February 18, 2008
Well another cloudy cold night at the Valley and it seems like Fall was the last time we had the scopes outside and no opportunity to even see comet Lulin with the bino's. Unfortunately Justin was not able to be here tonight. Not much astronomy took place tonight but we all did have fun disassembling an old printer of mine for parts that we will use to build our spacecraft that is on a mission to visit and study a distant star with an associated exoplanet system. We all were quite surprised as to the amount of parts in a relatively small inexpensive printer.
We're going to narrow our search by first researching our potential destination on the NASA website "Planet Quest-Exoplanet Exploration" http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/atlas/atlas_index.cfm.
Hopefully enough parts to get us to epsilon eridani/epsilon eridani b- a meager 10.4 ly away.
Sounds like a great project. I wish you abundant clear skies soon!
ReplyDeleteThat Lunar surface model is outstanding!
ReplyDeleteThanks Richard. I was actually quite impressed with it myself. It was our first attempt too.When we came back to see it the following week when it dried I was astounded as to how really cool it looked and FELT. My first thought was how great this might be for a visually impaired person.
ReplyDeleteI may try doing a more accurate rendition of it at home. Oh boy now I'm playing with paper mache and not wanting to go to work. Are there counselors who specialize in treating outreach astronomers? I really did have a great childhood...I think.