Object of the Day
For the Galaxy Zoo project (which we're involved in at work) there's an 'Object of the Day' - a bit like APOD but just with images from SDSS. I do one every Tuesday, and I try to make it a bit of an informative choice, although sometimes I don't have quite so much time to prepare one. But I was quite pleased with my efforts today, so I thought I would post it here as well:
Today I've gone for a comet:
587731514218577929 is a comet posted by Arralen.
I've picked this comet as, while it's fairly small, it shows very nicely how the tail of the comet is pointing in a different direction from the comet's motion - you can see the 'trail' of coloured points at the head moves in a different direction to the tail.
As to why I've posted a comet? Well, it's all to do with the LHC. "What have comets got to do with particle accelerators?" I hear you cry.
Well, I was reading a book last night called "The Varieties of Scientific Experience", by the well known astronomer Carl Sagan (who sadly passed on in 1996). It's an excellent read which I'd thoroughly recommend, and has more than a few gorgeous astronomical photos in it to boot.
In it, he tells the tale of Sir William Huggins, an astronomer in 1910. Huggins was amongst the earliest astronomers taking advantage of spectroscopy, and he'd taken spectra of several comets and had found the signatures of a number of organic molecules in them. Amongst those signatures was that of cyanide.
In 1910, it was looking like Earth might just pass through the tail of Halley's Comet. Despite reassurances from astronomers that the amount of cyanide in the tail would make no difference to people on Earth (if the Earth passed through the tail at all!), there was some degree of panic. The Pope issued a statement criticising people who hoarded oxygen cylinders in Rome. Quacks sold anti-cyanide comet pills. A number of people committed suicide.
Needless to say, noone died from being poisoned by Halley's Comet.
People today thought that switching on the LHC would spell the end of the world as well, despite reassurances that this would not happen. While I've heard of no instances of quacks selling anti-LHC pills (I doubt anyone would be gullible enough to think a pill could help there...) there's more than a few parallels.
And needless to say, noone died when the LHC got switched on.
Today I've gone for a comet:
587731514218577929 is a comet posted by Arralen.
I've picked this comet as, while it's fairly small, it shows very nicely how the tail of the comet is pointing in a different direction from the comet's motion - you can see the 'trail' of coloured points at the head moves in a different direction to the tail.
As to why I've posted a comet? Well, it's all to do with the LHC. "What have comets got to do with particle accelerators?" I hear you cry.
Well, I was reading a book last night called "The Varieties of Scientific Experience", by the well known astronomer Carl Sagan (who sadly passed on in 1996). It's an excellent read which I'd thoroughly recommend, and has more than a few gorgeous astronomical photos in it to boot.
In it, he tells the tale of Sir William Huggins, an astronomer in 1910. Huggins was amongst the earliest astronomers taking advantage of spectroscopy, and he'd taken spectra of several comets and had found the signatures of a number of organic molecules in them. Amongst those signatures was that of cyanide.
In 1910, it was looking like Earth might just pass through the tail of Halley's Comet. Despite reassurances from astronomers that the amount of cyanide in the tail would make no difference to people on Earth (if the Earth passed through the tail at all!), there was some degree of panic. The Pope issued a statement criticising people who hoarded oxygen cylinders in Rome. Quacks sold anti-cyanide comet pills. A number of people committed suicide.
Needless to say, noone died from being poisoned by Halley's Comet.
People today thought that switching on the LHC would spell the end of the world as well, despite reassurances that this would not happen. While I've heard of no instances of quacks selling anti-LHC pills (I doubt anyone would be gullible enough to think a pill could help there...) there's more than a few parallels.
And needless to say, noone died when the LHC got switched on.