Archive for the 'talks' Category

Hubble videos

Published Tuesday, 14 October, 2008 Hubble Space Telescope , media , talks 2 Comments

For any of you reading the blog who came to my Hubble talk last night, hello! As promised here are a few select links to some of the videos from the presentation. First up is a zoom into the Hubble Ultra Deep Field – click on the images to go to the spacetelescope.org video page where you can download whatever version and size you want.

The Hubble Ultra Deep Field Credit: NASA, ESA, and N. Pirzkal (European Space Agency/STScI) and the HUDF Team (STScI)

Next is a pair of videos showing the creation of the stunning Cat’s Eye nebula – first the companion star dies creating the concentric shells of material, then the jets and magnetic field of the other (alive) star warp and twist into the nebula to create the central detail and swirls. The first part is here and the second you’ll find by clicking on the image below.

The Cat’s Eye Nebula Credit: ESA, NASA, HEIC and The Hubble Heritage Team STScI/AURA)

Lastly then is a video of the bizarre object called V838 Monocerotis. You can download the video by clicking here. And remember that you can see more videos and (almost) all of the images from my talk on the ESA Hubble website here – www.spacetelescope.org.

Final Hubble talk for 2008

Published Tuesday, 7 October, 2008 Hubble Space Telescope , astronomy outreach , talks Leave a Comment

On Monday (13th October) I will be giving my final Hubble talk of the year to the West of London Astronomical Society (WOLAS). It will be, once again, entitled “Not just pretty pictures – the science behind Hubble’s greatest images”. The society has written a nice synopsis of the background of the talk, on their meetings page here.


What are these (different) things coming out of this cloud? Come to my lecture to find out! Credit: NASA and Jeff Hester (Arizona State University)

I’ve really enjoyed giving this particular talk this year however I’m going to be busy working on something else for the next few months, so this will be my last one for a bit. For now though if you are interested in coming along to the WOLAS meet-up here’s a map to Christ Church, Redford Way, Uxbridge where the meeting is being held.

Mars madness, Hubble and some book news

Published Wednesday, 20 August, 2008 astronomy outreach , books , science writing , talks Leave a Comment

I’ve had several emails, in the last two weeks or so, asking when Mars is going to appear the size of the Full Moon this August. I was going to post something up about this, however it seems Phil has been asked about it too. So I’ll leave the Bad Astronomer himself to debunk it, but in short this is absolutely not true and will not happen. It’s an email/Internet hoax that has been going around the Internet for the last few years. Unfortunately it seems to rear its ugly head every August.

Mars’s mean distance from the Earth is about 225 million kilometres meaning that even through a powerful amateur telescope it will only appear as a disc showing (at best) the polar ice caps and a few dark surface markings. At the moment Mars is not well placed for viewing as it’s far too close to the Sun (as seen from Earth). As the Earth and Mars travel through their orbits around the Sun, the distance between the two planets changes dramatically. So some years Mars does come closer to us and telescopic views do show it much better at these times than others. Yet even at its closest (56 million km) it only appears with the naked eye as a bright ’star’ with a ruddy tint, certainly nothing like the diameter of the Moon which is a mere 380,000 km from Earth.

Anyway on to much more sensible things – like a reminder of the talks I will be giving in the next few weeks! On the 2nd September I will be talking at the Wiltshire Astronomical Society, details are here. So if you are in the region come along and say hello. I will be giving my talk on the science behind Hubble’s greatest images entitled “Not just pretty pictures”. Then on Saturday 6th September I will be giving a lecture (starting at 2:45 pm) at the 2008 Herstmonceux Astronomy Festival, again with the my talk on the science in Hubble’s images. You can find out about the festival here as well as information on the main Saturday lectures here.

Finally then a bit of random book news. Yesterday I finished editing the manuscript and tomorrow will be sending off my final draft of the book to the publisher’s in New York. It’s quite exciting for me, as the next time I see it it will probably be in the form of the galley proofs. Lastly (I mean it this time) If you’re in the shops this week the new issue of Sky At Night magazine is out. You can read my cover feature on “The Next Supernova”, to see which Milky Way star astronomers think might be next to go supernova.

Bristol lecture (6th June 2008)

Published Monday, 2 June, 2008 Hubble Space Telescope , astronomy outreach , talks Leave a Comment

I will be giving a talk on the Hubble Space Telescope to the Bristol Astronomical Society this Friday at 7:15pm. It’s being held at Bristol Grammar School and members of the public are welcome to come along. For more information please visit the BAS website.

Herstmonceux Astronomy Festival 2008 lecture

Published Tuesday, 29 April, 2008 astronomy outreach , observatories , talks Leave a Comment

I’m very pleased to announce that I will be giving a talk at this year’s Herstmonceux Astronomy Festival, held at the famous Herstmonceux observatory in Sussex. The subject of my talk will be the science behind the Hubble Space Telescope’s greatest images. I’m very excited about speaking at the festival as the other speakers are all very highly regarded astronomers. To find out more about the festival, which will be held on the 5th, 6th and 7th of September, visit the Observatory Science Centre’s website here.

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