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Discovery Space and StarTales

We are thrilled to announce a new facet of a partnership with Discovery Communications. Earlier this month we wrote about a visit to Lowell and the Discovery Channel Telescope by a Discovery news team. Video journalist Kasey-Dee Gardner and Space Producer for Discovery.com, Dave Mosher spent time here on Mars Hill and at the DCT site and filed a great video news update on the DCT.

Now an exciting new collaboration in cyberspace has also emerged from that visit, thanks to Dave Mosher and Discovery Space — it’s an information-packed and visually very interesting website in the Discovery Networks armada. StarTales, Lowell’s daily astronomical feature appears now and then on Discovery Space in the form of the new Space Photo Quiz. The easiest way to find the Quiz is to head down to the bottom left of the Discovery Space site. Many thanks to Lowell Observatory astronomers Phil Massey and Larry Wasserman for reviewing StarTales and making them better and to Dave Mosher and Discovery Space for giving StarTales a new and brilliant stage!

Posted in DCT, Lowell in the News, Lowell outreach | 1 Comment »

Lowell Observatory, asteroids, and Dave Healy on Bloomberg.com

The Bloomberg.com story, Burnham’s Healy Specializes in Auto Stocks and Killer Asteroids by Jeff Green was published today. It’s a neat look into the world of searching for near-Earth asteroids, in particular through the lens of the talented Dave Healy. He is a financial analyst and asteroid hunter. We enjoy hearing his comments on National Public Radio in financial news segments from time to time. Lowell’s Brian Skiff, who is quoted in the Bloomberg.com article, thought the feature was well done and has some particularly good reporting. Enjoy! Congratulations and many thanks to Jeff Green and Dave Healy.

see also:
Arizona Man Built $500,000 Observatory in Backyard (on RedOrbit.com via Tribune-Review/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)

Posted in Lowell in the News | No Comments »

Arizona Key features Lowell Observatory

Lowell Observatory recently partnered with Arizona Key (which includes Arizona Key Magazine). This helps with a serious upgrade to our multimedia content because Arizona Key now features and hosts a Lowell Observatory virtual tour, a slide show from Mars Hill, and a video tour of the Observatory. We absolutely invite everyone to please come visit the Observatory in person. But, while you are planning your visit to Lowell, or if you simply want a visual sense of the many highlights we offer including our astronomy gift shop, our science center, the John Vickers McAllister Space Theatre, the historic Clark Telescope, and the Rotunda Museum — Arizona Key now helps us show you these and other great Observatory features!

see also:
Lowell Observatory, About Us (on Arizona Key’s website)

Posted in Exhibits, Lowell outreach | No Comments »

Mars Hill weather on the Web

The Friends of Lowell Observatory contribute to the institution in many ways. Recently, one of our supporters, August Johnson, donated a computer and weather monitoring software to allow us to broadcast current weather conditions on our Web site. The weather station is mounted atop the Clark refractor dome, and the monitoring software automatically uploads the current conditions to our Web site every five minutes. You can check out the first draft of the weather page here. This is a beta page: we will definitely be redesigning and fleshing it out over the next month or two, and we still have some instrument calibration to do, but it gives you the idea and allows us to monitor and test the whole system as we iron out its initial wrinkles.

We hope this is a useful reference for visitors wondering about the conditions up here on the hill. Thanks to August Johnson (son of a former Lowell astronomer) for the donation, and to the Flagstaff Cultural Partners (who also supported our new multimedia efforts; see post below) for funding acquisition of the weather station.

Posted in Lowell outreach | No Comments »

Discovery News Airs DCT Progress Update

We recently hosted a news team from Discovery Communications and they filed a video news update about the Discovery Channel Telescope at Lowell Observatory. Discovery’s Kasey-Dee Gardner and Dave Mosher conducted interviews with Lowell Director Bob Millis; DCT Mechanical Engineer, Heather Marshall; and others here at Lowell Observatory and out at the DCT site. The Discovery crew also interviewed Marty Valente in the University of Arizona’s College of Optical Sciences about progress on the primary mirror. Check out the story, the Discovery Channel Telescope Starts to See Light; it’s a great way to get a DCT update right from your computer. A special thanks to Kasey-Dee and Dave for making such good news happen and for all the Lowell staff who participated! Note: the video is at the top right of the Discovery news page, once you click the link above, or after clicking on the new Discovery Space site below.

see:

Discovery Space
the DCT website, a section of Lowell Observatory’s website (updated June 9, 2008)

Posted in DCT, Lowell in the News, Research | 3 Comments »

Lowell technical, planet finding staff part of TESS

With a heads up from Lowell Observatory Instrument Scientist, Ted Dunham, and from our Google news alerts, we learned this week that the TESS project, a planet-searching satellite, has progressed. Here’s an excerpt from a MIT press release:

The proposed satellite, called the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), would use a set of six wide-angle cameras with large, high-resolution electronic detectors (CCDs) being developed in cooperation with MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory, to provide the first-ever spaceborne all-sky survey of transiting planets around the closest and brightest stars……TESS partners include the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the Harvard Origins of Life Initiative, Lowell Observatory,…

Ted says that Lowell’s part in the NASA-funded project would include efforts by himself and Georgi Mandushev. Ted is going to support some of the design work, particularly optics and the laboratory test facility, and he is also helping with the overall instrument design. Georgi will, if all goes well, be involved in helping with the analysis software and follow-up observations.

Stay tuned for more about future developments with TESS, and check out MIT’s press release.

see also:

Largest Transiting Extrasolar Planet Found Around a Distant Star

Massive Transiting Planet with 31-hour Year Found Around Distant Star

Astronomers Find Jupiter-Sized Transiting Planet Using Innovative Telescope Network

Posted in Lowell in the News, Research | No Comments »

New multimedia show at Lowell

On Wednesday, June 4, at 7:00 PM, Lowell will premiere its new widescreen multimedia show as part of our monthly “Flagstaff night” festivities. The 30-minute show, Heavy Astronomy: Marvels of the Cosmos, is designed to complement our nighttime star party atmosphere by giving our visitors a visual tour of some of the incredible sights of the Universe. It features a blend of some of NASA’s finest astronomical images, as well as our own computer-generated images. We are pleased to thank the Flagstaff Cultural Partners for a generous grant that has made it possible for us to do several multimedia upgrades this year, including this show. The FCP supports many local non-profits each year, and we appreciate their ongoing support of Lowell’s many outreach programs.

Like our continuously running daytime show about the history and research at Lowell, Heavy Astronomy gives astronomical images, scientifically accurate subtitles, and a soundtrack equal prominence. The soundtrack is a critical component of the show, and we are most grateful to Mannheim Steamroller for their permission to use six tracks from their Fresh Aire albums in this show. The eerie sounds of Crystal accompany the Big Bang, the rotating motives of Dancing Flames accompany a flythrough of the Milky Way and into a monstrous back hole, and the thunderous pipe organ-meets-rock of the G Major Toccata will fly you through Saturn’s rings. Thanks to Mannheim Steamroller / American Gramaphone for their permission to use this music.

Below are a few stills from the show.

Fly through the canyons of the shattered moon Miranda, one of the satellites of Uranus…

…get a little too close to a pair of stars orbiting so close together that they touch…

…fly through the stars and nebulae of the Milky Way Galaxy’s disk…

…and take a trip down the cosmic drain as you fall into a supermassive black hole at the Milky Way’s center.

Come on up and enjoy cool images, text explanations, and an edgy soundtrack as we go from Earth to the end of the Universe — and back!

Posted in Lowell outreach | 1 Comment »

Artist of the Night Sky

Artist Greg Mort’s fascination with astronomy began at an early age as he watched the space race culminate in the manned-lunar missions.  After becoming intrigued with Percival Lowell’s studies and drawings of Mars, Greg visited Lowell in the 1980s.  Thus began a lasting friendship that continues to this day as Greg currently serves on Lowell Observatory’s Advisory Board - a position he has held since 1999.

Greg has been selected by NASA to artistically portray space missions, and his artwork can be viewed in the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, the Corcoran Museum of Art, the Portland Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, and in our very own Visitor Center here at Lowell Observatory.  Greg’s painting “A Century of Discovery” greets some 76,000 visitors per year.  Completed in 1994, the Observatory’s centennial, the painting is a collection of Lowell’s astronomers, major achievements, discoveries and instruments of the last century.

Greg’s paintings capture the beauty of the natural world, and often include astronomy-related subjects.  This 5-minute video features many of his paintings and includes Greg discussing his art:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MjeGOsM3Ss

Posted in Friends of Lowell | 2 Comments »

LONEOS, Brian Skiff and Ted Bowell on BBC Radio 4

Over the Holiday Weekend a splendid program aired on BBC’s Radio 4. Lonely Nights by Sound Recordist Diane Hope, a “30-minute radio feature… an impressionistic documentary/portrait of the working life of professional telescope operator Brian Skiff and features the LONEOS project. Recorded on location in Arizona, mostly at the Lowell Observatory, it also includes interviews with Lowell astronomer Ted Bowell and NOAO’s instrument specialist Di Harmer, as well as the sounds of various telescopes (Lowell’s 42″ & 72″ and Kitt Peak’s 4m), Arizona’s night time wildlife and the music of Julien Lourau, Radiohead, Jane Ira Bloom and Steve Roach, as well as a reading of Rebecca Elson’s poem, ‘We astronomers.’”

Requres RealTime audio and it’s only online for short time: so, hurry and listen! Congratulations and thank you to Diane — I sincerely hope you and BBC Radio 4 win some kind of award for this stunningly rich audio portrait!

Posted in Lowell in the News, Research | No Comments »

Fly directly from L.A. to Flagstaff

Travel to Lowell Observatory for our Los Angeles area Friends and potential visitors has become a little bit easier.  Horizon Air is now offering direct flights from L.A. International Airport to Flagstaff’s Pulliam Airport, beginning June 23rd.  Horizon is currently offering some special “introductory fares” to help launch this new route.  You can see their special deals and reserve flights here:
http://www.alaskaair.com/as/www2/promo/flagstaff-double-miles.asp

Also see the Flagstaff Convention and Visitors Bureau press release (dated March 31st) here:
http://www.flagstaffarizona.org/media_press.html

Posted in Friends of Lowell, General | 1 Comment »