Tag Archives: astro2110

Protecting Our Home

History is doomed to repeat itself. Will we be ready? Around 66 million years ago, an object estimated to be around 10km wide struck Earth at incredibly high speeds. The energy released was equivalent to roughly 100 million megatons of TNT. The impact, then, released over 6.5 billion times more energy than the catastrophically powerful […] Continue reading

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Could Aliens See Us?

One of the most inspiring ventures in the world of astronomy in the 21st century is the increasing discovery of exoplanets. They represent the most extensive effort to find life outside of Earth. So far, we have discovered thousands of planets surrounding other stars, but there is something of a selection bias. Astronomers use a […] Continue reading

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You Take the Moon and It Blocks the Sun

An eclipse occurs whenever a celestial body passes in front of or behind another in a way that whoever is on the surface can notice such an obstruction. Lunar eclipses occur on average twice a year when the moon moves into the Earth’s shadow during the full moon phase, which happens to be the only […] Continue reading

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The Solar Eclipse

Like many of you I was very excited to see the solar eclipse today. I thought about driving to see totality, but ended up choosing against it as I figured it would be too much, and I had a quiz the morning of. So, I decided to stick around campus and watch it from here. […] Continue reading

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The Most Famous Comet

The Bayeux tapestry For my blog post I wanted to focus on comets. I figured I would do some research on the only comet I knew by name before taking astronomy, Halley’s Comet. Halley is the most famous of its kind and its presence in our history goes back more than 1000 years. Halley was […] Continue reading

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Blog SOLAR ECLIPSE

Today was the day, I saw the eclipse. It was amazing, and truly a piece of art. There were lots of clouds and I was barely able to see the eclipse although when seeing it, it was eye burning. Literally. As I had no glasses, I took a video of it that I am very […] Continue reading

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Blog 6: The Solar Eclipse Today

This is my picture of the solar eclipse from today. The fact that eclipses even happen is one of the craziest coincidences, as the difference in relative size of the Moon and the Sun is the same percentage-wise, meaning that when the Moon is exactly in front of the Sun, it completely blocks it. There […] Continue reading

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Blog 5: The Controversy Behind Pluto’s Planethood

Pluto orbits our Sun far out past Neptune, and has been the source of controversy as we have learned more about it. The argument centers around whether this celestial object should be defined as a planet or a dwarf planet. This leads to an even bigger question: what separates a dwarf planet from a planet? […] Continue reading

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The Eclipse Almost Stole My Sight

by Marca On Monday, April 8, 2024, North America witnessed a solar eclipse, and it almost blinded me. But before I talk about that, what is a solar eclipse? A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon moves between the Sun and the Earth, which blocks the Sun totally or partially and casts a shadow on […] Continue reading

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Blog 5 – Triton!

Things that break all patterns are often the most interesting objects in our solar system. Neptune’s moon Triton is a prime example of breaking general patterns. It is the only large moon in our solar system that orbits in retrograde, opposite the rotation of Neptune (NASA). Originally I was interested in Triton because of its […] Continue reading

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