Bruce Berger's Astronomy Blog

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Diário do Nordeste

FENÔMENO ASTRONÔMICO (19/2/2010)
Ceará é ponto de observação

Ceara back to the point of observation of scientists. This time, the phenomenon being examined is the occultation of a star by Planetoide Varuna, which orbits beyond [...]

On Wednesday night, February 17th, Breno & I were to met Dennis and other CASF members at the observatory of the high school where he teaches, the Colégio Christus.
On the way to the school, we stopped at a restaurant to pick up Dennis, and briefly met one of the three teams representing the Paris Observatory.
 
We [...]

I’ve been busy the past week…
Arrived in Fortaleza about 7:30 on Tuesday (2/16/10) evening and I was met by 7 members of the Clube de Astronomia de Fortaleza. Three club members joined me for dinner after a quick stop at the Holiday Inn to check in and freshen up after 21 hours of travel.
 
I met [...]

Well, it’s off to Brazil tomorrow on another research expedition to help characterize the minor planet 20000 Varuna. It’ll be visible to us in Gemini just after twilight, or rather it’s shadow will be visible as it occults GSC 1914:301 on Friday night, 23:06UT. I’m still packing so not much time to write now, but [...]

OK, I realize it’s been a while since I posted. I started this blog with the good intentions of posting something once a week, and I have failed. Why? Because I’ve got so many projects going on, and first on that list is finding a full-time job.
I’m happy to share with you a list of [...]

My headline might seem a little risqué, but since this is an astronomy website it’s not what you think. As you read in the post below, the ATMoB team captured data on the occultation of a 10.5 magnitude star in Aquarius by a 129km diameter (est.) asteroid named 694 Ekard. Just 12 hours later, a [...]

Well, we saw it – or rather we saw it, then it winked out, and then it was there again. Magnitude 10.5 TYCO 0528-00946-1 star in Aquarius winked out for about 2 seconds while Gary Jacobson, Ken Cantrell, Marion Hochuli, Tom Calderwood and I watched.
This was an occultation by 694 Ekard, a 12.6 Mag asteroid [...]

UPDATE 10.29.09: Although my intentions were pure, I’ve taken down the link because of security concerns. The KML overlay of world-wide observatories on Google Earth is no longer publicly available. If you wish your observatory to be listed in the IAU Minor Planet Center database, or if you wish to correct or obscure the exact [...]

UPDATE: 10/23/09 – Sky & Telescope Magazine picked up this story and featured it in their online magazine!! Check it out – http://www.skyandtelescope.com/news/65538577.html
Last week I traveled to Mexico, specifically to Mexico’s Observatorio Astronomica Nacional’s San Pedro Mountain Observatory in North Baja California state, located 9,100′ (2790 m) high in the San Pedro Martir National Park. [...]

INTRODUCTION
The scientific interest in asteroids is due largely to their status as the remnant debris from the inner solar system formation process. Because some of these objects can collide with the Earth, asteroids are also important for having significantly modified the Earth’s biosphere in the past. They will continue to do so in the future. [...]