Author Archives: Tejas Mahesh

Solar Eclipse

Posted on April 8, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

Being in Nashville, I saw a partial solar eclipse today. It was unfortunate that it was extremely cloudy. Hence, the solar eclipse showed up once in a couple minutes. The clouds proved to be an excellent source of shades. So much so, that the combination of the thick clouds and the eclipse glasses blocked out […] Continue reading →

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Geological Activity Far out in the Solar System

Posted on April 7, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

Based upon the formation and evolution of the rocky terrestrial planets, size of the planet results in whether the planet is geologically active or dead. However, the moons of Jupiter, Saturn, and Neptune are smaller in size than Earth, yet are geologically active. How come? It turns out that the magma volcanic activity of the […] Continue reading →

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Why Stars?

Posted on March 5, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

Throughout history, many civilizations have been fascinated by the stars in the night sky. But the question is why. Why have many civilizations been fascinated by stars? What makes the night sky so attractive to humans? Why did they ascribe meaning to tiny dots that shone brightly, and seemed so far away? I present the […] Continue reading →

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Nuclear Fusion

Posted on March 5, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

We know that the Sun is extremely hot. Its surface temperature is 5,500 K. Temperature is a measurement of energy. So, we know that the Sun possesses huge amounts of energy. Where does that energy come from? How does the Sun create that much energy? Through a process called nuclear fusion, the Sun manages to […] Continue reading →

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Kepler’s Laws of Planetary Motion

Posted on February 13, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

After meticulously calculating the data that Tycho Brahe collected, Kepler discovered three different laws that described how planets move. Kepler’s First Law – The planets orbit in ellipses, not circles nor epicycles. For majority of history, it was thought that planets orbit through epicycles because the orbit of the planets must be perfect. However, the […] Continue reading →

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Historical Astronomers in Context

Posted on February 3, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

Isaac Newton Isaac Newton’s major life work was his book Principia Mathematica where he detailed his three laws of motion, gravitational law and other astronomical phenomena. He also created Calculus independently of Leibniz. Using his law of gravity, he derived Kepler’s three laws of planetary motion. Historical Events and Figure Scientific Revolution: The Scientific Revolution […] Continue reading →

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The Speed of Light

Posted on January 23, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

In 1905, Albert Einstein took the first crack at the Newtonian foundational physics. In his paper on special relativity, Albert Einstein postulated that the speed of light, c, is constant in all inertial reference frames. Assume that a person on a bicycle is holding a flashlight and moving at a constant speed relative to someone […] Continue reading →

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Welcome!

Posted on January 17, 2024 by Tejas Mahesh

Welcome to my blog! The below picture is the astronomical clock in Prague, Czech Republic. I took this picture last summer when I toured Europe as part of an orchestra trip. Here is more about it on wikipedia. Continue reading →

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