Physics  Tags: astronomy physics  

Gateways · NASA Sources · Selected Observatories · Organizations · General Resources · Current Topics · Interactive Resources

Gateways to Astronomical Sources

 

Astronomy Resources from YAHOO

Astronomy Resources from STScl

Internet resources in astronomy including mailing lists, personal web pages, and telescopes. This source is geared towards the professional astronomer.

Astronomer's Bazaar

Contains on-line catalogs and information on obtaining catalogs from other sites.

Astrogeology from the USGS

Star*s Family

Searchable database of international associations and organizations.

Astronomical Society of the Pacific

Maintains a list of amateur astronomy clubs in the U.S. and Canada.

Encyclopedia Astronautica

Provides a wealth of information on the U.S. and Russian space programs.

Famous Astronomers and Astrophysicists

Provides capsule biographies of many men and women have made important contributions to our knowledge of the universe.

Links for A Dictionary of Astronomy

A collection of resources related to astronomy.  The page is related to material found in A Dictionary of Astronomy.

Links for the Oxford Companion to Cosmology

A collection of resources related to cosmology.  The page is related to material found in the Oxford Companion to Cosmology.

NASA Sources

 

Deep Space Network

Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Space Calendar

Updated monthly.

ADS: NASA's Astrophysics Data System

A search engine covering over 200,000 astronomy-related abstracts from 1975-, scanned images of articles from the Astrophysical Journal (1975- ), and over 200,000 abstracts pertaining to Space Instrumentation.

Planetary Fact Sheets

Produced by the National Space Science Data Center and provide extensive statistical data on the nine planets, selected comets and asteroids. Similar to the Nine Planets site listed below, but without graphics and narrative. If you're interested in NASA images of planets and moons, JPL's Photojournal site provides an easy way to access them. The independently produced Views of the Solar System uses NASA imagery and text to provide a multimedia guide.

Solar Eclipse Information (Solar Data Analysis Center)

Provides "one stop shopping" for eclipse information. Fred Espenak's Eclipse Home Page provides information on past and future solar and lunar eclipses.

NASA Space Science Missions

An extensive list of past, present and possible future missions.

The Webb Space Telescope

This successor to the Hubble Space Telescope is scheduled for launch in 2010.

Infrared Astronomy

Provides an introduction to this important branch of astronomy. The site includes a gallery of infrared images.

Near-Earth Object Program

Established by NASA and JPL in 1998 to "provide a focal point for the study of comets and asteriods which can approach the Earth's orbit".

Selected Observatories

 

Big Bear Solar Observatory

Daily solar activity.

Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ.

U.S. Naval Observatory

Cerro Tololo (Chile)

Cerro Paranal (Chile)

Home to the VLT (Very Large Telescope) which actually consists of four separate telescopes, each with a mirror over eight meters in diameter. The telescopes are linked together electronically, creating the world's largest optical telescope. Construction was completed in mid-2000.

U.C. Santa Cruz, Lick Observatory Contains searchable catalogs

Calar Alto (Spain)

Hobby-Eberly Telescope (Texas)

The World's Largest Optical Telescopes

The Isaac Newton Group of Telescopes

Three telescopes located in the Canary Islands.

Organizations

• International Astronomical Union
• American Astronomical Society
• Astronomical Society of the Pacific
• Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (University of Arizona)
• Berkeley Cosmology Group . This site contains informative FAQs
• American Association of Variable Star Observers
• European Southern Observatory
• British Astronomical Association

Resources in Astronomy

 

Spaceweather.com

Provides information on the Solar-Earth environment including Solar wind, Solar flares and Earth-crossing asteriods and meteor showers.

The Nine Planets: A Multimedia Tour of the Solar System

Astronomiae Historia/History of Astronomy

Images from the Hubble Space Telescope

Some of the more spectacular HST images are preserved at Hubblesite.

Stars and Constellations

Contains lists of named stars, constellations and non-stellar objects from the Messier catalog.

An Atlas of the Universe uses nine maps to show "what our universe looks like".

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey

Uses a 2.5 meter telescope to make five color images of large sections of the sky. Recently the SDSS imaged a quasar of very high redshift, making it one of the most distant objects ever viewed by humans.

Bad Astronomy

Phil Plaitt's web site devoted to correcting "astronomical" errors in the media. Such diverse topics as the ability to balance an egg on end only on the Vernal Equinox and the Fox network's TV special explaining how the Apollo moon landings were "faked" by NASA are covered from a professional astronomer's perspective.

Astronomy Notes

Nick Strobel (Bakersfield College) created these notes for his introductory astronomy class. It's an online textbook covering many different aspects of modern astronomy: the Solar System, the Milky Way and other galaxies and Cosmology.

  Current Topics in Astronomy

 

Cosmology (Selected Resources)

UCLA professor Ned Wright gives an on-line college-level tutorial on Cosmology. Included are discussions of the age, density and size of the universe. The UCSB Physics Department is represented in the Boomerang or Balloon Observations of Millimetric Extragalactic Radiation and Geophysics project which maps the Cosmic Microwave Backround using a balloon-borne telescope which circumnavigates Antarctica. Cambridge Relativity is a site devoted to basic explanations of the Big Bang, Black Holes etc. There is a link to Prof. Stephen Hawkings' web site. The Cosmic Distance Scale is produced by NASA to show the unimaginably vast distances of the visible universe.

Supernovae

Supernovae, or star explosions, are among the most violent events in the universe. A taxonomy flow chart complete with bibliographic references is located at the Naval Research Laboratory. Distant supernovae are being studied by the High Z SN Search group for cosmological research purposes. The Supernova Cosmology Project at the Lawrence Berkeley Lab conducts similar research. If you would like to join in the hunt for supernovae the web pages of the International Supernovae Network will provide information. Included are links to lists of amateur contributions, as well as the distribution of supernovae in the night skies. A list of supernovae currently visible to amateur astronomers with telescopes of moderate apertures (25 cm or larger) is maintained by David Bishop of the Rochester Academy of Science. Could life on Earth be endangered by supernovae? Michael Richmond examines the prospects.

Gamma-Ray Bursters (GRB)

These short, intense flashes of high energy radiation have been called "one of the outstanding mysteries in astronomy" because no one can predict when they will occur or exactly where in the sky they will appear. A very basic explanation is provided on NASA's Imagine the Universe!history has been provided by the Goddard Space Flight Center. NASA's now defunct Compton Gamma-Ray Satellite contained a "Burst and Transient Source Experiment" to study the phenomenon. The results have been cataloged. The Gamma-Ray Coordinates Network site. A brief distributes radio and optical sources of GRBs in real time.

Extrasolar Planets

Astronomers have provided evidence for planets orbiting stars other than our Sun. The Extrasolar Planetsearch group at San Francisco State University is responsible for many (if not most) of the exoplanet discoveries. A group of astronomers headed by Michel Mayor at the Geneva Observatory is responsible for many other discoveries, including the first confirmed exoplanet. The Paris Observatory has an Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia containing a bibliography, links to other sites, as well as a list of stars suspected to have planets. Bill Arnett, author of the Nine Planets site listed above, has created an Other Solar Systems page containing concise information for the educated layperson. Some dissident astronomers claim that many of these discoveries are really brown dwarfs.

Interactive Resources

 

Your Sky

An interactive planetarium which produces sky maps for a given time/date for a given location on the Earth's surface. The Messier and NGC catalogs are used to display nonstellar objects. This site has many features normally available only on commercial planetarium software.

Digitized Sky Survey

Images of user-selected objects outside the solar system.

Astronomical Calculations from the U.S. Naval Observatory.

Enter your city name and state to obtain sunrise, sunset, moonrise and moonset times. The output will also provide your latitude and longitude, useful for some of the other resources on this page. From this site you can also determine rise/set times for the planets and bright stars.

Clementine

The Naval Research Laboratory's Clementine spacecraft imaged the Moon in 1994. The site allows you to select from any of the 1.8 million images acquired during the mission.

Skyview

"Generates images of any part of the sky at wavelengths in all regimes from radio to gamma-ray."

Solar System Live.

Online orrery.

Solar System Dynamics

Another interactive site from NASA and JPL. Allows one to generate comet ephemeris from a user-definable location, view lists of all known planetary moons, and see "face on" models of the solar system complete with the asteriod belt.

Atlas of Mars.

Viking orbiter images in black and white.

Hubble Guide Star Catalog

Contains nineteen million objects! Compiled to help "point" the Hubble Space Telescope. Searchable.

Interactive NGC Calalog Online

Allows the user to type in the catalog number of an object and obtain data and an image from the NGC 2000.0 catalog and the Digital Sky Survey. This site may not work with all browsers.

J-Pass

NASA's name for an interactive site which displays tracks of artificial satellites visible over a given location. If you live in the USA and don't know your latitude and longitude, you may enter city name or your zip code to obtain this information. Heavens Abovemaintains a similar site for generating visibility predictions for satellites of magnitude 4.5 or brighter, the Space Shuttle, and the International Space Station. The results are presented both in tabular and as a chart showing the path of the spacecraft against the backround of "fixed stars".

Java Jupiter

Plots the position of Jupiter's four largest moons and the transit of the Great Red Spot across the face of the planet. You may select different dates and times.

Sky View Cafe

Has a neat Java applet which can find your location automatically by using your computer's IP address. Using this information this site will plot the planets, stars and Deep Sky Objects for a given time. It also will provide Sun rise/set and Moon rise/set times, an orrery, daylight/night time hours and other information.

An Atlas of the Universe

Allows you to zoom from a point 12.5 light years from our Sun to view the entire visible universe!

The Internet Stellar Database

Provides data on many of the stars within 75 light years of the Sun, as well as some of the more well known stars at greater distances. You can find the distance to Betelgeuse or Lalande 21185's proper motion.

The Earth Impact Calculator

Allows the user to calculate the effects of an asteriod or comet impact depending on user defined variables.