Category Archives: Physics

The Limitations of Light Speed

Posted on May 3, 2023 by jackdoyle25

As we all (hopefully) know, nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. Light-speed is the universal speed limit, and no matter or energy can move faster than it, including radio signals or other forms of communication. This limitation makes me rather pessimistic about deep-space exploration. The Milky Way Galaxy is massive, at tens […] Continue reading →

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Blog #8 – Black Holes and How to Find Them

Posted on April 30, 2023 by constellationsarentreal

Black Holes are quite a popular topic in astronomy, but I still would like to talk about them for my last post, since they are truly revolutionary. Black Holes, in short, are gravity’s ultimate victory over stars. After a star supernova explosion, the core of a star remains. But if this core weighs more than […] Continue reading →

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Variable Stars and change in the Night Sky

Posted on April 29, 2023 by noahherrero

Image of Omicron Ceti (Mira) Source: Digitized Sky Survey 2 Looking up at the night sky it may seem that while the stars do move around, they remain the same brightness all year round. This was a common belief pushed by philosophers like Aristotle, believing that stars are eternal and invariable. However in 1638 Johannes […] Continue reading →

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Artemis

Posted on April 20, 2023 by araceal

Since there has not been another moon landing. Until now. In 2024, Artemis 2 will launch and send the first person of color and the first woman to the moon. This mission’s goal is to establish the first long-term occupancy on the moon. This mission is the first step to then sending our astronauts to […] Continue reading →

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The Event Horizon Telescope

Posted on April 11, 2023 by jackdoyle25

We’ve spent the semester so far studying the greatest discoveries and breakthroughs in the history of astronomy, from as long ago as Copernicus to as recent as the New Horizons flyby of Pluto. Even more recently, however, an astronomical breakthrough was made that will surely be the subject of textbook pages and lecture slides in […] Continue reading →

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The Cosmic Microwave Background

Posted on April 9, 2023 by constellationsarentreal

One of the pillars that the Big Bang Theory Model rests on is the existence and characteristics of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB). The CMB is an observed cosmic glow of radiation seen everywhere, filling the universe like a sea. Roughly 380,000 years after the Big Bang, the universe cooled enough (~3,000K) for free-roaming electrons […] Continue reading →

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Interferometry: Viewing the Minute

Posted on April 9, 2023 by noahherrero

Saying the universe is incomprehensibly massive, so much so only the brightest and closest objects and phenomena are visible to the naked eye. Throughout history people have had work arounds, be it using devices to mark inclination of stars to focusing light through telescopes to make the faintest bodies visible. One of the most interesting […] Continue reading →

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Ceres, the Celebrity of the Asteroid Belt

Posted on April 8, 2023 by willems49

Despite comprising almost a third of the asteroid belt’s total mass, Ceres is often left out of dwarf planet discussions. However, Ceres is actually pretty unique and could potentially support life in the future. Because of its relative closeness compared to the likes of Pluto, it was the first dwarf planet to be visited by […] Continue reading →

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Nemesis: The Ultimate Party (And Ort Cloud) Crasher

Posted on April 8, 2023 by Alex Diefenbach

(Hypothetical Rendition of Nemesis – https://images.app.goo.gl/214dFoRtpLU4LSW59) There is a theory concerning the orbit of celestial bodies which has been proposed that would explain the extinction of the dinosaurs. The theory rests on the idea that our sun is part of an astronomical dynamic called a binary system. A binary system resembles the mechanics of satellite […] Continue reading →

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Strange Stars (Literally)

Posted on April 8, 2023 by Europa

Neutron stars are the collapsed cores of massive stars of 10-25 solar masses. They are formed when these supergiant stars collapse under their own gravity and undergo a supernova explosion, which compresses the star’s core to the extremely high density of atomic nuclei. In fact, they are called neutron stars because the extreme forces within […] Continue reading →

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