April 15 Observation

I woke up at 3 AM to watch the lunar eclipse for an hour and it was very interesting to watch the moon turn reddish in color. I used the constellation app on my phone to find other constellations in the night sky. My dad and I took some interesting photos of the lunar eclipse.

APOD 4.4

Spica, Mars, and Eclipsed Moon

A red moon went through our night sky on April 15 immersed in Earth's shadow for over an hour. It was the year's first total lunar eclipse. In this image the moon is contrasting with the blue star Spica and it provides a really cool juxtaposition. Brighter than spica, Mars is near opposition and closest approach to Earth. This is a really cool and once in a lifetime image.

Hercules M13 Cluster

I adjusted the image by using the log then auto. I sharpened the image twice and then reduced the noise about 3 times.

Centaurus A

I adjusted the image by using log then auto. I sharpened the image, reduced the noise twice, then sharpened it again.

APOD 4.3

Mars Near Opposition

April 8-14 is when Mars is between opposition and closest approach looping through the constellation Virgo opposite the Sun in the night sky. This clear image was captured with a high speed digital camera and a 16 inch diameter telescope from Assis, Brazil. Mars' north polar cap is at the top left of the image and there are water vapor clouds condensing in the cold atmosphere above Mars' volcanos. Mars will be about 1/100th the angular size of the Moon. I've never seen as detailed an image of Mars before so this image is pretty cool.

Contributions to the Understanding of Our Galaxy

Galileo - Found that Milky Way Galaxy was full of stars and not just nebulae.
Immaneul Kant - Observed spiral nebula, believed that the Milky Way was the universe and the galaxy had a disc shape.
William Herschel - Provided many measurements to estimate distances and position in the Milky Way.
Henrietta Leavitt - Period and luminosity relation.
Harlow Shapley -Used a new telescope and the RR Lyrids and Cepheids to measure the distances to the globular clusters and that we were not near the center of the galaxy.
Heber Curtis - Believed that the universe had separate islands in the sky and wasn't one conformed group galaxy.
Edwin Hubble - Able to measure stars in other galaxies and show that there were many other things out there.

APOD 4.2

Along the Western Veil

This image is the of the western part of the Veil Nebula and is toward the Cygnus constellation in the Earth's sky. The Veil Nebula is a large supernova remnant. The light from the original supernova explosion reached Earth about 5,000 years ago. The glowing filaments in the image are like long ripples of separated red atomic hydrogen and blue-green oxygen gas. The Veil Nebula is also known as the Cygnus Loop; it spans the distance of about 6 times the diameter of the full Moon. Parts of the Western Veil that are brighter are recognized as separate nebulae, such as Pickering's Triangle (NGC 6979) and the Witch's Broom (NGC 6960). This image just has a really awesome color and is very aesthetically pleasing.