Volume 42 No. 12 December 1, 2005 NEXT MEETING 7:30 p.m., Monday, December 5, 2005 Maturango Museum, 100 East Las Flores Avenue, Ridgecrest PROGRAM FOR THE DECEMBER 5 MEETING In June planetary geologist Gary Peterson told us about the Galilean Satellites of Jupiter. Huygens Cassini has been sending us information about the satellites of Saturn. Let's talk about the more distant satellites that orbit Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, and trans-Neptunian objects (TNO's). At least four such satellites have been discovered this year. DATES TO KEEP IN MIND Monday, December 5, 2005: Regular CLAS Meeting at the Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest, 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, December 28, 2005: Deadline for next Skywatchers Newsletter Monday, January 9, 2006: Regular CLAS Meeting at the Maturango Museum in Ridgecrest, 7:30 p.m. SPECIAL NOTICE: The annual election of officers for the China Lake Astronomical Society will be held at the Society's December 5, 2005 meeting. ATTENTION! The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada Observer's Handbooks for 2006 are now on hand, along with their superb Astronomical Calendar. As a benefit of membership we have held the price to last year's amounts. The handbook will cost you $15.00, and the calendar will be $10.00. Thus, $25.00 for the set. STAR PARTIES WILL RESUME IN MARCH 2006 THE SKY IN DECEMBER (Roger Brower) 1. Venus is well placed in the southwest at sunset and shows an ever slimmer crescent each day. By New Years Eve, Venus will be only 7% illuminated but will remain brilliant. 2. Jupiter has moved to the morning sky and can be seen in the southeast as morning approaches. 3. Saturn rises about 9:00 p.m. at the start of December and so can be viewed rising in the east after this time. 4. Mars continues to dim throughout the month but remains brighter than any stars around it. Look for it high in southeast after sunset. 5. Mercury will be in the morning sky all month. Look for it in the south-southeast before dawn. 6. The Geminid meteor shower peaks on December 13th but will largely be washed out by the near full moon. STAR PARTY FOR MONROE MIDDLE SCHOOL PHYSICAL SCIENCE STUDENTS (Alex Shlanta) What an experience we had on Friday Evening, 4 November 2005. It was a star party at the Cerro Coso College Astronomical Observatory for about 60 Monroe Middle school students and 20 parents. The students were members of Damon Shotwell's 6th grade Physical Science classes. The young people were eager, enthusiastic, very energetic, and pretty well behaved. Occasionally, though, there were significant increases in the noise level. The students were anxious for their turn to do some viewing and asked some good questions. We probably had too many guests out at the observatory for this star party. As a result the students had to be herded through the observatory stations rather quickly and didn't get an opportunity to really savor the experience and ask all their questions. In talking to the teacher Damon Shotwell afterwards, he said the students thought it was really great and it exceeded his expectations. Viewing conditions were good during the star party with no clouds to obscure the seeing. There was some wind, but it wasn't too bad. I started off the star party by passing out Xeroxed copies of star charts. Then I used a green laser pointer to show the students some of the major constellations and to point out to them the location of some of the celestial objects that they would be viewing through the telescopes. Using the laser was really a big hit with the students. Then the students were free to wander between the seven viewing stations and see the sights. Popular celestial items were the crescent phase Moon, Venus in a waxing quarter phase, Mars showing surface features, M31 Andromeda Galaxy and its satellite galaxy M32, blue and gold double star Albireo in Cygnus, M57 Ring Nebula in Lyra, Polaris as a double star, M45 Pleiades open cluster, and M13 globular cluster in Hercules. Manning the observing stations were the following China Lake Astronomical Society (CLAS) members: Peter Eiserloh (11x80 binoculars), Alan Karty (10" Meade LX200), Kiran Mehra (11" Celestron N-11), Chuck Morgan (12" Meade LX200), Jerry Ott (14" Starmaster Dobsonian), Ken Pringle (12" Odyssey I Dobsonian), and myself (10" Cave equatorial reflector). My thanks to these CLAS members who helped out with the star party and for a job well done. SOMETHING THAT ARRIVED BY EMAIL (This is an unpaid, non-endorsed, presentation) For parents, grandparents, and educators interested in sharing their love of the night sky with young children, we have two new books that will help you do just that: Pieces of Another World by Mara Rockliff and How the Moon Regained Her Shape by Janet Ruth Heller. Please help us spread the word by forwarding this e-mail to other interested parties or by including information in your newsletter. Pieces of Another World introduces meteors and meteor showers to children. How many children see a meteor (also known as a shooting star) and wonder what it really is? The story follows a young child and her father as they venture out in the middle of the night to watch a meteor shower and see "Pieces of Another World". The scientific material presented in the story and in the "For Creative Minds" section was checked for accuracy by the Education Department at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Facilities. It has been reviewed by members of the American Meteor Association; Jack Horkheimer, Executive Director of the Miami Planetarium and Writer/Host of the PBS Series "Star Gazer;" and by Wesley Swift, the Observatory Director Von Braun Astronomical Society in Huntsville, AL. In addition to it being a sweet family story, this is a perfect book for early elementary curriculums relating to the night sky. The concept of meteors and what they are is clearly described - for adults and children! What is the difference between a meteor, meteoroid, meteorite, and comet? The colorful artwork by Salima Alikhan brings this enchanting story to life. For ages 5-9. ISBN: 0-9764943-2-9. Available now. How the Moon Regained Her Shape is a fascinating story, influenced by Native American folktales, that helps to explain the phases of the moon. It also provides a wonderful life lesson to children as they observe how "the Moon" was able to overcome a very personal adversity and rebuild her self-confidence. After the sun insults her, the moon is hurt and disappears - much to the chagrin of rabbits that miss their moonlight romps. With the help of her many friends and admirers on earth, the moon regains her self-confidence each day until she is back to her full size. Ben Hodson's art is incredible! Ben created the artwork for this book using acrylic paints, handmade papers, old wallpaper, pencil crayons, gesso, ink, and glue on watercolor paper. The shadows were added digitally to give it depth. The "For Creative Minds" section was reviewed by Dr. Wesley Swift, Jr., Director of the Von Braun Observatory in Huntsville, Alabama and includes: Moon Observations & Fun Facts, Native American names for full moons, and Moon Projects (Lunar Calendar / Moon Cookies / Viewing the Phases with a Moon Circle Graphic). This book supports elementary school curriculum that deals with the solar system and the night sky in science and the folklore genre in language arts. It helps adults answer some of those pesky questions like: why is the moon in the sky during the day? For ages 6-10. ISBN: 0-9764943-4-5. (Available January 2006). At Sylvan Dell, we publish only high quality, illustrated children's books that foster a love of reading and a desire to learn. We have award-winning authors and illustrators from across the country and Canada whose manuscripts and stunning artwork come together to produce an exciting collection of picture books. Most of our stories are fictional but deal with non-fictional themes of science, nature, and animals. Each of our books is vetted for scientific accuracy before publication and to each manuscript is added a 3-5 page "For Creative Minds" section with fun facts, crafts and/or games to supplement educational components of the book. These crafts/games are designed for easy use by parents and teachers and may be copied or downloaded from our website by the owner of the book for use with multiple children or for repeat use. FROM EARL TOWSON MOON DUST: The dozen Apollo astronauts who walked on the moon between 1969 and 1972 were all surprised by how "sticky" moon dust was. Dust got on everything, fouling tools and spacesuits. Equipment blackened by dust absorbed sunlight and tended to overheat. It was a real problem. Many researchers believe that moon dust has a severe case of static cling: it's electrically charged. In the lunar daytime, intense ultraviolet (UV) light from the sun knocks electrons out of the powdery grit. Dust grains on the moon's day lit surface thus become positively charged. Eventually, the repulsive charges become so strong that grains are launched off the surface "like cannonballs," arcing kilometers above the moon until gravity makes them fall back again to the ground. The moon may have a virtual atmosphere of this flying dust, sticking to astronauts from above and below. Or so the theory goes. But do grains of lunar dust truly become positively charged when illuminated by ultraviolet light? If so, which grains are most affected--big grains or little grains? And what does moon dust do when it's charged? Researchers inject a single grains of lunar dust into a chamber and catches" them using electric force fields. (The injector gives the grain a slight charge, allowing it to be handled by electric fields.) With the grain held suspended literally in mid-air, they "pump the chamber down to 10-5 torr to simulate lunar vacuum." A single grain of moon dust hangs suspended in the vacuum chamber. Researchers have found tow things: "First, ultraviolet light charges moon dust 10 times more than theory predicts. Second, bigger grains (1 to smaller grains (0.5 micrometer), just the opposite of what theory predicts." Clearly, there's much to learn. For instance, what happens at night, when the sun sets and the UV light goes away? Experiments to answer this will be run in early 2006. Instead of shining a UV laser onto an individual lunar particle, the dust will be bombarded with a beam of electrons from an electron gun. Why electrons? Theory predicts that lunar dust may acquire negative charge at night, because it is bombarded by free electrons in the solar wind--that is, particles streaming from the sun that curve around behind the moon and hit the night-dark soil. When Apollo astronauts visited the Moon 30+ years ago, they landed in daylight and departed before sunset. They never stayed the night, so what happened to moon dust after dark didn't matter. This will change: The next generation of explorers will remain much longer than Apollo astronauts did, eventually setting up a permanent outpost. They'll need to know, how does moon dust behave around the clock? Next comes the mesmerizing part: when researcher Abbas shines a UV laser on the grain. As expected, the dust gets "charged up" and it starts to move. By adjusting the chamber's electric fields with painstaking care, Abbas can keep the grain centered; he can measure its changing charge and explore its fascinating characteristics. MEMBERSHIP INFORMATION Basic CLAS dues are $20.00 per year, which includes the Skywatchers Newsletter. As a benefit of membership you may also receive Astronomy Magazine and/or Sky and Telescope Magazine. The fee schedule is as follows: Basic membership $20.00 per year Membership with Astronomy magazine $51.00 per year Membership with Sky and Telescope magazine $53.00 per year Membership with both S & T and Astronomy $84.00 per year Send your check to: Roger Brower, Treasurer, China Lake Astronomical Society, P.O. Box 1783, Ridgecrest, CA 93556. PRESIDENT - Earl Wilson - 760-876-5455 (email zearl.email@gmail.com) VICE-PRESIDENT - Bruce Churchill - 760-375-7247 (email bchurchill@atsecure.net) SECRETARY - Ted Hodgkinson - 661- 824-2738 (email ghodkinson@sbcglobal.net) TREASURER - Roger Brower - 760-375-1181 (email brower@iwvisp.com) NEWSLETTER EDITOR - Carroll Evans Jr. - 760-375-5681 (email clevans@ridgenet.net) WESTERN AMATEUR ASTRONOMERS WEB SITE http://www.waa.av.org/ Meetings of the China Lake Astronomical Society are held at the Maturango Museum at 7:30 p.m. on the first Monday evening of each month, except when the first Monday is a holiday. SKYWATCHERS Newsletter of the CHINA LAKE ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY POST OFFICE BOX 1783 RIDGECREST, CA 93556-1783 NOTICE! CANADIAN OBSERVER'S HANDBOOKS ARE NOW AVAILABLE NEXT MEETING: 7:30 p.m., MONDAY, DECEMBER 5, 2005: "DISTANT SATELLITES" AT THE MATURANGO MUSEUM, 100 EAST LAS FLORES AVE. CLAS WEB PAGE http://www1.iwvisp.com/brower/clas.html INDEX OF CLAS NEWSLETTERS http://www.ridgenet.net/~jebush/clas/