Tag Archives: astro201

A Slower Speed of Light

Posted on January 27, 2014 by gradytlynch

The open source MIT game “A Slower Speed of Light” is a first person game in which the player collects orbs that slow down time. As the game progresses, the user will find that the game becomes harder as the speed of light decreases, approaching the player’s own speed of movement. This brings many strange […] Continue reading →

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SkyCube: A Personal Satellite

Posted on January 27, 2014 by almetetj

Project Explanation Video: SkyCube Project Overview While skimming through a list of start up projects on Kickstarter.com, I noticed a project that peaked my interest a while back, the SkyCube. This project gave “backers” the opportunity to control the soon to  be launched satellite, effectively becoming the  first crowd source funded satellite intended for crowd-sourced […] Continue reading →

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The Hidden Universe

Posted on January 27, 2014 by dhbrett

It’s amazing to think about how much there is that we cannot yet see. Even the famous Hubble Deep Field image can only show us so much. The objects pictured are incredibly far away, but what lies beyond them is important too, since it may give us clues as to the formation of the universe. … Continue reading The Hidden Universe → Continue reading →

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Stellarium

Posted on January 27, 2014 by Leigh

I found the program Stellarium to be incredibly interesting and also very informative. The benefit of Stellarium is that it creates a visual and interactive representative of what can only be demonstrated through words and images in the textbook. Because … Continue reading → Continue reading →

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Light Travel Time: An Impediment to our Knowledge of the Universe

Posted on January 27, 2014 by Leigh

Despite common misperceptions, a light year is a measure of distance, not time. It is the only feasible way to measure distances in the universe because the universe is so vast that measurements of distance used on earth would quickly … Continue reading → Continue reading →

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Is Light The Limit?

Posted on January 27, 2014 by almetetj

Albert Einstein once theorized that speed of light serves as somewhat of a global speed limit. It is assumed that nothing in the universe is capable of traveling faster than the speed of electromagnetic radiation. According to his observations, this makes sense. How could something composed of atoms of mass travel faster than a beam […] Continue reading →

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Thinking and Observing

Posted on January 27, 2014 by paanvaannd

I think it’s fun to simply look up at the stars sometimes and think about what might be out there. There’s so much we don’t yet know, so much to be discovered. We thought we had conquered the final frontier when Amundsen had finally reached the South Pole at the beginning of the 20th century, … Continue reading Thinking and Observing → Continue reading →

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Blurry Telescope

Posted on January 27, 2014 by dhbrett

This is a picture captured by the famous Hubble space telescope. It looks blurry, because the team that designed the giant main lens didn’t properly account for the effects of gravity, causing the light to be refracted improperly. It took many years and many expensive maintenance trips to fix this error, but in the meantime, … Continue reading Blurry Telescope → Continue reading →

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Balancing eggs on the spring equinox

Posted on January 27, 2014 by Drew Hamilton

It is a popular myth that the spring equinox is the one day of the year that raw eggs can be perfectly balanced on end. When I was in elementary school, entire classes at my school would go outside with a bunch of eggs and try to balance them in a row. More often than… Continue reading →

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Sky and Telescope

Posted on January 27, 2014 by karapetros

Sky and Telescope This website is very cool!  It shows an easy to understand layout of what planets, stars, etc. you will be viewing in the night sky and where they will be moving throughout the night and week.  It also gives you categories of different celestial objects you can try to search for in … Continue reading Sky and Telescope → Continue reading →

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