before sunrise; but you should start looking about 20-25 minutes before local sunrise, with binoculars at first. But never do this after sunrise!
Date Mag Ph % Elong Diam
Jan 01 0.6 28.4 18.4º 8.6"
Jan 04 0.1 40.0 21.1º 8.0"
Jan 07 -0.1 50.0 22.6º 7.4"
2. VENUS
Is also currently visible as a morning star,
Date Mag Ph % Elongº Diam
Jan 01 -4.0 78.0 37.4 14.1"
Jan 05 -4.0 79.1 36.6 13.8
Jan 09 -4.0 80.2 35.8 13.5
3. PERIHELION
The Earth will be at perihelion, its closest point to the Sun for this year on January 3 at 00.38, at a centre to centre distance of 0.9833070 AU, or 147,100,633 km. This is also the time when the Earth is moving fastest in its yearly orbit, following Kepler's Laws (and Newton & Einstein, of course)
4. QUADRANTIDS:
The third richest shower of the year, the Quadrantids, peaks on the night of January 3-4. The radiant, which lies between the end of the handle of the Plough, and the head of Draco, is highest near dawn. There's not too much moonlight interference, as the LQ Moon doesn't rise until after 1 a.m., and in very dark skies, the ZHR could be almost 100, and the observed rate up to 70 or 80 per hour! Well worth making an effort this year, and as the meteors are quite slow, they show up well in photos – if you get one in the field of view!
5. IAA New Year Party, 6 January, 6 for 6.30 p.m. McBride's, the Square, Comber, Co Down. Food and entertainment. A film and a quiz. More details later.
6, IAA LECTURE, Wed 10 January, 7.30 p.m. Dr Matt Nicholl, ARC, QUB. "Fantastic Bursts and where to find them (searching for the brightest supernovae)
7. ISS. The ISS series of morning passes will continue until 3 January.
8. SATURN – slipping into the evening twilight.
Saturn is in Aquarius, slowly sinking into the evening twilight, now slightly faded to mag 1.0. The rings are now closing rapidly from our perspective, with an angle of only about 9 degrees, which explains why it's no longer so bright when at opposition. The apparent diameter is 16." equatorial, and 14.2" polar, which shows that the disc is noticeably oblate. The rings have a diameter of 36", but only 6" on the minor axis. Of the satellites, Titan is very easy, and Rhea is usually visible even in a small telescope. Tethys and Dione are closer in, and fainter, and may need an aperture of 150mm to be seen. Even closer in, and fainter still, are Enceladus and Mimas, which will be easier to spot next year when the rings are almost edge-on, and thus much fainter, so their light doesn't drown out the faint inner satellites.
9. JUPITER still dominates the sky!
Our largest planet was at opposition on 3 November, and is by far the brightest starlike object in the evening sky. It's high enough up in the East by about 6.00 for observing, in Aries, and at mag -2.8 it's much brighter than Saturn. Look for the 4 Galilean moons as they do their stately dance around the giant planet. Ganymede, Callisto and Io are bigger than our Moon; Europa is a bit smaller, but it's brighter than Callisto because of its bright ice-covered surface.
10. Diameter of Betelgeuse. Preliminary analysis of the recent occultation light curves in V, B and H-Alpha indicate an apparent diameter of 58 / 59 milliarcseconds – reassuringly close figures. Since it's at a distance of 642.5 light years (I don't think we know it THAT accurately!) that shows just how big it actually is! See also: A short documentary on the Betelgeuse occultation in Spain is available on:
https://eclipse262728.com/en/the-expedition-of-the-betelgeuse-occultation-2023/
11. AOP; Stargazing evening, 26 January. 6.30 - 9.00 pm, Book now.
12. Galway Astronomy Festival: Saturday 27 January 2024
13. IRISH ASTRONOMY WEEK: March 9-16, 2024.
14. The Communicating Astronomy with the Public (CAP) Conference is the only large-scale international conference for astronomy communication. The next CAP conference will be held in hybrid mode from 24 – 28 June 2024, in-person at Cité de l'espace, Toulouse, France and online.
15. NEW EASY TEASER:
What won't happen in 2037?
16. DIFFICULT TEASER: - ANSWERED ALREADY!
What's next in this sequence? A,A,C,B,S,?
This is a record, I think – it's THREE IN A ROW for Conn Buckley! He got his answer in next day. And he was shortly followed by another previous winner, Lindsay Green
The answer is M, because those are the initial letters of the Apollo Moonwalkers, in chronological order: Armstrong, Aldrin, Conrad, Bean, Shepard, and next was Mitchell.
Congratulations to both Conn and Lindsay.
17. NEW DIFFICULT TEASER:
What links a Camel, a Finch, a Koala, and a Tasmanian Devil? (And it is related to astronomy and/or space!)
18. GENERAL SEASONAL / HOLIDAY TEASER. I offer this for non-astronomer partners, children, parents, siblings etc, to give your grey matter some exercise over the holiday period. Of course, astronomers can have a go too.
Q. What common 5-letter English word has six single-word full anagrams, making seven including itself? Five are easy, but you'll have to work had to get the other two! One may be classed as slang, but is becoming quite common, and one of them is rather specialised or esoteric, but if you get five, a little bit of re-arranging and Googling will get you another one, and then another.
(By single-word I mean that all five letters are used in other single different words. For example, TIME has only 4, including itself – time, mite, emit, item. In that example, 'met', & 'tie', & 'it', & 'me', would not count.)
So, to repeat: I'm looking for a 5-letter English word in which all 5 letters can be used to anagram 6 other single words, giving a total of 7. You can obviously start with any of the words! And of course, plurals count.
And I trust you not to use any form of AI such as ChatGPT! (I haven't even checked to see if it would work!)
19. INTERESTING WEBLINKS (Disclaimer – Use of material herein from various sources does not imply approval or otherwise of the opinions, political or otherwise, of those sources). NB: If the title in the weblink does not indicate the subject matter, I give a brief simple intro before the link. I may also comment about the link afterwards.
ASTROPHYSICS:
Ancient Map of Night Sky Discovered in Italy: One Missing Star Has Researchers Perplexed (msn.com)
Penrose diagram of a Black Hole https://www.facebook.com/100045998303732/posts/919798786230056/?sfnsn=scwspmo I'll be testing you on this after Xmas!
Upcoming Einstein Probe will use its 'lobster eye' to hunt for extreme black holes and star explosions (msn.com)
Astronomers discover strangely missing stars in galaxies near Milky Way (msn.com)
Black Holes Found Inside Stars, Devouring Them From Within and Unveiling Cosmic Mysteries: New Study (msn.com)
Star factory galaxies https://www.facebook.com/100059420804643/posts/736345335022820/?sfnsn=scwspmo
Warped supernova spotted by James Webb Space Telescope could settle a longstanding debate (msn.com)
EARTH & MOON
Earth is spinning faster than usual and this is how it affects us (msn.com)
EXOLIFELife beyond Earth may form in the coldest depths of space, Ryugu asteroid samples reveal (msn.com)
EXOPLANETS:Earth 2.0? Huge breakthrough boosts hopes of finding life on other planets (msn.com)Scientists devise 'new and easier' way to identify habitable exoplanets (msn.com)NASA has just identified 17 planets that might be hosting life in subsurface oceans (msn.com) IMAGESThe Bubble Nebula
https://www.facebook.com/100007440215861/posts/3659417587649546/?sfnsn=scwspmo
Uranus imaged by JWST https://www.facebook.com/1015803760/posts/10227738448779470/?sfnsn=mo
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10225784069603370&id=1080556720&sfnsn=moHST image video of M31 SOLAR SYSTEM NASA outlines plan to deploy burrowing 'cryobots' on icy moons of Saturn and Jupiter (msn.com)
Life on Mars closer to reality after British scientists make huge breakthrough (msn.com) SPACE Russia, NASA agree to continue joint ISS flights until 2025 (spacedaily.com)
NASA completes record sustained burn of revolutionary rocket engine (newatlas.com)
Water-powered hybrid moon rockets... from London: Tech & Science Daily podcast (msn.com)
Dream Chaser enters final testing ahead of 2024 debut space flight (msn.com)
TELESCOPES, EQUIPMENT, TECHNIQUES etc
Warped supernova spotted by James Webb Space Telescope could settle a longstanding debate (msn.com)
This light-bending tech will let scientists see the sun like never before (msn.com)
The Einstein Gravitational Wave Observatory https://www.facebook.com/100036234364050/posts/1042532256964577/?sfnsn=scwspmo
20. JOINING the IRISH ASTRONOMICAL ASSOCIATION. This link gives options to join the IAA.
https://irishastro.org/join-the-iaa/ If you are a UK taxpayer, please select the 'gift-aid' box, as that enables us to reclaim the standard rate of tax on your subscription, at no cost to you. You can also make a donation via Paypal if you wish: just click on the 'Donate' button. See also https://irishastro.org/
The Irish Astronomical Association is registered with The Charity Commission for Northern Ireland NIC 105858
DISCLAIMER: Any views expressed herein are mine, and do not necessarily represent those of the IAA.
Clear skies,
Terry Moseley
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