astronomy links

collected by the OSU Astronomy Club .

modified 1999-01-16.

contents:

• about the OSU astronomy club
• Other astronomy organizations
• asteroids, planets, stars, galaxies, etc.
• Technical details about telescopes, software, and related ground-based hardware
• Space Telescopes The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) & Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST).
• Rockets, Corporations, and other ways of getting from Earth to Elsewhere
• Satellites, space stations, and other hardware in space
• Orbital Mechanics
• misc astronomy links

Related pages:

spaceship design http://www.rdrop.com/~cary/html/link_farm.html#spacecraft

asteroids, planets, stars, galaxies, etc.

• Star Map http://www.mtwilson.edu/Services/StarMap/: "enter the date, the U.T. time, and your longitude and latitude ... to get a star map ... you can control such things as the minimum magnitude of stars to show ... meteor showers". It returns the map in Postscript, but has a nice link to Ghostscript viewers.
• Bite-Sized Astronomy http://www.badastronomy.com/bitesize/ (fascinating little nuggets of information) /* was http://www.smart.net/~badastro/bitesize.html */
• Europa http://www.seds.org/nineplanets/nineplanets/europa.html just part of "The Nine Planets A Multimedia Tour of the Solar System by Bill Arnett " http://www.aai.ee/planets/nineplanets/nineplanets.html mirror: http://www.seds.org/billa/tnp/nineplanets.html
• 3D Starmaps http://www.clark.net/pub/nyrath/starmap.html tells where stars are in full 3D. 3D map programs, star catalogs, Pointers to the entire Hipparcos catalog. Includes source code. Lots of information on real stars used in science fiction.
• Lunar Domes http://brink.com/brink/gravity/domes/ evidence of activity on the Moon ?
• Astronomy Picture of the Day http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html ever-changing
• Fractal Dust Grains http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/fractals.html
• Planetlike Body Found Beyond Orbit of Pluto http://www.abqjournal.com/news/4news6-5.htm
• H2O on Luna http://www.rdrop.com/~cary/html/lunh2o.html
• Hypothetical Planets http://www.dkrz.de/~k202045/tnp/hypo.html There have been a number of objects that were once thought to exist by astronomers, but which later 'vanished'. Here are their stories.
• Near-Earth asteroid 3753 Cruithne http://www.asteroid.yorku.ca/companion --Earth's curious companion.
• our solar system http://freeware.intrastar.net/solarsystem/solarsy1.htm
• I found this interesting perspective on the the celestial objects we know today - galaxies, stars, planets and dust bunnies as just one chapter of a book on science in general .
• Nice photos of the moon; a to-scale graphic showing the size of the earth, the size of the moon, the distance between them, and geosync orbit. http://www.fourmilab.ch/earthview/moon_ap_per.html (Please email me if you find any other to-scale astronomical graphics -- -- I can't recall seeing *any* others on the 'web, and only 2 on paper).
• Is this image of Ring World http://www.access.digex.net/~mikelea/graphics/ring.JPG by Michael Lea to scale ? More images of Ring World are at http://www.qcc.sk.ca/qcc/personnel/markw/raytrace/.

Technical details about telescopes and related ground-based hardware

• the Bradford Robotic Telescope Observatory http://www.telescope.org/ You can add your request to the queue, and when your request bubbles to the top, it will photograph your desired section of the sky and return the photograph. Archives of lots of photos already taken. Has links to other online telescopes:

  Automated telescopes on the Internet. http://www.telescope.org/rti/automated.html

• NASA Orbital Debris Observatory http://www.sunspot.noao.edu/Nodo/nodo.html
• Schoolkids Can Use Net To Scan Stars - Albuquerque Journal http://www.abqjournal.com/scitech/1sci6-26.htm New Mexico schoolchildren will be able to log onto the Internet to control a large research telescope as a result of an agreement recently signed between the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology and the LodeStar astronomy project.
• Liquid Mirror (LM) technology http://wood.phy.ulaval.ca/lmt/ has some nice photographs at http://wood.phy.ulaval.ca/lmt/astroimageb.html
• Haggart Astronomical Observatory in Oregon City: http://www.spiritone.com/~malain/haggart/
• 300 Foot Telescope Collapse http://www.gb.nrao.edu/300foot.html This is an impressive piece of mechanical engineering. Look at the size of that thing ! National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) http://ftp.gb.nrao.edu/ also has some nice construction photos http://www.gb.nrao.edu/GBT/steel/GBTsteel.html of the new 100 m Green Bank Telescope (GBT). I don't know how much the old telescope cost, but Comsat/RSI from in Sterling VA is building the new GBT for $74,500,000. It should be online late 1999.
• Very nice explanation of how to use a QuickCam for astronomy, with some stunning photos: http://www.vub.ac.be/STER/www.astro/AstroCCD/AstroQC.htm
• "I have been using a color quickcam for astro photography with good success. I am interested in hearing from others who are doing similar things. ... imaging the moon and planets. ... It is low cost and it works well." --
  Walter Banks
  walter@bytecraft.com
• SAOimage http://tdc-www.harvard.edu/software/saoimage.html "SAOimage displays astronomical images in the X11 window environment." "SAOimage provides a large selection of options for zooming, panning, scaling, coloring, pixel readback, display blinking, and region specification. User interactions are generally performed with the mouse, but keyboard alternatives are often available." All source is available at

  ftp://cfa-ftp.harvard.edu/pub/gsc/SAOimage

Space Telescopes

• Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) http://www.stsci.edu/ has tons of images and information about the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) & Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST)

Rockets, Corporations, and other ways of getting from Earth to Elsewhere

• Rotary Rocket Company http://www.rotaryrocket.com/ "fully reusable piloted rocket"

Satellites, space stations, and other hardware in space

see also

• Spacecraft Locator http://www.reston.com/astro/spacecraft.locator.html help locate and view the Mir space station, Iridium satellites, and other man-made objects in space.
• the International Space Station http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/station/ ; flights http://station.nasa.gov/station/assembly/flights/2r/index.html ; International Space Station Assembly Sequence http://station.nasa.gov/station/assembly/rev_d.pdf .
• International Space Station http://station.nasa.gov/ Construction in orbit begins in June 1998 with the launch of the Functional Cargo Block (FGB) from Russia on a Russian Proton rocket.
• space probe Huygens (?) http://www.huygens.com/
• Cosmo Kramer (wr35@prism.gatech.edu) wrote: "The fastest "serious" proposal is probably JPL's Thousand Astronomical Unit (TAU) probe - 100km/s using an ion engine."
• http://www.jpl.nasa.gov is developing some cool new space technologies
• the NASA Commercial Technology Home Page http://nctn.oact.hq.nasa.gov ; the NASA Commercial Technology Network http://nctn.hq.nasa.gov/
• the New Space Network
• The Space Connection
• Photographs of the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft being constructed are now available on the Mars Global Surveyor home page (http://mgs-www.jpl.nasa.gov/). Mars Global Surveyor will be launched in November 1996 and will arrive at Mars in September 1997.
• Life on Mars ?
• NASA headquarters
• Space images
• NASA astronaut biography http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/
• http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo (Galileo home page -- includes photos of Europa)
• gopher://quest.arc.nasa.gov:70/11/interactive-projects/jupiter/journals
• 1997: Galileo's probe plunged into Jupiter's atmosphere http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/jupiter.html
• check out the STS-73 shuttle web page for the most recent science experiments regarding protein crystal growth in microgravity -- http://shuttle.nasa.gov/sts-73/ under "Payloads" and then "experiments in the module".
• Microgravity Activities http://zeta.lerc.nasa.gov/new/school.htm
• http://www.jsc.nasa.gov
• What happens when a candle burns in a spaceship ? and more interesting micro-gravity combustion pictures
• External Tank space station
• Space Studies Institute: e-mail:ssi@ssi.org
• National Space Society
• External Tank pictures
• The NASA Home Page
• GRAVITY PROBE B RELATIVITY MISSION
• Space Access Society
• The Millennial Project: Colonizing the Galaxy in 8 Easy Steps
• The Artemis Project -- a private venture to establish a permanent, self-supporting community on the Moon.
• The Atlantis Project -- a city built of concrete and steel, floating in the Caribbean.
• shaking the surface of the Sun

Orbital Mechanics

I (David Cary) have been told that there are some especially stable points for placing satellites in Earth's orbit, called Lagrange points

You should be able to spot some of them in these graphs I've made. (Darkest blue == smallest acceleration in a 1 orbit/month circular orbit). There are many other other fairly stable orbits (simple circular orbits; elliptical orbits) other than the ones shown here.

Unfortunately, I have not yet been able to find all 5 Lagrange points in my graphs.

According to the sources below, there are 5 Lagrange points in a 2 body system.

                     L4 (ahead of the secondary)


                           ^
  L3          (O)      L1  o   L2
                           |


                     L5 (following the secondary)


(O) = primary body
 o = secondary body

L4 and L5 are called Trojan points. I have heard that L1, L2, L3 are points of unstable equilibrium, but L4 and L5 are points of stable equilibrium. Why can't i see them on my graphs ?

More Lagrange information:

• http://www.physics.cornell.edu/sethna/teaching/sss/jupiter/Web/Lagrange.htm .
• NASA plans to put SOHO http://msl.jpl.nasa.gov/QuickLooks/sohoQL.html at the Earth-Sun L1 lagrange point. The SOHO mission is a joint undertaking of ESA and NASA. Selected images and an image sequence of the new observations can be found at: http://umbra.nascom.nasa.gov/comets/SOHO_sungrazers.html.
• Some people claim that "the Trojan asteroids are probably as numerous as those in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter." (the asteroids at the L4 and L5 points in the Jupiter-Sun system).
• Several science fiction works http://gundam.anime.net/world/spacecolony.html mention space colonies placed at Lagrange points.

misc astronomy links

• US Space Treaty
  http://www.acda.gov/treaties/space1.htm
  http://www.acda.gov/treaties/space2.htm

• Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1998 07:44:59 -0700 (PDT)
  From: Kathryn Aegis <aegis@igc.apc.org>
  To: extropians@extropy.com, transhuman@logrus.org
  Subject: >H SPACE:commercial spaceport opens in Virginia
  Sender: owner-transhuman@logrus.org
  Reply-To: transhuman@logrus.org
  
  Transhuman Mailing List
  
  The first commercial rocket launching site was dedicated yesterday 
  (September 14, 1998) on Wallops Island, Virginia.  Known as the Space 
  Flight Center, it was financed largely by private technology 
  corporations, with contributions from Virginia and federal funding 
  sources.  Orbital Sciences expects to launch its Taurus series of 
  rockets from the 200-foot tower, and DynCorp and Lockheed Martin also 
  plan to utilize the site.  The first launch should occur in the year 2000.
  

• http://www.celestaire.com/catalog/c_page20.html
• "The scientific world is buzzing with the suggestion that signals from aliens living in another star system may have been picked up by a part-time astronomer. Other astronomers are scrambling to confirm or deny them. It could either be the most important discovery ever made, or more likely, a case of mistaken identity or an elaborate hoax." http://www.news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_203000/203133.stm
• http://www.talkway.com/corp/partners/sweepstakes/ ???
• Island One Society http://www.islandone.org/ "a meeting place for future space colonists and business people of a libertarian or at least live and let live bent."
• Telescope On Line http://www.vol.it/UK/EN/SCIENCE/ASTRO/telescop_in.htm
• The Starlink Project http://star-www.rl.ac.uk/ astronomy and computers
• http://www.rdrop.com/~cary/html/machine_vision.html has some tips on building CCD telescopes.
• Astrolink to the Astroprairie http://www.prairienet.org/astro/ Pufferfish Observatory (Home-grown Astronomy, Down-home Photography)
• The Annotated "High Flight" http://www.ozemail.com.au/~aerial/hiflite.htm Beautiful poem; wacky annotation. http://www.europa.com/~jpilcher/pulsr996.html
• SPACE COLONIES http://science.nas.nasa.gov/Services/Education/SpaceSettlement/CoEvolutionBook/Table_Of_Contents.HTML "Is the surface of a planet really the right place for an expanding technological civilization ?" and other essays by many people including Gerard O'Neill (inventor of the O'Neill Colony concept), Carl Sagan and Lynn Margulis, and Jacques Cousteau.
• The Earth Satellite Ephemeris Service http://www.chara.gsu.edu/sat.html a table which tells where and when to look from a given location to see overflights of the brighter artificial Earth satellites.
• http://www.senet.com.au/~patkins/redspot.htm ???
• Voyager Family Portrait Images http://newproducts.jpl.nasa.gov/calendar/vgr_fam.html All the planets in the solar system (except Pluto), in a mosaic (to-scale ?)
• Infrared Space Observatory (ISO) Satellite Data Users Manual http://isowww.estec.esa.nl/manuals/iso_idum/iso_idum.html
• Asteroid and Comet Impact Hazards http://impact.arc.nasa.gov/
• Have any planets been found within 10 light years? http://128.252.223.112/perl/circR?/posts/905996696.As.r.html
• Views of the Solar System http://bang.lanl.gov/solarsys/eng/homepage.htm
• The Electronic Universe Project http://zebu.uoregon.edu/galaxy.html University of Oregon Physics Department
• For details on the Hipparcos mission and its scientific results,including a 3-D animation of the Hyades star cluster, see: http://astro.estec.esa.nl/Hipparcos
• Neptune, the Movie: Hubble Makes Movie of Neptune's Rotation and Weather
  -- from Breakthrough! #15
• Satellite photos http://lumahai.soest.hawaii.edu/gifs/
• NASA is preparing the most advanced spacecraft artificial intelligence software yet developed for launch aboard the New Millennium program's Deep Space One (DS1) spacecraft, at a total mass of 945 pounds. http://ccf.arc.nasa.gov/dx/basket/storiesetc/97_03AR.html
• Mars Global Surveyor http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mgs/
  November 1997 to May 1998 - Aerobraking Phase 1
  March 1999 - Start of Mapping
• Andromeda Software, Inc. (astronomy software) http://www.frii.com/~androsw/
• NASA press releases and other information are available automatically by sending an Internet electronic mail message to domo@hq.nasa.gov. In the body of the message (not the subject line) users should type the words "subscribe press-release" (no quotes). The system will reply with a confirmation via E-mail of each subscription. A second automatic message will include additional information on the service.
• Unanswered Questions http://www.aai.ee/planets/nineplanets/asteroids.html related to asteroids. "The total mass of all the asteroids is less than that of the Moon."
• Small Satellites Home Page http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/EE/CSER/UOSAT/SSHP/ Includes "micro satellites" and "nano satellites"
• Mike Combs wrote the The Space Settlement FAQ http://members.aol.com/oscarcombs/settle.htm (pretty images of proposed space colonies).
• http://southport.jpl.nasa.gov/
• Stig's Sky Calendar http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Hangar/7042/skycal.html Cool, interactive Java program.
• NASA astronaut biographies http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/
• Good Neighbor Outdoor Lighting http://www.skypub.com/lpnotes/gnol.html
• Jay's Links to Outer Space http://www.geocities.com/EnchantedForest/7060/space.html
• Visual Satellite Observer http://www2.satellite.eu.org/sat/vsohp/satintro.html
• Ron Dantowitz todo.html#astro_camera has some clever ideas on doing very high-resolution astronomy using off-the-shelf equipment and some clever image processing.
• NRAO Green Bank Radio Telescope http://www.gb.nrao.edu/noframes.html ???
• Starquakes lead to discovery of first new Soft Gamma Repeater in 19 years http://science.msfc.nasa.gov/newhome/headlines/ast09jul98_1.htm
• NASA Office of Space Flight http://www.hq.nasa.gov/osf/hotlist/hotlist.html http://www.hq-nasa.gov/osf/hotlist/hotlist.html
• James Oberg: ABC News Web: Science Page http://www.abcnews.com/sections/science/
• Bill Harwood: CBS http://www.uttm.com/space/spacelinks.html
• CNN http://cnn.com/tech/9707/mir/related.sites/
• dead link ? Position of Jupiter in the sky, by ALAN SAWICKI

• ------------------------------
  
  Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 14:53:19 -0600 (MDT)
  From: "Patrik D'haeseleer" <patrik@cs.unm.edu>
  Subject: fx-discuss: Earth2 news
  
  The Extrasolar Planets Encyclopaedia announced the discovery of six more
  possible Jupiter-sized planets (see http://wwwusr.obspm.fr/planets/). They
  also list an article on a new technique which should make it possible
  to detect Earth-size planets from Earth.
  
  
  http://www.usno.navy.mil/ftsrel.html:
  
       ...
       Preliminary observations of Betelgeuse, presented in San
       Diego today, confirm the theoretical predictions of the mFTS's
       performance. Although these test-bed observations, using a collecting
       area only 12cm (5 inches) in diameter, are not sensitive enough to
       detect Earth-sized planets around this particular bright star, the
       results from the prototype instrument suggest that, for a telescope
       3 meters (10 feet) in diameter, planets a few times the size of
       the Earth could be detected around many of the stars visible to
       the naked eye in the night sky.
       ...
  
  
  
  Patrik
  
  ------------------------------
  
  ------------------------------
  
  Date: Thu, 2 Jul 1998 19:09:54 -0600 (MDT)
  From: "Patrik D'haeseleer" <patrik@cs.unm.edu>
  Subject: Re: fx-discuss: Space Station claim looking for judge
  
  Richard B. Woods writes:
  >
  >Already, some asteroids have been seen to pass closer to Earth than our
  >Moon.  I think the largest so far was about a half-mile wide. 
  
  
  Here's the relevant table: http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/ca_past.html
  
  
  Asteroids
  
  No. & Name, or    Abs.  Date of Close     Distance   Orbit
  Designation       Mag.  Earth Approach   (AU)  (LD)  Ref.
  - ----------------  ----  --------------  ------ ----  --------
  1994 XM1          28.0  1994-Dec-09.79  0.0007  0.3  JPL#3
  1993 KA2          29.0  1993-May-20.86  0.0010  0.4  EB960803
  1994 ES1          28.6  1994-Mar-15.72  0.0011  0.4  EB960110
  1991 BA           28.7  1991-Jan-18.72  0.0011  0.4  EB960611
  1996 JA1          20.5  1996-May-19.69  0.0030  1.2  JPL#7
  1991 VG           28.8  1991-Dec-05.42  0.0031  1.2  JPL#4
  1995 FF           26.4  1995-Apr-03.38  0.0045  1.8  EB960613
  4581 Asclepius    20.5  1989-Mar-22.90  0.0046  1.8  EB960311
  1994 WR12         22.2  1994-Nov-24.85  0.0048  1.9  EB960804
  1937 UB (Hermes)  17.1  1937-Oct-30.71  0.0053  2.1  EB960619
  1995 UB           26.8  1995-Oct-17.16  0.0050  1.9  EB960114
  1993 UA           25.4  1993-Oct-18.80  0.0067  2.6  EB960618
  1994 GV           27.5  1994-Apr-12.13  0.0068  2.6  EB960110
  1993 KA           26.0  1993-May-17.93  0.0071  2.8  JPL#4
  2340 Hathor       20.3  1976-Oct-20.74  0.0078  3.0  JPL#4
  1988 TA           20.9  1988-Sep-29.09  0.0098  3.8  EB960817
  
  
  
  LD refers to Lunar Distance, so the only four asteroids which are known
  to have come closer than the Moon are 1994 XM1, 1993 KA2, 1994 ES1 and
  1991 BA. Looking up the estimated diameter for those absolute magnitudes
  (see http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/iau/lists/Sizes.html), we get sizes
  between 4 and 15 meters, depending on albedo. 
  
  
  Patrik
  
  ------------------------------
  

  The article "What to do about bolts from the blue" article by Steven Marcus _IEEE Spectrum_ 1998-12 mentions that "1991VG may be a returning piece of manmade space debris." and references "Asteroid and Comet Impact Hazards" http://impact.arc.nasa.gov/ "Asteroids and Comets" http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/planets/asteroidpage.html "Asteroid and Comet Defences" http://www.house.gov/science/canavan_05-21.htm "current efforts and future plans to inventory and characterize the population of Near Earth Objects" http://www.house.gov/science/pilcher_05-21.htm NEO detection programs: Spacewatch http://lpl.arizona.edu/spacewatch Lowell Observatory Near-Earth Object Search (loneos) http://www.lowell.edu/cgi-bin/koehn/count?loneos Near-Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) http://huey.jpl.nasa.gov/~spravdo/neat.html Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research Project (Linear) http://www.ll.mit.edu/LINEAR ODAS, the French-German Astroid Survey http://pentium.pe.ba.dlr.de/odas/odas.htm Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) mission http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/near.html scheduled to achieve orbit around the near-earth asteroid 433 Eros in 1999 Jan (?)

• SkyView http://skview.gsfc.nasa.gov/skyview.html "a Virtual Observatory on the Net generating images of any part of the sky at wavelengths in all regimes from Radio to Gamma-Ray"
• Galaxy Photography Astrophotography by Jason Ware http://www.galaxyphoto.com/
• http://www.galaxyphoto.com/thizy.html http://www.galaxyphoto.com/thizy.html
• Russell Sipe http://www2.sipe.com/ maintains some serious and humorous astronomy pages, including "Comet Hale-Bopp" http://www.halebopp.com/
• The Cavendish Astrophysics Group http://www.mrao.cam.ac.uk/ runs the Mullard Radio Astronomy Observatory (MRAO)
• Alpha Centauri A Candidate for Terrestrial Planets And Intelligent Life http://monet.physik.unibas.ch/~schatzer/Alpha-Centauri.html (Alpha Centauri a, b, c triple star system, shown to scale.) (drawings of habitable zones, to scale)
• http://science.msfc.nasa.gov/
• http://monet.physik.unibas.ch/~schatzer/space-time.html ???
• warp drive ??? http://www.lerc.nasa.gov/Other_Groups/PAO/warp.htm
• http://www.rdrop.com/users/green/school/ ???
• http://midas.oma.be/www_root/serverdoc/www/Astronomy.html a long list of astronomy links to: astronomical databases, Astronomical Organisations, astronomy software (including the FITS file format), Astronomical Journals and Newsletters, The Digitized Sky Survey, TeX and LaTeX tutorials, astronomy pictures,
• Astronomy at Northwestern University http://www.astro.nwu.edu/
• Swimming Elk Astronomy Software http://www.saunalahti.fi/~elk/
• Life in Extreme Environments "If life can exist somewhere - it will" http://www.reston.com/astro/extreme.html lots of cool articles about "extremophiles", (creatures living in areas on Earth previously thought to be uninhabitable by any living thing), and the possibility of their survival on other planets and moons. Archaea deep within the earth ("lithoautotrophic") may comprise more than half of the earth's biomass; fish and bacteria survive below 0 C at Antarctica; creatures survive in complete darkness at temperatures above 150 C at the bottom of the ocean; "Methane Ice Worms" live and feed off solid chunks of CH4:H20; "Archaea are "autotrophic," meaning that they subsist on carbon dioxide, nitrogen and hydrogen -- they don't need any amino acids or pre-existing organics."
• "Thanks to a steady stream of ultraviolet radiation, the water [near the surface of] the ocean ought to be sterile. Yet each drop teems with millions of viruses." http://www.apnet.com/inscight/06061997/graphb.htm
• "Is it possible that alien life could exist on other planets and moons in our solar system?" http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/1997/Jun/hour1_062097.html
• Astronomy/Space Links http://qlink.queensu.ca/~3dw18/astro/astro.htm
• http://dir.yahoo.com/Entertainment/Humor__Jokes__and_Fun/By_Topic/Science/Astronomy_Humor/
• Eric's Treasure Trove of Astronomy http://www.astro.virginia.edu/~eww6n/astro/astro.html lets you search for astro terms.
• Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics University of Colorado http://lasp.colorado.edu/

  Dos XX http://dosxx.colorado.edu/ ???

• Bill Arnett http://www.seds.org/billa/offerings.html has collected lots of astronomy info.
• Al Kelly's amateur CCD Astrophotography Page http://www.ghgcorp.com/akelly/
• British Astronomical Association: Campaign for Dark Skies http://www.u-net.com/ph/cfds/
• Software detects small satellites in spacecraft imagery http://www.nasatech.com/TSP/PDFTSP/NPO20201.pdf Given a sequence of images ... automatically detects small satellites of asteroids and other planetary bodies ... written in MatLab by Paul Stolorz, Victoria Gor, and Richard Doyle of Caltech and Clark Chapman, Randy Gladstone, William Merline, and Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute, for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
• **** Fastest-Spinning High-Energy Pulsar Discovered - UniSci http://www.scienceguide.com/News/News_Articles/12698Article_10.html The fastest-spinning high-energy pulsar has been discovered, whirling on its axis twice as fast as any similar star -- and six million times faster than the Earth.
• I've heard that Space Station Mir is visible to the naked eye; anyone know how to figure out when and where to look ?

•     T a s t y   B i t s   f r o m   t h e   T e c h n o l o g y   F r o n t
      This issue: < http://www.tbtf.com/archive/03-02-98.html >
  ...
      ________________
  
  .Iridium puts on a light show
  
    Getting our entertainment where we can find it
  
      These low-earth-orbit satellites will enable worldwide phone ser-
      vices beginning this year. Fifty-one are presently in orbit. It
      turns out that the satellites' antennas catch the sun and cause
      "flares" [17] visible from the ground. For minutes at a time the
      satellites brighten from magnitude 6 (binoculars required) to
      magnitude -2 or even -4 (brighter than Venus). This useful page
      provided by the German Space Operations Centre [18] will calculate
      for you the next seven Iridium flares visible from your location.
      (Their initial mission was to calculate and display appearances of
      the Mir satellite.) First you need to say exactly where on earth
      you are. Using the Census Bureau's Tiger Mapping Service [19] you
      can pinpoint a spot in the US to 4 decimal places of latitude and
      longitude, or within about 6 feet. Start at this atlas of place
      names [20] for rough coordinates that you can feed to the Tiger
      for refinement.
  
      [17] http://www2.satellite.eu.org/sat/vsohp/iridium.html
      [18] http://www.gsoc.dlr.de/satvis/
      [19] http://tiger.census.gov/
      [20] http://www.ahip.getty.edu/tgn_browser/
      ________________
  ...
      TBTF home and archive at < http://www.tbtf.com/ >. To subscribe
      send the message "subscribe" to tbtf-request@world.std.com. TBTF
      is Copyright 1994-1998 by Keith Dawson, < dawson@world.std.com >.
      Commercial use prohibited. For non-commercial purposes please
      forward, post, and link as you see fit.
  

• Space Explorers (students) http://www.space-explorers.com ???
• Don Lancaster recommends the book _Planetary Astronomy_ by Ronald Schorn,
• lots of random space-related links http://wwn.nebcorp.com/~doyle/space.html
• Astronomical Society at the University of Illinois http://www.students.uiuc.edu/~lmcarter/
• James Dawe's Aerospace Links http://www.jamesdawe.com/space.html
• Current information about the Moon http://www.geocities.com/~wererat/moon.htm

Started 1998-11-07
Original Author: David Cary
Current Maintainer: David Cary

Send comments, suggestions, bug reports to
David Cary
d.cary@ieee.org.

end http://www.okstate.edu/osu_orgs/ac/html/astro_links.html