As you are certainly aware of, the Geoff Welch Literary Competition is now back on track. You will find enclosed a brief background story on this competition as well as the amended rules.

The competition runs from October to July of the following year, which means that it is now open but you still have 9 months to send your entry for this year.

Everybody can enter and, for more chance to win a prize, you can send as many

In this issuePage 1: Editorial President’s messagePage 2: Calendar/Communications Hubble images at ImaxPage 3: Impact on Jupiter Richest planetary systemPage 4: Synchronous rotation Observing from SydneyPage 5: Water vapour on carbon starPage 6: Life in the Blue MountainsPage 7: St Ives North PS Star PartyPage 8: Sausage sizzle Secret message

Journal of the Northern Sydney Astronomical Society Inc. Volume 21 Number 4 October 2010

This issue of Reflections should be reaching you early October, so it’s now the end of the Society’s year.

The NSAS Annual General Meeting will be on Tuesday the 19th of October at St. Ignatius, and as Presidents usually do, I urge you to attend and make your thoughts about the Society known and, if you would like to participate more than you did this last year, consider nominating for a position on the Committee, or at least volunteering for one of the many roles in the Society that go to make up the “little jobs” that make the difference in how the Society delivers to its membership.

The Society continues to attract new members but in much lower numbers than during the IYA09 and, in fact, we have had more or less a balance of member numbers since the start of the year, with some leaving and some joining, leaving us with about 60 members. One of the things that we really need to consider is whether this is an adequate membership to provide the activities and services that the Society presently supports. I believe most of the current Committee has come to the conclusion that we need to increase our membership to get an adequate number of volunteers to carry out the current activities of the Society, and we will have to come up with some effective recruitment in the future.

President’s MessageSo what have we done during the year? I’m pleased that we have been able to maintain a very high level of presenters from the professional astrophysical field, and in particular, we were fortunate to get a strong group from Macquarie University and CSIRO, as support from the traditional Universities has dried up this year. On the basis of a conscious decision by the Committee to back off on outreach activities, we have had a more modest year in this respect, with support of Macquarie Open Night, St. Ignatius Science Week (washed out) and some schools, including St. Ives North Public. Thanks to all the volunteers who have supported the outreach this year.

The various core groups and streams have continued with varying interest this year. The Theory Group continues to work its way through “Understanding the Universe” to great satisfaction of the participants. Observing has had a marginal year, with particularly bad weather at Observing dates, but there have been a couple of successful sausage sizzles at North Turramurra, and one good night at Mt White earlier this year. We’re thinking of another Mt White night before the end of the year. The New Astronomers Group has been quite active at times during the year, even though there have only been a limited number of new members with scopes. As of late, it appears to be tiring, and the future of the NAG may

depend on new members with interest in observing.

After having been very static for a couple of years, the NSAS website has been completely rebuilt, and quite recently, has been made much more dynamic, with current astronomical news on the front page. More needs to be done, and will be, as our volunteers have time.

Finally, one of the Committee’s achievements of the current year has been the successful resolution to amend the Constitution of the Society to make more clear the obligation of members to pay their dues within a reasonable time, and to allow the Society to cancel the membership of non-financial members, which was not possible under the Model Constitution under which we operate.

I’ve enjoyed being your President for the current year, and whether I continue in that role or another depends on whether I can convince some of you to take an active

role in the management of the Society for the next year. See you at the AGM.

Best Regards,

Bob Fuller

contributions as you wish.Your articles do not have to be byzantine. In fact they should be an easy and interesting read for all members so, fire up your computer and send them tonsas.editor@ozemail.com.au,I’m eagerly waiting for them.

Cheerio,Jean-Luc Gaubicher

General Meetings: October 19th Annual General Meeting Guest Speaker: TBA November 16th Guest Speaker: TBA December 21st Christmas Party

NAG Meetings: October 26th November 23rd

Theory Group Meetings: October 12th November 9th December 14th

Observation Nights: October 1st / October 15th November 5th / November 12th December 3rd / December 10th Deadline: Please send your contributions to the April issue of Reflections in time to reach the editor

before December 15th to nsas.editor@ozemail.com.au

Calendar

I was privileged to be able to attend the preview for teachers of the stunning Hubble images, back in August.Even more interesting was my inclusion in the attendance of my granddaughter’s class of 11-year old students of the same 3D performance, the following week.

The class travelled down from Morpeth, near Maitland, took in the Power House Museum’s Space Display and came on to Imax at Darling Harbour.

It was good to see the session before theirs, as they came pouring in, almost all were school children, What a worthwhile audience!I was seated amongst the children, They were attentive and obviously impressed by the overwhelming difficulties that were successfully overcome.

But what surprised me the most, was the discussion on the bus home when I travelled back up with

them. I expected school children chatter but the talk was of what had impressed them most, a varied lot of opinions, and all about their admiration of what they had seen.

I certainly found it worthwhile seeing these Hubble images a second time and was inspired by the children’s deep appreciation of their experience.

Lydia Bell

Hubble Images at Imax

Pictures by the author

Shop 3075, Westfield Shopping CentreCnr Florence and Hunter StreetsHornsby NSW 2077 AustraliaPhone: 02 9257 0092www.australiangeographic.com.au

I am a frequent visitor to the forums of IceInSpace as it is a great place to catch up with what is happening with amateur astronomy in Australia.While I was browsing through the various forums, I happened across one post which had just been added.It was dated 3rd June 2010 at 9:20 pm and was titled “Jupiter Impact, June 3 2010“ You can probably see why this article caught my eye. I looked at the post and this is what it said:

Jupiter Impact, June 3 2010.Morning all :-) This is not a hoax, at approximately 20:30utc this morning I recorded a large fireball on Jupiter, it lasted a couple of seconds and was very bright. I have it recorded on video :-)I’m at Trevors place at the moment, using his internet, I’ll put together a short video later. This was a large fireball, but it doesn’t seem to have left any mark, probably all gone in the upper atmosphere before it reached the clouds. How exciting! Cheers, Bird

Bird is actually Anthony Wesley, an amateur astronomer in Broken Hill who became famous in July 2009 by being the first to detect the impact of an asteroid on Jupiter which left clearly visible marks on the planet..Well Anthony Wesley has done it again and the post above was how he revealed that just 11 months later he has witnessed and recorded a 2nd impact on Jupiter..... this time an impact which has left no marks.Though there are no visible signs of the impact, the video footage and images of the event are amazing. One person reading the posts by “Bird” suggested that NASA should put him on their payroll if he keeps on discovering new events.

Roy Jordan

Impact on Jupiter... Again!

Astronomers using ESO’s world-leading HARPS instrument have discovered a planetary system containing at least five planets, orbiting the Sun-like star HD 10180.

The researchers also have tantalising evidence that two other planets may be present, one of which would have the lowest mass ever found. This would make the system similar to our Solar System in terms of the number of planets (seven as compared to the Solar System’s eight planets). Furthermore, the team also found evidence that the distances of the planets from their star follow a regular pattern, as also seen in our Solar System. “We have found what is most likely the system with the most planets yet discovered,” says Christophe Lovis, lead author of the paper reporting the result.

The team of astronomers used the HARPS spectrograph, attached to ESO’s 3.6-metre telescope at La Silla, Chile, for a six-year-

long study of the Sun-like star HD 10180, located 127 light-years away in the southern

constellation of Hydrus. HARPS is an instrument with unrivalled measurement stability and great precision and is the world’s most s u c c e s s f u l e x o p l a n e t hunter.Thanks to the 190 individual H A R P S measurements,

t h e

astronomers detected the tiny back and forth motions of the star caused by the complex gravitational attractions from five or more planets. The five strongest signals correspond to planets with Neptune-like masses — between 13 and 25 Earth masses — which orbit the star with periods ranging from about 6 to 600 days. These planets are located between 0.06 and 1.4 times the

Earth–Sun distance from their central star.“We also have good reasons to believe that two other planets are present,” says Lovis. One would be a Saturn-like planet (with a minimum mass of 65 Earth masses) orbiting in 2200 days. The other would be the least massive exoplanet ever discovered, with a mass of about 1.4 times that of the Earth. It is very close to its host star, at just 2 percent of the Earth–Sun distance. One “year” on this planet would last only 1.18 Earth-days.

Continued on page 6

Richest Planetary System Discovered

ESO 3.6 m telescope, La silla Observatory

HD 10180Image Credit: ESO and Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgment: Davide De Martin

Back to Basics: Synchronous rotationSynchronous rotation is a phenomenon that occurs when a satellite (moon) orbits its planet close enough so that the period of rotation of the satellite is synchronized with its period of revolution.Seen from the planet, it always presents the same face. Or seen from the satellite, the planet appears fixed in the sky.

Gravitational attraction between two celestial bodies produces tidal forces that tend to stretch them in the direction of the axis planet-moon. This is because the gravitational forces on the near sides of the bodies are greater than the gravitational forces at the centres of these bodies and even greater than the ones on the far sides.If the bodies in question are sufficiently flexible and if the tidal forces are sufficiently strong these bodies will be slightly deformed.As the majority of the moons are spherical under the action of their own gravity, the action of the tidal forces give them a slightly elongated shape (football shaped) pointing toward the planet.As the moon turns the tidal forces try to keep the bulges aligned with its

planet, which creates frictions that dissipate energy and slow down the moon’s rotation. This slowing-down is dependent on the magnitude of the forces of friction that are impeding the re-alignment of the bulges: it can be greater in case of a highly rigid body or it can be less important if the bulges are fluid, which is the case for the Earth with its oceanic and atmospheric tides.The result of these constantly changing tidal distortions is the production of heat that

causes rotational energy to be lost. Eventually, over eons, the moon slows down until its rotation about its axis exactly matches its orbital period and keeping always the same face toward the planet. This is called tidal synchronization

As a matter of fact, all moons in the solar system are synchronized with their planets, the only known exception being Hyperion, one of the many moons of Saturn.In the case of Pluto and its moon Charon, it goes one step further, both are tidally locked to each other: viewed from Pluto’s surface Charon has always the same position in the sky and, viewed from Charon’s surface, Pluto too has always the same position in the sky.Syncrhonous rotation can be achieved pretty quickly when the mass difference between moon and planet is large enough: it is estimated that it took ony a few tens of millions of years for our Moon to become tidally locked. When it comes to Earth, it too is slowing down. It is estimated that the energy dissipated by the tidal forces caused by the Moon and the Sun is approximately 2.75 terawatt, which brings about a lengthening of Earth’s day of approximately 2 ms: one day, billions of years from now, Earth too will be in synchronous rotation with the Moon.

Jean-Luc Gaubicher

The far side of the MoonImage Credit: NASA, Apollo 16 crew

Observing the night skies from SydneyOctober 2010

47 Tucanae (NGC 104)Constellation name: TucanaA globular cluster, 16,000 light years away, 47 Tuc is a naked eye object shining at magnitude 4.5. It is the second brightest cluster after Omega Centauri but its core is much more compact and is very bright

The Sculptor Galaxy (NGC 253)Constellation name: SculptorNGC 253 is a large spiral galaxy seen almost edge-on. that is approximately 11 millions ligt-years distant. Itis a “starburtst galaxy” where star formation is taking place a t an exceptionaly high rate.At magnitude NGC 253 can be seen through binoculars under dak skies but larger telescopes are necessary to show some texture.

Omicron Ceti (Mira) Constellation name: CetusOmicron Ceti is the most variable star. Discovered in 1596, it was named it Mira Stella, the Wonderful Star, by Johannes Hevelius in 1662. Its magnitude varies between 3.4 and 9.3 with a periodicity of 332 days. According to AAVSO, its next maximum should take place on the 16th of this month.

November 2010Zeta Piscium

Constellation name: PiscesZeta Piscium is a magnificent double star. Its 2 stars, a whight dwarf star and a pale-yellow star of magnitude 5.6 and 6.5, are separated by 24 arcseconds that can be easily resolved with a medium size telescope.

47 TucanaeImage Credit: ESO

The Andromeda Galaxy (M 31)Constellation name: AndromedaThe Andromeda Galaxy is part of the local cluster of galaxies the closest spirsal galaxy to us. Under dark skies it is one of the most distant object visible to the naked eye at a distance of aproximately 2.5 million light-years. A small telescope will also reveal 2 companion eliptical galaxies: M 32 and M 110.

M 15 (NGC 7078) Constellation name: PegasusM 15 is a globular luster about 34,000 light -years away from the Earth and is estimated to be 13 billion years old . Its 6.2 magnitude makes it a binocular object but a telescope of 200mm is necessary to resolve it in individual stars.

December 2010The Great Barred Galaxy (NGC 1365)

Constellation name: FornaxThe Fornax cluster is one of the largest cluster of galaxies. One of its best known member is the Great Barred Galaxy. Despite its name, you will need a fairly large telescope and good conditions to view NGC 1365’s bar. Situated at a distance 56 million light-years its magnitude is around 10.3.

Omicron 2 Eridani (40 Eridani - Keid)Constellation name: EridanusOmicron 2 Eridani is an interesting triple star less than 16.5 light-years away.The primary star, a magnitude 4 orange dwarf, is easily visible to the naked eye.. The 2 other components are a magnitude 9 white dwarf and a magnitude 11 red dwarf.

NGC 1399 and NGC 1404Constellation name: FornaxA wide-field eyepice should allow you to see another interseting view in Fornax. NGC 1399 and NGC 1404 are two elliptical galaxies that lies just a few arcminutes apart in the midst of a few other faint galaxies NGC 1365

Image Credit: ESO/IDA

M 31Image Credit: JL Gaubicher/ESA/ESO/ NASA Fits Liberator

A team of astronomers led by Leen Decin (University of Amsterdam and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium) have found water vapour in the atmosphere of a carbon star using the Herschel space observatory.

Until now the formation of water vapour in the atmosphere of such a star was deemed impossible. When the astronomers discovered the unexpected cloud of water vapour around the old red giant star CW Leonis (IRC+10216) in 2001, they immediately began searching for the source.Stars like IRC+10216 are known as carbon stars and are thought not to make much water. Initially they suspected the star’s heat must have been evaporating water from comets or even dwarf planets.Now, Herschel’s PACS and SPIRE instruments have revealed that the secret ingredient is ultraviolet light, because the water is too hot to have come from the destruction of icy celestial bodies.

“This is a good example of how better

instruments can change our picture completely,” says Decin. The superb sensitivity of Herschel’s instruments has revealed that the water around IRC+10216 varies in temperature from about –200°C to 800°C, which indicates that it is being formed much closer to the star than comets can stably exist. IRC+10216 is a red giant star, hundreds of times the Sun’s size, although only a few times its mass. It is 500 light years away and while it is barely detectable at visible wavelengths, even in the largest telescopes, it is the brightest star in the sky in the infrared at a wavelength of 10µm. This is because of a huge envelope of dust that surrounds it and absorbs almost all its visible radiation and re-emits it as infrared light.It is in this envelope that the water vapour has been found. But how did it get there? Observations had already revealed the

clumpy structure in the dusty envelope around IRC+10216. The astronomers realised that ultraviolet light emitted by

stars can reach deep into the envelope between the clumps and break up molecules such as carbon monoxide and silicon monoxide, releasing oxygen atoms. The oxygen atoms then attach themselves to hydrogen molecules, forming water.

“This is the only mechanism that explains the full

range of the water’s temperature,” says Decin.The closer to the star the water is formed, the hotter it will be.

Decin and her colleagues now plan to extend the observations to other carbon stars. “We are very hopeful that Herschel will find the same situations around those stars too,” she says.

SRONNetherlands Institute for space Research

CW LeonisImage Credit: ESA/PACS/SPIRE/MESS

Water vapour discovered on carbon star

Frederick Eccleston Du Faur was born in London in 1832 and died in Australia 1915. He had arrived in Australia in 1853 and was chief draftsman in the Crown Lands Office in the 1870s. He was a member of an intellectual group, the Royal Society.

He formed a strong attachment to the Blue Mountains landscape and purchased land at Mt Wilson in 1875.In 1874 Du Faur was chosen as one of the official observers of the Transit of Venus, expected on 9th December that year, and last observed in 1769 by Captain James Cook.Of the four government Astronomical Stations established, the one at Woodford was set up in the seven hectare former police paddock to the west of Alfred Fairfax’s house. The observation was successfully accomplished on the expected date.

Du Faur introduced the artist William Piguenit (1836–1914) and landscape photographer Joseph Bischoff to Grose Valley in 1875.

Life in the Blue Mountains: An Astronomer and a Politician

Sir Henry Parkes emigrated to Australia with his wife Clarinda in 1839.In the mid 1870s he built a country retreat on land in the Blue Mountains which he named Faulconbridge after his mother, Martha Faulconbridge.On his death in 1896 his family declined the pomp and ceremony of a State funeral.

The event attracted a vast array of dignitaries and citizens. The mourners filled six carriages of the special funeral train that bore his body from the Sydney Mortuary Station to Faulconbridge.There Sir Henry was laid to rest beside his wife in the small cemetery he had earlier set aside from his estate as sacred ground. Photos of him and his funeral cortege are shown.

By a strange twist of fate politics and astronomy somehow share a link, the town of Parkes being the home of the famous radio telescope.

Arthur Boyd

Woodford Astronomicla StationPicture by Joseph Bischoff

Sir Henry Parkes at Faulconbridge(Springwood Historical Society)

The funeral cortege of Sir Henry Parkes at Central Station on 29 April 1896(Springwood Historical Society)

Continued from page 3“This object causes a wobble of its star of only about 3 km/hour— slower than walking speed — and this motion is very hard to measure,” says team member Damien Ségransan.If confirmed, this object would be another example of a hot rocky planet, similar to Corot-7b.The newly discovered system of planets around HD 10180 is unique in several respects. First of all, with at least five Neptune-like planets lying within a distance equivalent to the orbit of Mars, this system is more populated than our Solar System in its inner region, and has many more

massive planets there Furthermore, the system probably has no Jupiter-like gas giant. In addition, all the planets seem to have almost circular orbits.

Using the new discovery as well as data for other planetary systems, the astronomers found an equivalent of the Titius–Bode law that exists in our Solar System: the distances of the planets from their star seem to follow a regular pattern. “This could be a signature of the formation process of these planetary systems,” says team member Michel Mayor.Another important result found by the astronomers while studying these systems

is that there is a relationship between the mass of a planetary system and the mass and chemical content of its host star. All very massive planetary systems are found around massive and metal-rich stars, while the four lowest-mass systems are found around lower-mass and metal-poor stars. Such properties confirm current theoretical models.The discovery was announced on 24 August 2010 at the international colloquium “Detection and dynamics of transiting exoplanets”, at the Observatoire de Haute-Provence, France.

For more details go to:http://ww.eso.org/public/news/eso1035/

Richest Planetary System Discovered

This evening was organised by Paul Brooks who is a parent at the school and was held on 11th August 2010.

This Star night turned out to be a worthwhile event with a very clear sky, the children, parents and teachers enjoyed themselves and found it an informative evening and everything ran very smoothly.

Although only 3 of us from NSAS eventually made it to the school, we were welcomed with offers of food and coffee or tea and, later on, were presented with a bag of goodies to tie us over for the evening.; a very warm welcome.

While Paul Brooks had organised for specific intervals for each child to be at

St Ives North PS Star Nighta scope it turned out each one came to have a look, with a parent in tow, and they moved on very quickly. There was a teacher standing by to assist when this was required.

Initially we looked at Venus, Mars and Saturn and later on some shifted to formations such as the Jewel Box.The children were very impressed with Saturn, just with its shape and its rings.Some were amazed by the gaps between the rings and many expressed astonishment at seeing Saturn “in the flesh”.

For many it was the first time they had ever looked through a telescope and this was an exciting experience for both children and parents.

One boy said he could see the ice cap on Mars, while an adult seriously enquired “Where does the sun go in the evening?”

The evening lasted until about 8pm when most people had left and by 8.30pm the sky was clouded over.

We all enjoyed the evening and learnt how to do it better next time.

Peter Korber

Pictures by Lara Kepitis

The Binocular and Telescope Shop84 Wentworth Park RoadGlebe NSW 2037Phone: (02) 9518 7255

Find the Secret Message by Roy JordanT H T F A R C E C A P S P E L F A I R SO R B I T S R T S P M E M I E V R E S ON T O D S P S A E A R I G O O T I Q H RS S F I R A U O T I T H L N O R O U E ER O T O E C N E G S T E R K U N B I C DA L E R M E O E P Y Y E L A Y B O N A GS A C E O S E N E O P R T L L W N O P IL R L T N H T A S U C N A E I S A X S AU W I S O U R R S T E S F N O T M Y P NP I P A R T A H E C E R E L I M E A E TO N S P T T O N A G A L A L W B T U E GA D E O S L A M A W S R L Y E S E R D AL R D G A E I L D R S A E A T T O O N LU E I E E X A E A Y I L N L T I R R C IB T T E O X T S S I R A L O P I V A E LE A A R I I A T M O S P H E R E O A S EN R P E H U E L O H K C A L B O K N R OR C S W Q M M U N I V E R S E S C T A GA N D R O M E D A G A L A X Y R O N P G

Find and circle all of the Astronomy related words that are hidden in the grid. The remaining letters spell a secret message.

ANDROMEDA GALAXYAPOGEEASTEROIDASTRONOMERATMOSPHEREAURORABINARY STARBLACK HOLECONSTELLATIONCORONACRATERDEEP SPACEECLIPSEEQUINOXGALAXIESGALILEOGRAVITYHUBBLEKEPLERLIGHT YEARMETEORMILKY WAY

MOONNEBULAORBITPARSECPERIGEEPOLARISPROXIMA CENTAURIPULSARSQUASARSRED GIANTSATELLITESOLAR SYSTEMSOLAR WINDSPACE SHUTTLESPACECRAFTSTARSSUNSUPERNOVATELESCOPETIDESUNIVERSEWHITE DWARF

Solution: Use a mirror to discover the secret message The first person to set foot on the Moon was Neil Armstrong

Sausage Sizzle at Tarrumarra

Reflections is published quarterly by the Northern Sydney Astronomical Society IncPO Box 56 Lane Cove 1595 Tel: 0423 971 374 E-mail: nsas@nsas.org.au Web site: www.nsas.org.au