mountaineer skies spring 2019 · fossil. one theory about how things in our solar system are formed...

Department of Physics and Astronomy

Magnitude

MOUNTAINEER SKIES

Inside This Issue

1. Coming Soon/In The Sky This Quarter

2. The Snowman in the Kuiper Belt

3. Planetarium Show Schedule

4. Monthly Sky Chart—January

5. Monthly Sky Chart—February

6. Monthly Sky Chart—March

Coming Soon We’re switching things around with the planetarium schedule this quarter! In addition to our new “first come first served” reservation policy, we will also be moving our children’s shows to Saturday afternoon at 2 PM! The department will be hosting a SPOT Science Day on Saturday March 23rd from 1-3 PM. Join us for science demonstrations including UV beads and an infrared camera. Last quarter we did a giveaway for a telescope, and we will continue giving away telescopes. Come to our show on Saturday February 23rd at 2 PM for your chance to win a small telescope!

Constellation Rise Set Magnitude Mercury Ophiuchus 6:35 AM 3:49 PM -0.4 Venus Libra 3:58 AM 2:12 PM -4.4 Mars Pisces 11:37 AM 11:36 PM 0.5

Jupiter Ophiuchus 5:34 AM 3:00 PM -1.6 Saturn Sagittarius 7:45 AM 5:03 PM 0.5

In The Sky This Quarter

January 1, 2019

Constellation Rise Set Magnitude Mercury Capricornus 7:47 AM 5:39 PM -1.3 Venus Sagittarius 4:35 AM 2:08 PM -4.1 Mars Pisces 10:23 AM 11:19 PM 0.9


February 1, 2019

Constellation Rise Set Magnitude Mercury Pisces 7:29 AM 7:36 PM 0.2 Venus Capricornus 4:58 AM 2:42 PM -4.0 Mars Aries 9:20 AM 11:05 PM 1.2


Volume 19, Issue 1 planetarium.wvu.edu January — February —March 2019

March 1, 2019

*Note: all magnitude values are taken to be a 9:00 PM

Volume 19, Issue 1 Edited by Haley and Belinda


The Snowman in the Kuiper Belt How did you ring in the New Year this year?

With family and friends celebrating another trip around the Sun? Astronomers and engineers at NASA also had a reason to celebrate, but not for just completing a voyage around our nearest star, but to the most distant object ever visited by a spacecraft. In the early hours of January 1st, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft flew by a small asteroid located 4 billion miles from Earth called 2014 MU69, or, as scientists call it, “Ultima Thule,” which means “beyond the known world,”. If the New Horizons spacecraft sounds familiar, it is probably because you have heard about it in reference to Pluto! New Horizons is the spacecraft that made history in July of 2015 when it became the first spacecraft to fly past Pluto and take data. The New Horizons mission was created to explore worlds beyond our own and after passing Pluto, it has continued to the outer edges of the solar system. The craft was able to get within 2,200 miles of Ultima Thule, which is three times closer than it was able to get to Pluto.

The flyby was not only amazing because it represented the most distant object a probe has encountered, but it was also an important milestone because it can tell us a lot about the history of our solar system, most notably planet formation. Ultima Thule is an asteroid in the Kuiper Belt, which is like another asteroid belt in the very outer solar system. This rock has essentially remained untouched since the creation of the solar system, so it acts as a cosmic fossil. One theory about how things in our solar system are formed is called the pebble accretion model. In this model, gas and dust left over from the

formation of the Sun come together by gravity to form larger objects. However, these “pebbles” do not just refer to rocks the size of the ones you find on a beach, but can refer to things as big as boulders. The theory describes how small gas and dust particles grew to form these bigger rocks, which ultimately became planets.

Ultima Thule’s shape seems to support the pebble accretion theory, looking like a snowman with two lobes, one being about 3 times smaller than the other. Scientists believe that Ultima Thule formed from a collision between two

bodies, but two bodies moving very slowly, less than 1 mile per hour. During the early stages of formation, the solar system was in a period referred to as the

Late Heavy Bombardment epoch, where material leftover from planet formation was slamming into other bodies. The fact that the objects that formed

Ultima Thule seemed to have collided so slowly helps prove that not all things formed when the solar system was very chaotic. Scientists expected to possibly find moons around this object, as there has been evidence that other asteroids

have moons around them, but not finding moons around this object is consistent with the pebble accretion theory; pebble accretion would have ejected small pieces of dust and gas

that it did not accrete, leaving no moons in orbit around the object.

Overall this flyby was not just interesting because it was the first time a very distant object was explored, but because it can tell us new things about the history of the solar system. New Horizons will continue its journey through the Kuiper Belt as NASA’s team pinpoints the next object for exploration.

Sources: https://www.space.com/42873-ultima-thule-bowling-pin-shape-new-horizons-photo.html https://www.space.com/42874-new-horizons-ultima-thule-flyby-whats-next.html https://www.space.com/42889-new-horizons-ultima-thule-flyby-planet-formation.html https://www.space.com/36661-late-heavy-bombardment.html


Enhanced color image, a high-resolution black and white image, a combination of both Credit: NASA/John Hopkins University Applied Physics

An artist’s rendition of the flyby Credit: Adrian Mann/All About Space


January 11th: 7:00 PM: To Space and Back 8:00 PM: To Space and Back January 26th: 2:00 PM: Children’s Show: Larry Cat in Space 3:00 PM: Children’s Show: Larry Cat in Space

February 8th: 7:00 PM: The Dark Matter Mystery 8:00 PM: The Dark Matter Mystery February 23rd: 5:00 PM: Children’s Show + Giveaway Show: Earth, Moon, Sun 6:00 PM: Children’s Show: Earth, Moon, Sun

March 8th: 7:00 PM: Ultimate Universe 8:00 PM: Ultimate Universe March 22nd: 5:00 PM: Children’s Show: The Secrets of Gravity 6:00 PM: Children’s Show: The Secrets of Gravity

Regularly Scheduled Shows

For regularly-scheduled evening shows,visit our website http://planetarium.wvu.edu/shows to check show times. If you have a group of 10 or more and would like to make a reservation for a public show, please email us For those who are interested in bringing a group such as schools or scouts, please visit our field trips page on the website and send us an email: http://planetarium.wvu.edu/fieldtrips

Date Sunrise Sunset Moon Rise Moon Set Moon Phase January 8th 7:41 AM 5:13 PM 9:25 AM 7:44 PM Waxing Crescent January 21st 7:36 AM 5:27 PM 6:13 PM 7:58 AM Full Moon/ Total

Lunar Eclipse January 23rd 7:35 AM 5:29 PM 8:42 PM 9:29 AM Full Moon/ Total

Lunar Eclipse February 14th 7:14 AM 5:55 PM 12:44 PxM 2:33 AM Waxing Crescent February 28th 6:55 AM 6:11 PM 3:07 AM 12:54 PM Waxing Gibbous

March 14th 7:33 AM 7:26 PM 12:25 PM 2:27 AM Waxing Crescent March 20th 7:24 AM 7:32 PM 7:15 PM 7:27 AM Waning Gibbous

Selected Sunrise/Sunset and Moon Rise/Moon Set Times

Full Moon: New Moon: January 21, February 19th, March 21st January 6th, February 4th, March 6th

*Note: moon set times can be the next day

Planetarium Shows

Volume 19, Issue 1

~Admission to all planetarium shows is free~

Edited by Haley and Belinda


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January 2019 Sky Chart* for:10:00 PM at the beginning of the month

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The WVU Planetarium is for the educational benefit of WVU students, staff, and faculty members, as well as the local community. Should you wish to make a contribution to the planetarium, it can be made through the WVU Planetarium Project at the WVU Foundation, Inc., through methods available on our website at http://planetarium.wvu.edu/give. Thank you.

*Sky Chart used with the kind permission of Heavens-Above at http://www.heavens-above.com/




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February 2019 Sky Chart* for:10:00 PM at the beginning of the month







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Volume 18, Issue 2

Volume 19, Issue 1

March 2019 Sky Chart* for: 10:00 PM at the beginning of the month




Edited by Haley and Belinda

mountaineer skies spring 2019 · fossil. one theory about how things in our solar system are formed...

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