November 2007 - Utah-Astronomy - mailman.xmission.com

Re: [Utah-astronomy] Fwd: Whats Up: November and a Cassini question
by Kurt Fisher 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

The following was posted on CloudyNights purported as a response from the Cassini team to Irish Deirdre Kelleghan's inquiry to NASA/JPL - Kurt ================================ "Nov. 6, 2007 First of all, quite a few of the project members have been following Comet 17P/Holmes, and are very excited about this unique astronomical event. However, there are three principal difficulties with pointing Cassini's cameras at Comet 17P/Holmes. First, it is quite close to the Sun as seen from Cassini. We cannot point our cameras very close to the Sun or sunlight will damage the instruments. Comet 17P/Holmes may be far enough from the Sun to target it - just barely - in about a week, but stray light from the Sun may make it impossible to take any useful measurements. Second, Cassini is about six times as far away from Comet 17P/Holmes as the Earth is. Remember, Saturn is nearly 10 times as far from the Sun as the Earth, and the comet is still in the inner solar system. Ground-based telescopes and orbiting platforms like Hubble are much closer than Cassini is, and generally more able to conduct better science. Third, since our spacecraft carries twelve instruments with twenty-seven associated investigations, we must design and build our sequences many months in advance to plan the detailed and optimized measurements our scientists (and the public) deserve. In order to add a new observation days or weeks in advance, we must work very hard to rebuild a piece of a sequence and test it thoroughly to make sure we don't make a mistake. Also, we have very little idle time on board the spacecraft, so observations of 17P/Holmes would have to replace interesting observations of some other very fascinating body in Saturn's system - and those are the measurements Cassini was built to take. We almost never do this - outside of responding to an anomaly - and only for the very highest priority activities. Having said all that, however, there actually are Cassini scientists that are looking into the feasibility of taking some observations of Comet 17P/Holmes. It really is a very interesting astronomical event, and Cassini carries an Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrograph which could make observations that Earth-based instruments could not (since Earth's atmosphere blocks nearly all of the UV part of the spectrum). Also, imaging the comet and its tails from a different perspective could also be scientifically useful (as well as pretty cool!). These potential observations are in a very primitive stage, and would have to be justified against the interference in our existing sequences, the added workload they would cause, and any risks associated with pointing close to the sun. But stay tuned, and perhaps we'll have something to add to the excitement in the coming months." _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Sky-at-Night tips on taking M31 wide field images
by Kurt Fisher 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

The current webbroadcast of Moore's _The Sky at Night_ includes a segment with tips on taking wide-field images of M31. No mosaic techniques are shown. - Kurt http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/space/spaceguide/skyatnight/proginfo.shtml _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Re: [Utah-astronomy] Fwd: Whats Up: November and a Cassini question
by Kurt Fisher 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

Richard, I agree with the Cassini team analysis - they aren't likely to add any useable science. Personally, what I'd like to see is an advanced image from Dr. Harold Weaver's 10-29 session imaging 17P with the Hubble. Weaver bio: http://heritage.stsci.edu/2007/14/bio/bio_primary.html He is a leading comet scientist who goes back to Shoemaker-Levy 9 days. But these are busy people, so I have been hesitant to post anything on wide-dispersion newsgroups, lest a butch of people start pestering him. One the other hand - a discrete inquiry from our resident reporter employed by a major local paper (hint, hint) - might be appropriate. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Re: [Utah-astronomy] Comet mosaics
by Kurt Fisher 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

Joe asked, > I have been using software that was specific to my SBIG camera. > I use Maxim DL to adjust the image. Still, I do have Meade > imageing software, so I imagine I should be able to use the > SBIG with its software to acquire the photos and the > Meade software to put them together -- does that make sense? > Thanks again, Joe The Meade Dizzle feature is their Envisage image capture software. You have to use it within Envisage capture package. Drizzle is not part of their post-capture AutoStar image processing software. I do not believe that Envisage supports an SBIG camera, but I could be wrong on that. As how to mosaic within Maxim DL, I don't know how to do that, not being a DL licensee. Here's a webpage returned from a search engine that explains how to use Maxim DL's mosaic command to blend images together into a mosaic. http://www.cyanogen.com/help/maximdl/Context2/HID_EDIT_MOSAIC.htm The instructions seem fairly straight forward - but in astronomy software - that means "cross your fingers." -:) - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Friday morning's comet pictures
by Patrick Wiggins 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

My pictures of Comet Holmes from Friday morning are on the U-A Gallery. http://gallery.utahastronomy.com/v/patrickw/ patrick

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Re: [Utah-astronomy] Comet mosaics
by Kurt Fisher 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

Joe asked: > So what's the secret of assembling mosaics? To some extent, it is a software specific answer. I believe you have a Meade SCT. In the current version of the Meade Envisage software (4.85), their "dizzle" image processing option automates the mosaic taking process. In Envisage 4.85, in image process select "dizzle". A setting option button labeled, normally hidden and labeled (appropriately) "settings" will appear next to the "Evaluation count" option. This setting option will allow you to choose the multipler for the extended image size. For Meade enabled telescopes, the software will handle taking the multiple pictures and assembling the mosaic. Mosaics are covered at pages 9 through 14 in Part I of the Drizzle manual (2005). If you do not have the current version, it (and the Drizzle manuals) can be downloaded from Meade. The advantage of Envisage is that it handles the merge process for you. For manually merging individual images, I have found the freeware program iMerge particularly easy to use and effective. It works with fits, jpg or bmp images. I have used it, for example, to build panoramas from Apollo mission hand-held taken on the surface of the Moon. Other image processing packages like AIP4WIN also include image seam matching features. If you are in the Celestron equipment world - for example my Synta mount, third party freeware can be used to assist in taking the individual images. EQMOD is a simple application that uses the generic ASCOM drivers and a Celestron 5e emulator. All you have to do is to point at the target's center and then specify the final mosaic size. EQMOD automates driving the scope around to individual mosaic frames. It stops and alerts you to take a picture and then slews the scope to the next frame of the mosaic. I don't know Maxim DL. Hope that is of some help in giving you some options. - Kurt _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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RE: [Utah-astronomy] Discovery
by Kurt Fisher 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

Congrats, Patrick. How do you search for a new asteriod? _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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Comet mosaics
by Patrick Wiggins 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

Thanks to Jerry Foote who talked me through the process (Thanks again Jerry) I was able to shoot and assemble a couple of 9 panel mosaics of Comet Holmes tonight. Each panel measures 9' x 13'. With a 5% overlap I'm guessing that nets a field of about 25' X 35'. I tried to add them to the UA Gallery but somehow managed to delete my section... (And I'm supposed to be an administrator?) So I've planted them on my site until I can move them to U-A. Both were taken with a C-14 @ f/11, SBIG ST-10 binned 3x3 and chilled to -25°. Because the exposures were so short I did not need to guide. Each of the 9 raw images used in each mosaic were reduced with flats and darks before being woven into the final product. The 5" version: http://users.wirelessbeehive.com/~paw/temp/HOLMES08NOV2007-005.JPG The 10" version: http://users.wirelessbeehive.com/~paw/temp/HOLMES08NOV2007-010.JPG patrick

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Fwd: Whats Up: November and a Cassini question
by Richard Tenney 11 Nov '07

11 Nov '07

This answers a question posed recently about the comet being imaged from Cassini... --- jane.h.jones(a)jpl.nasa.gov wrote: > Date: Fri, 9 Nov 2007 17:03:27 -0800 (PST) > From: jane.h.jones(a)jpl.nasa.gov > To: retenney(a)yahoo.com > Subject: Whats Up: November and a Cassini question > --------------------------------- Hello Richard Tenney, We received quite a few questions to the Cassini website this week from people who asked about the possibility of Cassini taking an image of the interested comet 17P/Holmes which brightened suddenly a little over 2 weeks ago. Soo many questions that we turned it into a FAQ or Frequently Asked Question on our website. I thought you would enjoy the question and the answer. Here is answer to Does it make sense to point the cameras on the Cassini spacecraft toward Comet 17P/Holmes? If you have a question about Cassini, you can go to any of the Cassini webpages, and at the bottom of the page, click "Contact us" and ask your question. It can take a few weeks for a response - we get a lot of questions. But before asking, you can always read the FAQs. You can find them also on the bottom navigation bar of every Cassini web page. Those we get a lot of are turned into FAQs. And here is this months Whats Up - not about Saturn, Im afraid, but rather, about Mars and Mira Thats all for now! Jane Jane Houston Jones Senior Outreach Specialist, Cassini Program JPL - 4800 Oak Grove Drive, MS 230-205 Pasadena, CA 91109 Phone - 818-393-6435 Fax - 818-393-4495 jane.h.jones(a)jpl.nasa.gov http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

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U of U astro article in Tribune
by Kurt Fisher 10 Nov '07

10 Nov '07

U. shedding light on black holes Utah group helped identify high energy particles' likely origin By Sheena McFarland The Salt Lake Tribune 11/10/2007 http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_7425136 U researchers participant in massive study that associates ultra high energy cosmic particles with massive galactic cores. Findings published in Nov. 9 issue of _Science_. Related article - Correlation of the Highest-Energy Cosmic Rays with Nearby Extragalactic Objects The Pierre Auger Collaboration* Science 9 November 2007: Vol. 318. no. 5852, pp. 938 - 943 DOI: 10.1126/science.1151124 http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;318/5852/938 _______________________________________________ Sent via CSolutions - http://www.csolutions.net

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