CHILDREN OF THE STARS

ByANDY FLEMING

It’s the story of how we, and all of the creatures with whom we share the Earth came to be. It’s an epic tale to rival the best Shakespearean tragedy or our best works of literature. It’s the story of how we and everything we see was literally ‘made in heaven’, and it confidently predicts what our fate may be...

Stars do not live forever, and our Sun will one day die, and with it all life on Earth. Five billion years from now, when our planet has been incinerated to a crisp, our local star will have run out of the fuel that powers its nuclear fusion. Its hydrogen depleted and all consumed, it will have metamorphosed from the relatively stable yellow dwarf star that we see today into a bloated angry red giant, its outer layers and atmosphere occupying most of the inner solar system.

Indeed, the Sun is already imperceptibly increasing in temperature – it’s 20 per cent hotter now than when the Earth coalesced out of the Sun’s proto-planetary disk 4½ billion years ago, and within a couple of hundred million years the Earth will become uninhabitable. This chain of events is inevitable and, over different time periods, happens to all stars.

Stars coalesce by gravity out of clouds of interstellar gas, made up largely of the original constit-uent elements of the universe: about 75% hydrogen and 25% helium, plus trace amounts of lithium – the latter two termed ‘metals’ in the unorthodox nomenclature of astronomy.

SHARING THE P, B AND J

BBC2's Stargazing Live presenters: Brian Cox and Dara O Briain. Photograph courtesy of the BBC.

byANDY FLEMING

The late NASA astronomer and science populariser Dr Carl Sagan once wrote about his passion for science stating that when you’re in love with someone or something, you want to tell the world. And he was in love with science and astronomy.

To socialise is a strong human trait, we are after all perhaps the most social of animals; hence the popularity of internet social media such as Facebook and Twitter. And such media are a potent tool when it comes to inspiring others to become involved with our own interests and hobbies. It’s what the Chief Executive Officer of the Pasadena, California-based Planetary Society, the Science and Planetary Guy Bill Nye calls sharing the P, B and J; the Passion, Beauty and Joy of astronomy and space exploration.

So who inspired you into the subject of astronomy, space exploration and science? Was it one

The late Sir Partrick Moore, presenter of BBC1's Sky at
Night programme for over fifty years.

of the pioneering popularisers of the twentieth century using broadcast media to convey their interest and passion and to help inspire you into the hobby or perhaps scientific career?

Perhaps it was Jacob Bronowski, David Attenborough, Carl Sagan or Sir Patrick Moore. Or perhaps it was one of the contemporary popularisers of science such as Dr Brian Cox or Dr Neil deGrasse Tyson. It could have been reading up on the lives and thoughts of the early Ancient Greek natural philosophers or indeed perhaps discovering the paradigm-shifting discoveries of Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Newton, Einstein or Hubble. Or it could have been a friend or family member who shared and inspired you into their passion, perhaps even throwing in some optical equipment such as a pair of binoculars or a telescope!

Whoever it was, why not give something back to the subject and spread the word of science? If you’re enthralled by astronomy and have experienced the spiritual uplift of realising your place in space and time you quite possibly have a yearning to share your interest and lobby to support initiatives in science and space exploration.

You may be a member of your local astronomical society, but you’re possibly wondering what else can you do to promote your passion and hobby? In the twenty first century there’s much you can do without even leaving the comfort of your own home. For starters, why not join an astronomy forum, or even better, join the blogosphere. You’ll soon be publishing by registering free for a service such as Google Blogger, or start a traditional website at one of the free web hosts such as http://www.webs.com/. If you can find objects in the night sky through a telescope and know how to switch a computer “on”, you’ll find publishing on the internet easier than A, B, C!

If you’re into astro-imaging then this is a great place to upload and showcase your images

, videos or sketches. Alternatively you can publish your own astronomy posts on subjects of your choice. These may include your observing notes, articles and news from the world of astronomy and cosmology that you may wish to publicise. In addition to your own articles, guest bloggers can be engaged and of course press releases and photographs can be reproduced without royalties from organisations such as NASA, JPL, ESA, the European Southern Observatory, the W M Keck Observatory on Mauna Kea, Hawaii and indeed virtually every other astronomical research establishment in the world! Publicising your posts for free on social media and bookmarking sites such as Reddit, Stumbleupon, Facebook or Twitter will mean your blog will soon be attracting thousands of readers and subscribers, along with all of their comments (which you can moderate!).

M31, the stunning Andromeda Galaxy 

M27 the Dumbbell Nebula in Vulpecula.

In addition to the internet there’s also astronomy society member magazines where you can share your experiences with other astro-folk. Or perhaps you could share your passion by producing an astronomy society meeting presentation on a subject of your choice.  

Of course, there’s also helping at a star party, perhaps at a planetarium or, as I have done recently in connection with BBC2’s Stargazing LIVE at another venue altogether.

In the UK, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds takes the inter-relationship between birds, other wildlife and the natural environment, including the night sky and I had great fun helping out at a star party with members of the general public, who were thrilled to view the night sky through a large 200mm Newtonian Reflector. The staff too at the superb RSPB field centre at Saltholme near Port Clarence, were also thoroughly enthralled!

If you have connections with the media then network and utilise your contacts and skills. Local newspaper editors particularly like ready made articles about astronomy, cosmology and science in general. This is particularly the case now as competition from the internet and new media means many newspaper groups no longer have the funds to employ dedicated science correspondents. Well-written press releases with succinct information and contact details are much appreciated. An example of what can be achieved is illustrated by a recent interview I had with Stuart Arnold at the Northern Echo. My input was part of a story that again was being published to celebrate BBC2‟s Stargazing LIVE entitled Fresh Focus on the Night Sky.

Astronomy Live and On Air direct from the presenter on
local FM radio.

Of course if one’s work and passion for astronomy can be included in the free-to-air broadcast media then a real sense of fulfilment can be achieved and you can literally have the attention of thousands of viewers or listeners for maximum impact! Perhaps eventually your astro-photography will be featured on the BBC1’s very popular Sky at Night programme. Now that would be an inspiration indeed for all budding astro-imagers!

I managed to dovetail my lifelong interest in radio, music and astronomy into a weekly five minute slot on my programme on a local radio station that and was well aware of the popularity of astronomy due in part to the success of Dr Brian Cox’s numerous BBC television series. Recordings of the weekly segment were edited and stored as a podcast download on iTunes.

And then there is the possibility of narrating and publishing your own podcast or presenting a strand on a pre-existing podcast or web radio show, such as the segment I present on Podcast-UFO.

Don’t forget to tailor the broadcast to the general public. Of course one is always open to the accusation of ‘dumbing down’ the subject, but since April, 2012 I’ve managed to cover subjects in an interesting and inspirational style as diverse as black holes, exoplanets orbiting Alpha Centauri B, astrophysics, numerous constellations, SETI, along with a monthly ‘What’s Up?’ segment. It’s amazing what you can communicate in a few minutes on the radio, and hopefully through my sound bites, the seeds are being sown in the minds of some of our listeners to explore the subject further.

Popularising astronomy either via star parties and outreach work or via the media is a very rewarding past time and one I can certainly recommend to anyone. Carl Sagan said many times that it is the birth-rite of every child to know their true co-ordinates in space and time, and by now you may think you can help in and enjoy the task of enlightening the public.

Your involvement will also bring one further massive benefit for astronomy and science that I haven’t mentioned: the public are the ones who pay the bill via their taxes for much astronomical research and exploration either solely in the UK or as collaborative efforts with other countries via projects such as the European Space Agency or the Large Hadron Collider.

It’s vitally important that amateur astronomers get as many members of the public interested in science as possible to bring pressure to bear on elected politicians to save funding for science. When politicians and the electorate are confronted by cost-saving measures, it’s another field that’s cut, rather than the scientific seed corn upon which our future technology, economy and ultimately the UK‟s future success will be built.

Who knows, something may even be done about light pollution… now that would be a real result!!

FEEL THE PB&J (PASSION, BEAUTY, AND JOY) OF THE COSMOS? SHARE IT!

CARL SAGAN & HIS LIFE IN THE COSMOS: A TRIBUTE

ByANDY FLEMING

It's incredible to think that it's more than fourteen years since the world lost a most remarkable astronomer, pioneer exobiologist and populariser of science - Carl Sagan.

A son of Jewish immigrants to the United States, Sagan was born in Brooklyn, New York, where he spent his childhood developing an interest in astronomy. A high achiever, he studied physics at the University of Chicago, gaining a master's degree in 1956, before being awarded a doctorate there in 1960 in astronomy and astrophysics. He then lectured at Harvard University until 1968, when a move to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York beckoned. In 1971 this became a full-time professorship that included the directorship of the Laboratory for Planetary Studies. He also took an increasing interest in pioneering exo-biology and publicising the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). During this period, he also became an Associate Director of the Centre for Radio Physics and Space Research at Cornell, and later was instrumental in lecturing at Cornell in scepticism and critical thinking.

Such an academic career would have been amazing in itself, but Sagan had been heavily involved in the US space program since the 1950s -- including his celebrated briefings of the Apollo astronauts before their flights to the Moon. However, of utmost interest to this most talented of scientists was planetary science and the increasing number of NASA robotic missions to neighbouring planets in the solar system.

BLUES FOR A RED PLANET

Many scientists think that the Ancient Martian Ocean Would Have Been Salty ‘Dead Sea’.

ByANDY FLEMING

Evidence is mounting that Mars was once a wet and warm world, similar to the early Earth. What went wrong with the Red Planet -- is it possible that future explorers may find fossils from a more habitable time -- indeed did microbial life survive until the present time?

Once upon a time there were two adjacent planets orbiting a run-of the-mill star in one of the arms of an unremarkable spiral galaxy. Both were warm, both were wet, both had substantial atmospheres, both had vulcanism, both had oceans, seas and rivers, and both were in or on the edge of their star’s habitable zone. Life, we are certain began on one, but on the other – well we’re not too sure.

The planets in question are of course the Earth and Mars. Everyone is fascinated by Mars. From an earlier less-informed age, science fiction by Ray Bradbury and Edgar Rice Burroughs, or the imagined canals of astronomer Percival Lowell has fired our imagination, and has ensured that the Red Planet now has a special place in both our hearts and popular folklore.

The real Mars is even more fascinating however, and the planet’s formation and history can be the subject of some fascinating speculation. Mars is still one of the few places in the solar system that humans can think realistically about exploring on foot. Did life arise on Mars in its early past like it did on Earth? Even more speculatively, did life arise on one planet, only to be transported by ejecta to the other after an asteroid impact? Many scientists think that life, well microbial life at any rate, protected from cosmic rays and a fiery entry into the Earth’s atmosphere inside a space rock can traverse the vast distances between planets.

One of the meteorites discovered on the snows of the Allen Hills of Antarctica showcased by NASA in 1996, and confirmed as Martian by isotopic analysis, contains tantalising crystal structures that may be either chemical in origin or fossilised bacteria (albeit very small bacteria!). Meteorite ALH84001 may surprise us yet. Will future geologists as they explore Mars discover fossils in the sedimentary rocks that are so indicative of the planet’s wet and warmer past? Did creatures swim in the seas and rivers of ancient Mars – were they washed up on the now high and dry fossilised Martian beaches that we’ve identified with our Mars orbiters? Did they take the ultimate white-knuckle ride over waterfalls to dwarf Niagara in the Vallis Marineris, a gargantuan canyon the length of North America? As the late NASA astronomer and planetary scientist Carl Sagan (1994) speculated, “Now that would be a world to explore – unfortunately we are four billion years too late!

Whether such speculation turns out to be confirmed, things started to go wrong with Mars about 3.8 billion years ago, about the time life got started on Earth. Mars is about half the size of the Earth so its interior began to radiate heat to space much more quickly and its core began to solidify. Without a molten iron core acting as a dynamo, any magnetic field surrounding the planet started to dissipate exposing the atmosphere and surface to the Sun’s charged particles. Any tentative carbon cycle would grind to a halt too -- despite having the largest volcano in the solar system (Olympus Mons), vulcanism would cease, and with it any possibility of recycling the planet’s carboniferous rocks.