Dark Matter

What if someone told you that around 80% percent of what is in space is not something that scientists can actually observe? Well, I am telling you this right now and extraordinarily this is actually true. How is that possible that most of what is in space is not something we can see? Well, this "thing" that takes up so much of space is something called dark matter.

What is dark matter?  And how do we know that it exists if we can't see it?

Well, in the 1950s, there were studies done which showed that the universe contained more matter than is actually seen by the naked eye. The universe has an abundance of baryonic matter, but if dark matter is baryonic or not is something we do not know about. Some possibilities of "dark matter" could be due to brown dwarfs, white dwarfs, neutrinos or even black holes, all of which are fairly heavy and dense. Other scientist believe that dark matter is composed of non-baryonic matter such as WIMPS (Weakly interacting massive articles). WHIPS have ten to a hundred times more mass of a proton but their weak interaction with normal matter makes it all the harder to detect. The foremost candidate in this group is the Neutralino which is heavier and slower than neutrinos, however, they are yet to be found.

Scientists are able to tell that there is such thing as dark matter by examining stellar object's motion. In the 1950s, astronomer who were studying spiral galaxies, expected to see the center of the galaxy moving faster than the edges. Instead, they found that both the edge and center moved at the same velocity, proving that the galaxies had more mass than could be seen. Cluster of galaxies would fall apart if the only mass they contained were the ones we are able to see; this is due to the lack of gravitational pull if it did not have enough mass. With the help of Albert Einstein who proposed that massive objects can actually have enough gravity to pull light, causing light to bend and distort, scientists are now able to create a probable dark matter map.

Observation 4.8

Date: May 22, 2014

Observation:
On this night sky, was once again looking up at the constellation Ursa Major and I followed the arch to Arcturus and continued it on until I found Spica. I already did Boötes in the last observation where I also mention that Spica was in the constellation Virgo, or Virgin. In my picture, the circle is the general area of Virgo, but the actual constellation is really higher up. I would have been able to draw it out if it was not cut off in the picture. Before I get into Virgo's story, the constellation that you see next to Virgo is Corvus, or the Crow.

The story of Virgo: This constellation is about the goddess of justice, Dike, who has wings. Dike lived during a time called the Golden Age of mankind, when Cronus ruled the heavens. This was a time of peace and happiness and where food grew without cultivation and where humans never grew old. They basically lived like gods, not having to work, never felling sorrow, pain and had no wars. Dike went among them and gave out her wisdom and justice. One day, Zeus overthrew his father from Olympus and became the ruler of the heavens. This brought the Silver Age. During this time, Zeus shortened springtime and introduced the cycle of seasons. During this age, humans began to fight and stopped worshiping the gods. Dike, who longed for the old days, came and gathered the people and scolded them for forsaking the ideal of their ancestors and warned them of worse days to come. She then left and took refuge in the mountains, turning her back on humankind. Soon the Bronze and Iron Ages came where there was violence, theft, and war. Unable to endure the sins of humanity, Dike left Earth and flew up into heaven where she now sits next to the constellation Libra which is the scale of justice.

I will write the story of Corvus another day because it is related to the 2 constellations next to it. Other than that, Happy Summer!

APOD 4.8

What planet do you think this is? Did you say that it was Saturn? Close. This planet is actually Neptune! Yes, for those of you who did not know, Neptune has rings. In fact every planet outside the asteroid belt has some sort of ring or rings encircling it. This is partly due to the excess debris after the formation of our solar system as well is the gravitational pull by the large planets. This image was actually taken by Voyager 2 which was the only spacecraft to visit Neptune. You can see one of Neptune's moon, Triton, which is slightly lit on the bottom. If you look at the bottom of Neptune, the south pole has some cirrus clouds and a dark band circle. There are about 6 rings encircling Neptune and its atmosphere is mostly made up of hydrogen, helium and methane.

Observation 4.7

Date: May 22, 2014

Observation:
So with the spring sky coming up, there is a chance to find some new constellations! One of the first constellations that I noticed in the sky today was the constellation Ursa Major. I already made a blog post about this constellation in the past so if you want to brush up on that story, feel free to look back. Right next to Ursa Major if the constellation Boötes or the Bear Driver. If you look at it though it sort of looks like a boot, but that is not where the name comes from. In the constellation is the star Arcturus and there is a very easy way in finding this constellation. What you do is find Ursa Major and then follow the arch of the pan handle to Arcturus; or better said "Follow the arch to Arcturus". Arcturus is very easy to find because it is one of the brightest stars in the sky. Another tidbit is that if you continue to follow the arch from Arcturus you can find the next brightest star in the spring sky called Spica which is located in the constellation Virgo, but that will be in another observation.

Now for the story. Boötes actually represents Arcas, the son of Zeus. His mother was Castillo, other wise known as Ursa Major, who was the daughter of King Lycaon. Now one day Zeus came down to dine with King Lycaon. Lycaon, who wanted to see if his guest was actually Zeus, took Arcas and cut him up and fed him to his father. Obviously recognizing his own son, Zeus burned with rage and tipped over the table, ruined the whole feast and killed Lycaon's sons and turned Lycaon into a wolf. He then took the pieces of Arcas and brought him back to life. Now his mother, who was impregnated by Zeus and had Arcas, was turned into a bear due the goddess Hera's jealousy of her having a child with her husband. When Arcas turned into a handsome teenager, he came across this bear while hunting in the woods. Castillo, noticing her son, tried to greet him warmly but she could only growl. This was obviously taken in the wrong way as Arcas took to chasing her transformed mother. Castillo ran to the temple of Zeus, where the god himself took Arcas and his mother and put them in the sky where they will always be running through the heavens.

APOD 4.7

For those of you who don't know what this picture is of, it is a edge-on picture of a galaxy. This beautiful reddish galaxy is called the Hamburger Galaxy! 

Can you see it? It kind of looks like a burnt burger... 

Anyways... The more scientific name for this galaxy is NGC 3628. This galaxy is about 100,000 light years across and the tail (the dust clouds surrounding it including the dust coming out on the left side of the galaxy) stretches to about 300,000 light-years. That just makes you wonder how far away was this photo really taken... And even more, how small you really are. This spiral galaxy neighbors 2 other large spiral galaxies M65 and M66 in a grouping called the Leo Triplet. The tidal tail that you see on the left side of the galaxy is due to the gravitational interaction these three galaxies have faced with each other. Because these objects are so big, the amount of gravity that they have corresponds making the gravitational pull very intense. Anyways, the Hamburger Galaxy is the more fainter of the three but it is nevertheless impressive. The cloud that you see surrounding the galaxy, called the halo, is made up of dust and globular clusters which tend to be hundreds of thousands of stars that are up to 13 BILLION years of age! That is even before our own galaxy was even formed! 

Pretty crazy things can happen up in space....

Observation 4.6

Date: April 30, 2014

Observation:
Going outside this day, I saw the beautiful waxing crescent! Just yesterday was the New Moon and today you can see the little strip of light in the sky. In both photos you can still see the whole Moon but when you are physically looking at the Moon outside you will not be able to see the outline of the Moon. This is partly due to the intense contrast of the very light strip of the Moon and the darkness of the sky. I took this photo around 8:30 pm and right now the Moon is in the western sky so it is about to disappear from view soon and that will soon leave us to a beautiful "empty" sky allowing all the other stars to have a chance to shine bright. So if you want to do any stargazing, this week would be the best time while the Moon isn't too bright and since it sets pretty early. Just make sure to follow the stars!

APOD 4.6

Is that really an astronaut just floating there in space? Is this real? Was the movie Gravity possibly based on a true story?

No...

Yes, this picture is real but unfortunately, actually thankfully, a real person was not thrown off into space to orbit the Earth forever. This spacesuit floated away from the International Space Station eight years ago. The suit was actually filled with old clothes and was purposely pushed by the space station crew. The suit had a faint radio transmitter and it successfully circled Earth twice before the radio signal became weak. After a few weeks, the spacesuit burned up in the atmosphere.

Well, now we know that if you were to be floating around in space, you probably wouldn't have much time to live. At least you would have a very nice view during your last moments. Just make sure if you ever happen to find yourself on a space craft, don't let go!