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Tag Archives: size
The Universe is HUGE
Size: Planet vs. Solar System. vs. Galaxy For as long as I can remember, I have been fascinated by the vastness of the Universe and how everything around us has been untouched by humans. Everyone lives on Earth (unless you are an alien…). Yet, Earth is only one of eight planets in our solar system. […] Continue reading
“Powers of Ten” and the Scale of the Universe
I didn’t remember until I started the video, but I had seen “Powers of Ten” before in some science class many years ago. This staying power, evidenced by my recollection and the countless Youtube comments saying similar things, is proof of how mind-blowing the concept of scale is. Scale determines what we can comprehend andContinue reading ““Powers of Ten” and the Scale of the Universe” Continue reading
The Universe as the United States
If there’s one straightforward lesson from astronomy, it’s that we’re tiny. We’re small compared to the Earth’s vast size, which is small compared to the sun, which is tiny compared to the space that contains our solar system, which is a tiny dot in one arm of the Milky Way galaxy, which is one of … Continue reading The Universe as the United States → Continue reading
A Speck on a Speck in a Speck in a Speck…
Humans are very arrogant creatures, and we often forget just how small we are in relation to the rest of the Universe. So much so that our units of measurement are very impractical to use on a larger scale, so we will mostly be using light seconds, minutes, hours, day, months and years to talk about […] Continue reading
Tardigrades
Tardigrades are amazing extremophiles! They are minute animals that are the only organism proven to withstand the vacuum of space. Recently, thousands of them were attached to a satellite that was spent into space, and were exposed into the vacuum of space to see how they would survive. As they dried out in space, their DNA broke […] Continue reading
Posted in Class, SolarSystem
Tagged astro2110, blog9, extremophiles, size, SizeandScale
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A Viral Photo Gone Wrong
This image was talked about in class today; it has gone viral as a supposed image of Earth from the Hubble Deep Space Telescope. There are a number of reasons why this is absolutely impossible. One clear reason is the size of the atmosphere. From this distance, the atmosphere on Earth could not possibly be […] Continue reading
Posted in Class, SolarSystem
Tagged astro2110, blog6, earth, size, SizeandScale
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The size and scale of the solar system
http://www.space.com/30590-solar-system-built-to-scale-in-nevada-desert-video.html I thought this video was a fascinating new way to consider both the size and scale of the Solar System in one experience; so often orbits in images of our Solar System are to scale compared to each other, but not compared to the size of the planets. Instead, often the planets are far too […] Continue reading
Posted in Class, SolarSystem
Tagged astro2110, blog1, marbleearth, size, SizeandScale
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Blog #1 Vast Size and Scale
From Chapter 1 of our course textbook, we dived deep into the vastness that is space. We explored what our cosmic address is, how long it takes to travel among the stars in terms of light-years, and measured our distance from the center of the Milky Way. Despite this almost unimaginable expanse, the chapter doesn’t really […] Continue reading
Blog #1: The Size of the Universe
The size and scale of the universe is extremely difficult for the human brain to understand. It is hard for us to wrap our minds around just how vast and empty space actually is. When we first learn about the solar … Continue reading → Continue reading
The Scope of the Universe
Although we talked about the scale of the Sun, the galaxy, and the rest of the universe, it didn’t really …