The Astronomical Numbers game

[ToSeek]

Oct. 1, 1981 - NASA personnel numbered 491.

Just at Dryden Flight Research Center (http://www.nasa.gov/centers/dryden/about/Dryden/80.html), that is. I can personally vouch that there were more than 491 NASA employees at Goddard alone in that era.

[ToSeek]

492 arcseconds - minimum separation of the center of the Sun and Venus for the June 9, 2255 transit. Mark your calendars now!

[The_Radiation_Specialist]

493- luna is much more than 493 kilometeres away from earth! :) ok, ok... i know that won't count!

493- The power output was 493 watts when Galileo spacecraft arrived at Jupiter

[ToSeek]

The Meade 494 Autostar (http://www.meade.com/autostar/autostars.html) is a "GOTO" telescope controller.

[LurchGS]

Just at Dryden Flight Research Center (http://www.nasa.gov/centers/dryden/about/Dryden/80.html), that is. I can personally vouch that there were more than 491 NASA employees at Goddard alone in that era.

arg, I should have checked - that was part of the cut/paste that didn't cut/paste. Stupid windows box (it could NOT have been my fault!)

Unusual Supernova Remnant DA 495

[ngc3314]

Abell 496 is a rich cluster of galaxies toward Eridanus, something like 140 Mpc away, notable for its mix of galaxy types and for gradients in the chemical makeup of its hot intracluster gas. ESO has posted an optical picture (http://www.eso.org/outreach/press-rel/pr-1999/phot-46-99.html) taken with their 2.2-meter telescope and wide-field imaging mosaic. The X-ray results were obtained by the guy in the next office and one of our more successful former grad students, so that Abell number should have rung a bell.

[The_Radiation_Specialist]

497 AD- Aryabhata, an Indian astronomer and mathematician, calculates pi (π) as ≈ 62832/20000 = 3.1416, correct to four rounded-off decimal places.

[The_Radiation_Specialist]

498- Saturn's moon Enceladus has a diameter of about 498 km.

[LurchGS]

5th century Indian Astronomer Aryabhatta's book The Aryabhatiya, published in 498 AD, described numerical and geometric rules for eclipse calculations

[The_Radiation_Specialist]

499- Light travels 1 AU in 499 seconds.

[LurchGS]

About 500 AD
Metrodorus assembles the Greek Anthology consisting of 46 mathematical problems.

[ToSeek]

Ariane flight 501 was a failure caused by one of the most notorious software bugs ever.

[Dave Mitsky]

The binary star Otto Struve 502 in Cepheus

Dave Mitsky

[ToSeek]

Apollo mission 503 was cancelled and replaced by the first manned lunar mission, Apollo 8.

[ngc3314]

A photon of wavelength 504 Angstroms or less will ionize helium once. This produces a "step" feature in spectra of, for example, solar prominences, and hot stars behind any significant amount of interstellar gas. In fact, this step can be so strong that 504 A is sometimes taken as the long-wavelength boundary of the extreme-ultraviolet regime, as the transmitted intensity recovers shortward f this (until reaching the next helium ionization energy at 228 A).

[brianok]

The mean diameter of Enceladus (one of Saturns' moons)
is 505 kms.




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enceladus_(moon)

[ToSeek]

Even though it's rather too similar to my last entry, I can't let this one go by:

NASA mission AS-506 is better known as Apollo 11. Perhaps you've heard of it? ;)

[jfribrg]

507 - Section of the Canadian Aeronautics Act which applies to model rocketry.

[ToSeek]

The NASA website is required to be Section 508 (http://www.section508.gov/) compliant.

[ToSeek]

Markarian 509 is a well-studied Seyfert galaxy.

The Earth's total surface area is about 510 megameters.

[Eroica]

511 - 511 Davida (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/511_Davida), thought to be the fifth largest asteroid.

[Donnie B.]

The Earth's total surface area is about 510 megameters.Would that be square megameters? Or mega square meters?

The first multiplier would be 1 by 1 megameters, or 10^6 by 10^6 meters, or 10^12 square meters, which seems high on first blush.
The second would be 10^6 square meters, which seems way too low.

Hmmm... by my calculation, the first is right... though I get more like 511 square megameters (511.2 x 10^12 m^2).

[ngc3314]

Each Digicon detector (red and blue-optimized) on Hubble's original-equipment Faint Object Spectrograph (FOS) used 512 diodes. Two one-dimensional 512 arrays versus today's spectrographs with mosaics of 2048x4096 CCDs and bigger coming - things have come a long way. Alas, this does not apply to Hubble spectroscopy at the moment, with zero genuine spectrographs functional and only cruder use of gratings in front of imagers possible for spectra. (Come, on, SM4! et's go, SM4!)

[ToSeek]

NASA's website had 513 million hits in the 48 hours incorporating the landing of the Spirit rover on Mars.

(Should have been square megameters, of course.)

[Pleiades]

514 kJ mol-1 is the heat of vaporization for thorium. Thorium is added when making refractive glass, allowing for smaller and more accurate camera lenses. Its a stretch but its all I could come up with.

[ToSeek]

515 was the old (1980's-1990's) NASA Goddard code for the Simulations and Compatibility Testing branch, which I supported for many years.

And 515 was the task order for the Landsat-7 spacecraft simulator on the Goddard Consolidated Network Missions Operations Support Contract, for which I was the task lead during most of the first three years.

[ToSeek]

Asteroid 516 Amherstia occulted TYC 2893-01704-1 on January 7 at 0054 UT.

[Pleiades]

NGC 517 found in the constellation of pisces and is generally paired with NGC 515.

[ToSeek]

518 billion - size of the sky in square arcseconds.

[Carnifex]

"Hayabusa" landing module "Minerva" weighs 519 grams

[ToSeek]

520 - The section where you'll find astronomy books at your local library (assuming it uses the Dewey Decimal System).

[ToSeek]

Okay, here's the rest of Dewey's astronomy section (this is what the rest of you get for not supporting this thread for 24 hours):

521 Celestial mechanics
522 Techniques, equipment, materials
523 Specific celestial bodies & phenomena
524 Not assigned or no longer used
525 Earth (Astronomical geography)
526 Mathematical geography
527 Celestial navigation
528 Ephemerides
529 Chronology

Rather obsolete - most books now would be 522 or 523.

[Carnifex]

Asteroid 530 is called Turandot and was discovered in April 11th, 1904 by Maximilian Franz Joseph Cornelius Wolf (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Wolf). And if not for this game, I would have never ever browsed the net for this tiny piece of rock :)

[Tobin Dax]

Okay, here's the rest of Dewey's astronomy section (this is what the rest of you get for not supporting this thread for 24 hours):

I'm patiently waiting for 533. Thanks for speeding up the process. Now we'll have to see if I can get it. :)

[kylenano]

DXXXI - the year Dionysius Exiguus worked out (erroneously) that Christ had been born 531 years earlier. And not having the concept of zero, caused endless arguments (http://www.bautforum.com/archive/index.php/t-8964.html) about when the Millennium began :)

[Carnifex]

This (http://www.seds.org/~spider/ngc/ngcdss.cgi?obj=NGC!!532&r=1:25.3&d=+09:16&e=J2000&h=15&w=15&f=GIF&c=none) galaxy in Virgo cluster of galaxies (it's called Virgo Metagalaxy I presume) is labeled NGC 532.

Go get it, Tobin ;)

[Tobin Dax]

Forgot about this this morning. :doh: Glad I hopped on tonight. (Especially since I missed 446.)

V533 Herculi was a dwarf nova that occurred in late January 1963. It was around 5.5 mag at peak brightness.

[Eroica]

534 - STF 534 (http://www.alcyone.de/SIT/bsc/HR1378.html) = discoverer code for 62 Tauri (http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/sim-id.pl?protocol=html&Ident=62+Tauri&NbIdent=1&Radius=10&Radius.unit=arcmin&CooFrame=FK5&CooEpoch=2000&CooEqui=2000&output.max=all&o.catall=on&output.mesdisp=N&Bibyear1=1983&Bibyear2=2006&Frame1=FK5&Frame2=FK4&Frame3=G&Equi1=2000.0&Equi2=1950.0&Equi3=2000.0&Epoch1=2000.0&Epoch2=1950.0&Epoch3=2000.0), a double star in Taurus.

[ngc3314]

This (http://www.seds.org/~spider/ngc/ngcdss.cgi?obj=NGC!!532&r=1:25.3&d=+09:16&e=J2000&h=15&w=15&f=GIF&c=none) galaxy in Virgo cluster of galaxies (it's called Virgo Metagalaxy I presume) is labeled NGC 532.


Nit - NGC 532 is just about opposite the Virgo Cluster in our sky (although still llikely part of the Local Supercluster). NGC 4532 is part of Virgo, and a little odd-looking. But its number won't come up in this thread for weeks yet.

[Carnifex]

Blasted Google...

* sticks to Wikipedia from now on *

Sorry for the mistake :(

[Soltras]

535 Montague.

Minor planet slash asteroid kind of thing. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/535_Montague)

[ToSeek]

536 CE - A period of widespread crop failures and summer frosts begins, believed by some to have been caused by a comet hitting the Earth's atmosphere and exploding, enveloping the Earth in ash and reducing the light from the Sun for several years.

[jfribrg]

537 After the area code, the next 3 digits you would dial on your phone if you wanted to talk to someone in the Physics department at California State University, San Bernadino (http://physics.csusb.edu/faculty_staff.html).

[ToSeek]

The NASA Infrared Telescope Facility atop Mauna Kea is operated by the University of Hawaii under Cooperative Agreement no. NCC 5-538 with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Office of Space Science, Planetary Astronomy Program.

The Columbia University astronomy department is at 538 W. 120th St., New York, NY.

[jlhredshift]

Astrology as we know it today, star based instead of moon based, begins after the fall of Babylon to Cyrus the Great of Persia in 539 BC. (© Dr Shepherd Simpson, Astrological Historian)

[LurchGS]

Phanerozoic Eon:540 million years ago through today

[Soltras]

541. A prime.

[LurchGS]

Meade #542 AC Adapter 115vAC/12vDC 2.0 Amps for 416XT and 1616XT

I like this one better (bold mine):


The World Tree in Maya Calendrical Astronomy

542 days after the beginning (zero base-day) of the Classic Period Long Count notation, three planetary spirits came together, so to speak, and, using the combined force of their natural power, raised the World Tree into its proper place in the cosmos.

http://www.mayanastro.freeservers.com/worldtree1.HTM

[ToSeek]

543 BC - Gautama Buddha dies. Important to astronomy because this is the first year of the Thai calendar.

[ToSeek]

SPACEWARN Bulletin 544 notified readers of the launch of the recently returned Stardust mission.

[ToSeek]

Astronaut Dave Scott has spent over 545 hours in space on Gemini 8, Apollo 9, and Apollo 15.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

Thales of Miletus (http://eaa.iop.org/index.cfm?action=summary&doc=eaa%2F4051%40eaa-xml), First Known Greek Philosopher, Even Predicted an Eclipse; Died in 546 B.C.E.

:cry:

[Fram]

547: the minimum number of days the Hyreus mission (http://www.marsinstitute.info/rd/faculty/dportree/rtr/rs26.html) would have stayed on the surface of Mars in 2003-2005 before returning to Earth with 27 kilo of samples.

[ToSeek]

The asteroid Hayabusa landed on, Itokawa, is 548 meters long.

[pghnative]

549 Spacewarn bulletin 549 notified readers of the release of the Chandra X-ray telescope from the space shuttle

550 Number of color photographs taken by the Apollo 11 astronauts.

[jfribrg]

I've been waiting too long for this one to let it go by without a post, even if pghnative did beat me to it.

550 - Distillation temperature, in degrees Fahrenheit, of the Diesel Fuel that is used in the NASA Crawler that transports the Shuttles from the VAB to the launch pad.

[ToSeek]

551 years ago - Gutenberg publishes the first mass-produced book, the Gutenberg Bible. 536 years later, A Brief History of Time sells nine million copies.

[ToSeek]

The nearest pulsar is 552 light years away.

[ToSeek]

Spacewarn Bulletin 553 (http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/spacewarn/spx553.html) reported a UFO!

[LurchGS]

Asteroid #554 Peraga

[Eroica]

555 - NGC 555 (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=113847071799773&str=NGC+555), a faint galaxy in Cetus.

[ToSeek]

Footnote S5.556 to World Radio Conference 1995 (WRC-95) protects certain gigahertz frequencies for use by radio astronomers.

[Gruesome]

Cosmos 557 - failed Salyut space station

[brianok]

AR-558 was a planet in the Chin'toka system of the Alpha Quadrant in a Deep Space 9 episode. (star trek)


http://www.memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/AR-558

[ToSeek]

Mare Orientale on the Moon is 559 miles in diameter.

[Eroica]

560 - 560 CE, birth of Isidore of Seville (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isidore_of_Seville), the author of the Encyclopaedia Britannica of the Miiddle Ages, the Etymologiae (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etymologiae), Books III, XIII and XIV of which deal with matters astronomical.

[ToSeek]

Q 0957+561 is a distant quasar and the first gravitationally lensed object discovered. A microlensing event in 1996 suggested the presence of a planet in the lensing galaxy. If so, it would be the most distant planet yet discovered.

[ToSeek]

Astronaut Jay Apt has orbited the Earth 562 times.

[ngc3314]

Well, if we can use declinations (sound of 2x4 smacking side of head at missing the chance to do 0957+561 (http://www.astr.ua.edu/keel/agn/q0957.html)):

AM 1954-563 is a giant polar-ring galaxy in an interacting triple system, seen near the boundary between Telescopium and Pavo.

Arakelian 564 is a widely-observed Seyfert galaxy. The Arakelian catalog identified galaxies which were potentially interesting either for havin a bright active nucleus or unusual rate of star formation. In an early example of large-scale catalog-matching astronomy, Arakelian calculated surface brightnesses from catalogued integrated magnitudes and apparent diameters, flagging those galaxies that stuck out from the "normal" relations.

[Dave Mitsky]

Astronomy 465/565: The Evolving Universe - a graduate level astronomy course at Yale

Dave Mitsky

[jfribrg]

566 - Eccentricity x 10^-3, of asteroid 1862 (apollo)

[ToSeek]

567 CE - The Moon simultaneously passes in front of Venus and Jupiter, an event that will not happen again until 1998.

[LurchGS]

(568) Cheruskia

[brianok]

Galaxy cluster Abell 569



http://www.jburnell.com/Abell569.html

[Dave Mitsky]

NGC 570 - a barred spiral galaxy in Cetus

Dave Mitsky

[ToSeek]

SSN-571 is the USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered submarine. Not astronomy related, but I thought it was cool.

Okay, astronomy related:

Meridian Telescopes (http://www.meridiantelescopes.com/index.htm) is at P.O. Box 571 in the bustling metropolis of Mt. Clemens, MI.

Ah, even better:

Comet Hyakutake's tail was measured as being at least 571 million kilometers long (http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20000408/fob1.asp).

[jfribrg]

572 - Orbital period, in Earth days, of the planet HD 222582B (http://www.extrasolar.net/planettour.asp?StarCatID=normal&PlanetID=110) around its parent star

[ToSeek]

Cosmos 573, launched 15 June 1973, was an unmanned test flight of the Soyuz spacecraft to test the modified breathing ventilation valve after failure of said valve caused the death of three cosmonauts on Soyuz 11.

[ToSeek]

There are 574 Fraunhofer lines in the solar spectrum.

[Eroica]

575 - HR 575 (http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/sim-id.pl?protocol=html&Ident=HR+575&NbIdent=1&Radius=10&Radius.unit=arcmin&CooFrame=FK5&CooEpoch=2000&CooEqui=2000&output.max=all&o.catall=on&output.mesdisp=N&Bibyear1=1983&Bibyear2=2006&Frame1=FK5&Frame2=FK4&Frame3=G&Equi1=2000.0&Equi2=1950.0&Equi3=2000.0&Epoch1=2000.0&Epoch2=1950.0&Epoch3=2000.0) = 48 Cassiopeiae.

[Arneb]

576 - orbital period, in days, of HD 222582's planetery companion (http://www.sussex.ac.uk/press_office/media/media74.html)

[ToSeek]

The Beehive Cluster is 577 light years away.

[Arneb]

ngc 578 (http://mywebpages.comcast.net/tzeldredge/images/ngc578.jpg) in Cetus. Pretty, innit?

[jfribrg]

Finally, an easy one:

579 - Diameter, in miles, of Ceres

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

580 - The Measurement, in Angstroms, of The Red End of The Yellow Spectrum!

[ToSeek]

581 - The highway I take to get to my parents' house.

A bit more astronomy related:

Gliese 581 has a planet about the size of Neptune, making it one of the smallest detected so far.

[ngc3314]

580 - The Measurement, in Angstroms, of The Red End of The Yellow Spectrum!

For us ordinary humans, not equipped like at least the Zaphod Beeblebrox I saw in a movie, that would be in nanometers...

[ToSeek]

582 BCE - Greek philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras born, unusual solar eclipse combined with an occultation of Jupiter, Saturn, and Mercury takes place in Egypt.

[eugenek]

583.92 is the synodic period, in days, of Venus.

[ToSeek]

Code 584 is the Real-Time Software Engineering Branch of the Information Systems Center (Code 580) of the Applied Engineering and Technology Directorate (Code 500) of the Goddard Space Flight Center of NASA. It's also the organization I support right now.

[Arneb]

585 BC - Anaximenes of Miletus born (http://www.astro.uni-bonn.de/~pbrosche/persons/pers-index.html) around this time; Thales of Miletus is said to have predicted a total eclipse of the Sun (http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEhistory/SEplot/SE-0584May28T.gif) for that year.

[ToSeek]

586 km - Equatorial radius of Pluto's moon Charon.

[Eroica]

587 - 587.7 light-years is the distance to Nu Eridani. (http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/sim-id.pl?protocol=html&Ident=Nu+Eri&NbIdent=1&Radius=10&Radius.unit=arcmin&CooFrame=FK5&CooEpoch=2000&CooEqui=2000&output.max=all&o.catall=on&output.mesdisp=N&Bibyear1=1983&Bibyear2=2006&Frame1=FK5&Frame2=FK4&Frame3=G&Equi1=2000.0&Equi2=1950.0&Equi3=2000.0&Epoch1=2000.0&Epoch2=1950.0&Epoch3=2000.0)

[ToSeek]

which rounds to 588....

Also, 588 Achilles is the first of the Trojan asteroids to be discovered.

[eugenek]

589.0 and 589.6 nm are the emission/absorption lines of Sodium.

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

589.0 and 589.6 nm are the emission/absorption lines of Sodium.
And 590 Angstroms (Nanometers), Is The Measurement of The Blue End of The Orange Spectrum!

:think:

[ToSeek]

The Meade 591 is a 6" reflector sold in the 1980's.

[ngc3314]

Number 592 in Igor Karachentsev's catalog of pairs of galaxies (CPG) is the attractive system NGC 7769/7771 (http://www.astr.ua.edu/gifimages/cpg592.html), along with NGC 7771's little interacting companion NGC 7770. 7769 shows an unusually compact nucleus (due to stars, not a strong active nuxleus), while 7771 shows numerous bright knots of star formation.

[Arneb]

Enjoy this wonderful APOD (http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/image/0407/rings2_cassini_big.jpg) of 593 days ago! Now that's a change of perspective, innit? :o

[ToSeek]

594 square degrees - the size of the constellation Orion

[eugenek]

595 years ago, in 1411, Jamshid al-Kashi finishes his "Compendium of the Science of Astronomy"

[ToSeek]

MGS Release MOC 2-596 (http://www.msss.com/mars_images/moc/2004/01/05/) shows Spirit's landing site.

[Arneb]

Anybody here speak Czech? I suppose this site (http://spaceprobes.kosmo.cz/index.php?sekce=prehled&kind=all&cid=43) is telling us Luna 1 was 597 megameters from Earth on 5 Jan 1959, but I am not sure....:o

[Hydro]

598 -668 Brahmagupta, Indian mathematician and astronomer. He was the head of the astronomical observatory at Ujjain, and during his tenure there wrote two texts on mathematics and astronomy: the Brahmasphutasiddhanta in 628, and the Khandakhadyaka in 665.

[pghnative]

599 -- days between the first and last manned Gemini missions (inclusive)

[ToSeek]

The RATAN-600 is "the world's largest diameter individual radio telescope", according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BTA-6).

[Roy Batty]

The RATAN-600 is "the world's largest diameter individual radio telescope", according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BTA-6).Wow, kind of makes Arecibo seem small :)

Havn't posted in here for a while, hope this is ok:
HS 601 communications satellite (http://www.astronautix.com/craft/hs601.htm)

[ngc3314]

The RATAN-600 is "the world's largest diameter individual radio telescope", according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BTA-6).

I was about to link a couple of my pictures of this ring, but notice that the Wikipedia author has thoughtfully done so! Anyway, I've been waiting for one of these, so to keep from being distracted all afternoon I'll bundle some up:

Area code 602 was, for a long time, the first thing you'd dial to reach observers at Kitt Peak, Mt. Hopkins, Lowell, and Mount Lemmon.

There are 603 entries in Karachentsev's catalog of galaxy pairs, the basis of many statistical studies of pairs, interactions, and mergers.

NGC 604 is the brightest star-forming region in the Pinwheel galaxy M33, and right up there in power with the Tarantula Nebula and our own NGC 3603 in the first rank throughput the Local Group. It shows up as a distinct fuzzy blotch in even modest telescopes under dark skies. Just to be different, despite this high star-formation rate, NGC 604 does not include a central super star cluster, but a number of individual more normally-scaled young clusters.

[ToSeek]

Giotto passed within 605 kilometers of Comet Halley on 14 March 1986.

[Arneb]

The Hubble Ultra Deep Field (http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/releases/2004/07/) was taken at a wavelength of 606 nm (among others). Exposure at that wavelength was 30.3 h (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubble_Deep_Field).

[ToSeek]

Asteroid 607 is named Jenny, apparently after the discoverer's girlfriend.

[Eroica]

608 - Abell 608 (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=114265099787485&str=ACO+608), a rich cluster of galaxies in Camelopardalis.

[ToSeek]

If the solar system out to Pluto were 2.54 centimeters (one inch) in diameter, then the center of the Milky Way Galaxy would be 609 kilometers (379 miles) away.

[antoniseb]

NGC 610 must have been a comet, because its not there now.

[Eroica]

If the solar system out to Pluto were 2.54 centimeters (one inch) in diameter, then the center of the Milky Way Galaxy would be 609 kilometers (379 miles) away.
I get 5043 km. :think:

[ToSeek]

Well, I stole the line off a website, but I can still jigger the results. Put this into Google (it's my main calculator right now, not just my encyclopedia):

(26000 light years/68.6 au) inches in km

[Eroica]

Well, I stole the line off a website, but I can still jigger the results. Put this into Google (it's my main calculator right now, not just my encyclopedia):

(26000 light years/68.6 au) inches in km
I stand corrected. I must have misplaced a decimal point somewhere along the line. (Also, I used 80 au as the diameter.)

611 - IC 611 (=IC 610) (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=114278519813853&str=IC+611), a spiral galaxy in Leo.

[ToSeek]

612 MHz is a standard frequency for doing radio astronomy.

[ToSeek]

NGC 613 (http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap051001.html) is a very attractive barred spiral galaxy.

[Arneb]

...while Ross 614 is a rather noncescript Red dwarf (http://www.solstation.com/stars/s20ly.htm) double star in the vicinity of our solar system (13.4 ly)

[ToSeek]

CHiPS Episode 615 (http://www.chips-tv.com/Guide/Episode/615.shtml), entitled "Journey to a Spacecraft", is dedicated to "the Men and Women of NASA" and features a shuttle launch and landing and a cameo appearance by astronaut Gordon Cooper.

[Eroica]

616 - 616 Elly, another asteroid with a silly name thanks to August Kopff.

[ToSeek]

617 Patroclus is the second Trojan asteroid and the first one discovered in the trailing (L5/Trojan) camp, versus the leading (L4/Greek) camp. It is actually a binary object, with a second, slightly smaller asteroid, Menoetius (named for Patroclus's father) accompanying it.

[antoniseb]

Gliese 618 is a multiple star system of red (and brown) dwarfs between 7 and 8 parsecs from here.

[jfribrg]

619 - The area code you would use to call an astronomer at San Diego State University

[ToSeek]

The two stars that make up the double Algieba orbit each other every 620 years.

[antoniseb]

Call (520) 621-STAR for the Flandrau Science Center for the planetarium at the University of Arizona.

[antoniseb]

Astro 622 Interstellar Matter, A course at the University of Hawaii.

[ToSeek]

The moon Orthosie orbits Jupiter every 623 days.

[LurchGS]

Thales of Miletus (624-548BC) Measured apparent diameter of Sun accurately. Explained solar eclipses. Defined the constellation Ursa Minor and wrote on its use in navigation.

[ToSeek]

625 miles - the width of the gap in Saturn's rings that the Cassini spacecraft threaded on arrival, or the upper altitude limit of the most crowded section of Earth-orbiting spacecraft and debris.

[antoniseb]

626, the model Mazda I drove the one time I visited the Mount Palomar Observatory.

[ngc3314]

Spacewarn bulletin 627 (http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/spacewarn/spx627.html) announced the recent launch of New Horizons - to Pluto and beyond.

[kylenano]

NGC 628 aka M 74 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_Galaxy).

Someone's written a poem about it: WHAT NGC 628 MAY NEVER SEE (http://www.simonyi.ox.ac.uk/dawkins/WorldOfDawkins-archive/Catalano/what_ngc_628.shtml).

[ToSeek]

629 - The Dewey Decimal Classification for books about space exploration (actually 629.4, but we're rounding here).

[ToSeek]

630 kg - mass of the Corot satellite at launch.

[antoniseb]

Ananke is Jupiter's thirteenth moon. Ananke is 12.5 miles (20 km) in diameter and orbits 13,100,000 miles (21,200,000 km) from Jupiter. It orbits Jupiter in 631 (Earth) days and is in a retrograde orbit (orbiting opposite to the direction that Jupiter rotates).

[antoniseb]

SN 1998es was seen in Lenicular Galaxy NGC 632.

[antoniseb]

633 nm, the main wavelength produced by a Helium Neon LASER.

[ToSeek]

Thread #634 (http://www.bautforum.com/showthread.php?t=634) on this forum is devoted to watching Bad Astronomy: the Book's rank on Amazon.

[antoniseb]

635 AD, A Chinese astronomer recorded the rule that the tail of a comet always points away from the Sun.

[Eroica]

635 (again) - 635 AD, birth of the Mayan ruler Chan Bahlum II (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chan_Bahlum_II) of Palenque, during whose reign Mayan priests (at Copán) began calculating dates with the formula 149 lunar months = 4,400 days (i.e. 1 lunar month = 29.53020 days, remarkably close to today's estimate of 29.53059).

[ToSeek]

636 kg - Launch mass of the Genesis spacecraft.

[antoniseb]

NGC 637, A nearby open cluster in Cassiopeia

[antoniseb]

638 star listed by position in th Perseus Double cluster in Garcia Abad's 1995 paper.

[antoniseb]

Astronomer's Telegram #639 about "The Nearby Supernova Factory"

[antoniseb]

640 light years, the distance to Geminga reported in 1999.

[antoniseb]

641 rotations per second for millisecond pulsar PSR B1937+21.

[ngc3314]

The highest-redshift quasar so far found (this one from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey) is at z=6.42. An original measurement of z=6.43 was affected by strong foreground gas absorption chopping out part of the Lyman-alpha emission line biassing its redshift value; the improved measurement comes from chasing spectral lines of other species not affected by such absorption into the IR and even millimeter ranges.

[ToSeek]

MPC 643 (http://www.mpc643.org/) is a group dedicated to improving our knowledge of "minor planets." They claim at least partial credit for 62 discoveries.

[Arneb]

Venera 1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venera_1) weighed 644 kg at liftoff (number rounded).

[0Kelvin]

645 Km - Altitude of (SORCE) Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment.

[Arneb]

Saros cycle 136 (http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/SEsaros/SEsaros136.html) started 646 years ago.

[antoniseb]

647 days, period of eclipsing binary Epsilon Aurigae.

[Arneb]

Spare satellites (http://ccar.colorado.edu/asen5050/projects/projects_2000/redlin/) for the Iridium system orbit at a height of 648 km

[Arneb]

Oh, and the eminent astronomy writer, Douglas Adams (http://www.douglasadams.com/), was born 649 months ago, in March 1952 ;).

[ToSeek]

The closest known supernova, marked by the Vela supernova remnant, is a mere 650 light years away.

(The Helix Nebula and Betelgeuse are also 650 light years away.)

[Eroica]

651 - NGC 651 (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=114410594276573&str=NGC+651) = Messier 76, the Little Dumbbell Planetary Nebula.

[ToSeek]

The constellation Aquila has an area of 652 square degrees.

[antoniseb]

653 miles: This diameter of Charon

[ToSeek]

Astronaut Pierre J. Thuot (http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/thuot.html) has logged over 654 hours in space.

[antoniseb]

655 Million Years Ago: the longest time ago that Mars had liquid water based on analysis of the iddingsite in the Lafayette meteorite.
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1200/is_n14_v151/ai_19320022

[Chip]

HR 656 – a safety provisions bill introduced to Congress on February 8, 2005 by Rep. James Oberstar (D-MN), "To amend title 49, United States Code, to enhance the safety of the commercial human space flight industry." (Not passed.)

[ToSeek]

Also: 656 yards - mission success criterion for distance traveled by the Mars rovers

657 kilograms - mass of the Viking 1 and 2 landers.

[ngc3314]

The prominent emission line of [N II] (a collisionally excited transition from N+) at 658.3 nanometers is important in measuring the nitrogen abundance and excitation conditions in interstellar gas, from the Orion Nebula to quasars.

[jfribrg]

659 - Regarding the Mars Surveyor 2001 orbiter and lander (http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/marsmiss99/pdf/2551.pdf#search='659%20days%20orbit'),


On day 659 of the Science Phase, a maneuver will place the Orbiter in a sun-synchronous orbit that allows THEMIS to resume observations for another 227 days.. Emphasis mine.

Looks like we've gone 8 posts without referencing a star or galaxy catalog. That must be a modern day record for this thread.

[ToSeek]

The Hyades star cluster is believed to have formed about 660 million years ago.

[antoniseb]

In Space 1999 (perhaps the worst big budget SciFi TV series ever): Journey to Where (season two episode 5) they travel 661 years back in time. This episode discusses neutrinos going billions of miles per second (much faster than light).

[ToSeek]

Betelgeuse's diameter is estimated to be 662 times that of the Sun.

[antoniseb]

Delta Apodis is an irregular M-type giant star 663 light years away.

[ToSeek]

664 is the exchange portion of the BA's phone number at Sonoma State (http://epo.sonoma.edu/contact.html).

[antoniseb]

665, the number of comoving stars in the Orion Nebula Cluster studied by Hillenbrand & Hartmann in 1997.

[ngc3314]

All right, everybody, let's watch this next one, and try to avoid oblique references to Bart Sibrel, Michael Griffin, Immanuel Velikovsky, Fritz Zwicky, or the entire mainstream astronomical establishment... I guess we could get away with quoting late Heinlein.

[Halcyon Dayz]

Herbig-Haro 666 (http://www.noao.edu/image_gallery/html/im0862.html), an extremely large outflow in the Carina Nebula.

So there. ;)

[Arneb]

Antares and its companion are separated (http://www.space.com/spacewatch/050225_antares_moon.html) by 1/667 of a Moon diameter.

[Titana]

There are aproximately 668 Sols per Martian year.

[Titana]

Edit: Double Post

[Eroica]

668 - STF 668 (http://www.alcyone.de/cgi-bin/search.pl?object=HR1713), the discoverer code for double star Rigel.

[Edit: Triple post! :)]

[ToSeek]

Actually the Martian year is closer to 669 sols in length (668.5921).

[Titana]

The Spitzer Space Telescope was a $670 million project.

[antoniseb]

International Ultraviolet Explorer (IUE) had a launch mass of 671 Kilograms

[Arneb]

Well, this site (http://www.friends-partners.org/partners/mwade/lvs/dela2914.htm) gives the launch weight as 672 kg. Rounding issue again? ;)

[ToSeek]

673 CE - The Venerable Bede born, who pioneered the year numbering system that defined the year of his birth as 673 CE (or AD).

[Arneb]

674 - in millidays, orbital period (http://www.solarviews.com/eng/thebe.htm) of Thebe (http://www.solarviews.com/cap/jup/galsat2.htm), one of Jupiter's small inner moons

[ToSeek]

675 CE - The first sundial is built in England, in Newcastle.

(England is well behind the rest of the world due to their lack of sunlight. ;) )

[antoniseb]

676 years. The duration of the first and fourth worlds (The Sun of the Jaguar and The Sun of the Wind) in meso-American mythology.

[Eroica]

677 - IC 677 (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=114477694544861&str=IC+677), a fairly bright (for the IC) spiral galaxy in Leo.

[ToSeek]

Valery Poliakov has spent 678 days in space, the record holder from 1995 until 1999 and the second highest total for any astronaut or cosmonaut.

[antoniseb]

Ham, the first Mercury astronaut, landed 679 kilometers down range.

[ToSeek]

The company I bought my telescope from is currently located at 680 S.W. 24th Ave., Norman, OK, 73069

[Eroica]

681 - NGC 681 (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=114486574387421&str=NGC+681), The Little Sombrero galaxy in Cetus.

[ToSeek]

The north polar cap of Mars is about 682 miles across.

[antoniseb]

Yale 683, a G spectral type star about 40 light years from here. AKA Gliese 95.

[Arneb]

Navigating the Columbia Hills (http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/all/2/n/684/2N187085447EFFAJW6P1785R0M1.HTML) on Sol 684...

[ToSeek]

685 kilometers is a standard altitude for Earth-observing satellites in polar orbit, including Landsat-7, AcrimSat, and South Korea's Arirang.

[antoniseb]

It would take 686 years to drive at 65 miles per hour the distance between Earth's orbit and Jupiter's.

[antoniseb]

687 Earth Days for Mars to orbit the Sun.

[Eroica]

687 Earth Days for Mars to orbit the Sun.
Dagnammit! I was waiting for that one! :wall:

688 - BU 688 (http://www.alcyone.de/SIT/bsc/HR8300.html), the discoverer code for a multiple star associated with 77 Cygni.

[antoniseb]

Dagnammit! I was waiting for that one!

I imagine we all were.

689 kilograms, the mass of each Iridium Satellite.

[ToSeek]

The Helix Nebula is about 690 light years away.

[Titana]

NASA's Cosmic Ice Laboratory Home Page:.......:shifty:


www-691.gsfc.nasa.gov/cosmic.ice.lab/

[ToSeek]

Jupiter's moon Carme has a 692-day orbit.

[Arneb]

GALEX's orbit (http://www.heavens-above.com/satinfo.asp?satid=27783) is 693x698 km.

[antoniseb]

about 694 kilograms (1530 pounds) of nitrogen tetroxide (N2O4) as propellant in the GEOS satellites.

(I bet we're going to see the GALEX orbit thing again soon)

[Eroica]

695 - FK5 695 (http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/sim-id.pl?protocol=html&Ident=FK5+695&NbIdent=1&Radius=10&Radius.unit=arcmin&CooFrame=FK5&CooEpoch=2000&CooEqui=2000&output.max=all&o.catall=on&output.mesdisp=N&Bibyear1=1983&Bibyear2=2006&Frame1=FK5&Frame2=FK4&Frame3=G&Equi1=2000.0&Equi2=1950.0&Equi3=2000.0&Epoch1=2000.0&Epoch2=1950.0&Epoch3=2000.0), AKA Chi Draconis, a bright spectroscopic binary in Draco.

[ToSeek]

The Sun's radius is 696 megameters.

[Arneb]

Nice drawing of NGC 697 (http://www.anysllum.com/ngc697.jpg), a galaxy in Aries

[Arneb]

Saudicommsat 2 (http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/r36m2.htm) has a perigee of 698 km.

(No GALEX this time, antoniseb (http://www.bautforum.com/showpost.php?p=724685&postcount=704). What do I win? :whistle: )

[antoniseb]

PKS 2152–699 is a radio hotspot created by a jet from a nearby AGN and a cloud of highly ionized gas.

[The_Radiation_Specialist]

700 is just a cool round number which doesnt have any association with astronomy. :D

[Arneb]

Luckily, 700 megamiles is also the approximate distance Mars Global Surveyor had to travel along it's Hohmann II ellipse to reach Mars.

[ToSeek]

Communications satellite Intelsat 701 is at exactly 180 degrees east in geosynchronous orbit and is a source for NASA TV.

[Eroica]

702 - FK5 702 (http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/sim-id.pl?protocol=html&Ident=FK5+702&NbIdent=1&Radius=10&Radius.unit=arcmin&CooFrame=FK5&CooEpoch=2000&CooEqui=2000&output.max=all&o.catall=on&output.mesdisp=N&Bibyear1=1983&Bibyear2=2006&Frame1=FK5&Frame2=FK4&Frame3=G&Equi1=2000.0&Equi2=1950.0&Equi3=2000.0&Epoch1=2000.0&Epoch2=1950.0&Epoch3=2000.0), or Epsilon Scuti, a double star in Scutum.

703 - IC 703 (http://www.messier45.com/cgi-bin/dsdb/dsb.pl?ss=114513469146589&str=IC+703), a headscratcher in Dreyer's Index Catalogue.

704 - 704 Interamnia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/704_Interamnia), the sixth largest asteroid, comprising about 1.4% of all the mass of the asteroid belt.

[Arneb]

This (http://tboeckel.de/EFSF/efsf_etna/etna2001/july/diary/diary_e.htm) stunning photo of Mount Aetna's 2001 outbreak was shot from a height of 705 km.

[ToSeek]

MESSENGER's first course correction, on December 12, changed its speed by 706 miles per hour.

[antoniseb]

7 June 1979, the Viking Orbiter took an image of a mysterious region near the Martian equator referred to as "the white rock" It took this picture from 707 miles above the surface.
http://www.science-frontiers.com/sf007/sf007p06.htm

[Arneb]

Stardust cruised 708 million miles (http://www.nasa.gov/centers/johnson/exploration/stardust_delivery.html) to return from Comet Wild 2.

[ToSeek]

The time between consecutive new moons is 709 hours.

We missed a good alternative at 707:

707 is the BA's area code at Sonoma State.

[antoniseb]

710 Light years away, 'La Superba', a very red Carbon star AKA Y Canum Venaticorum.

[Arneb]

The lowest temperature measured on Venus is 377 °C, or 710 °F.

[Arneb]

710 Light years away, 'La Superba', a very red Carbon star AKA Y Canum Venaticorum.

Shoot, ten minutes late!

So watch this Jupiter image (http://history.nasa.gov/SP-349/ch9.htm) by Pioneer 10, taken from a range of 711 kilomiles.

[ToSeek]

The planet around HD 47536 has an orbital period of 712 days.

[ToSeek]

Iapetus's oblong shape can be modeled as an ellipsoid with a minor axis of 713 kilometers.

[antoniseb]

714 Kiloparsecs is the derived distance (based on Hubble observations of Cepheids in 1993) to the Milky Way's dwarf irregular satellite IC 1613. It also is the once astronomical number of home runs hit by George Herman (Babe) Ruth.

[Titana]

Image (http://www.space.com/php/multimedia/imagedisplay/img_display.php?pic=060414_nothing_02.jpg&cap=Image+of+the+Deep+3+%27empty%27+field+observed +with+the+telescope+at+La+Silla.+The+image+is+the+ combination+of+714+frames+for+a+total+exposure+tim e+of+64.5+hours+covering+a+total+area+larger+than+ one+square+degree.+Credit%3A+ESO) of the Deep 3 "empty" field observed with the telescope at La Silla. The image is a combination of 714 frames for a total exposure time of 64.5 hours covering a total area larger then one square degree.

[ToSeek]

Pluto's equatorial radius is approximately 715 miles.

[Eroica]

716 - STF 716 (http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/sim-id.pl?protocol=html&Ident=118+Tau&NbIdent=1&Radius=10&Radius.unit=arcmin&CooFrame=FK5&CooEpoch=2000&CooEqui=2000&output.max=all&o.catall=on&output.mesdisp=N&Bibyear1=1983&Bibyear2=2006&Frame1=FK5&Frame2=FK4&Frame3=G&Equi1=2000.0&Equi2=1950.0&Equi3=2000.0&Epoch1=2000.0&Epoch2=1950.0&Epoch3=2000.0), discoverer code for the fifth-magnitude double star 118 Tauri.

[ToSeek]

717 is another designation for the Boeing KC-135 series of aircraft, best known to space geeks for its use as NASA's "Vomit Comet" zero-g simulator.

[antoniseb]

718 square meters, the actual surface area of a 30 meter telescope.

[Titana]

Panoramic view of Gusev Crater (http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/all/2/p/719/2P190199714EFFAMENP2438R1M1.HTML)acquired on Sol 719

[ToSeek]

720 BCE - The Chinese begin recording solar eclipses.

[Arneb]

NEO 2004 JP1 (http://g3.tmsc.org/astronomy/2004jp1.html)was 721 kilomiles away from Earth at closest approach on May 18, 2004.

[ToSeek]

Opportunity drove 722 feet on Sol 410 (March 20, 2005), the current record for a single-day traverse by a Mars rover.

[Arneb]

723 years ago, Guo Shoujing (http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/%7Ehistory/Biographies/Guo_Shoujing.html) became director of the Beijing astronomical observatory.

[Tobin Dax]

724 days ago, it was said in a Hubble press release (http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/releases/2004/14/) that the HST was unable to find Sedna's hypothetical moon.

[Arneb]

Mathematician and theoretical astronomer Carl Friedrich Gauss was honoured by German Mail with stamp no. 725 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Gauss_stamp.jpg), released in 1955.

[ToSeek]

Luyten 726-8 AB is the sixth closest system to Sol.

[antoniseb]

727 nanometers, the middle of three filters for Cassini of filters where Methane absorbs light.
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA02865.tif

[Arneb]

As of today, MER Spirit (http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.html) is 727 sols past its original 90 sol "warranty".

[Arneb]

727 nanometers, the middle of three filters for Cassini of filters where Methane absorbs light.
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA02865.tif

Well, that was close again.

So, MER-A (Spirit) will be 728 days beyond its original mission success criterion tomorrow.

Better still, look (http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/press/spirit/20040408a/Sol89A_P2373_L5-A094R1_br2.jpg) what the sturdy rover had before it 728 sols ago on it's way form Bonneville crater to the Columbia Hills.

[Eroica]

NGC 728 (http://www.seds.org/~spider/ngc/ngc.cgi?728) - Triple star in Pisces

NGC 729 (http://www.seds.org/~spider/ngc/ngc.cgi?729) - Double star in Fornax

NGC 730 (http://www.seds.org/~spider/ngc/ngc.cgi?730) - Single star in Pisces


Not one DSO among them. Dreyer was obviously having a bad-hair day! :)

[ToSeek]

And I was all set to mention that Charon is 728 miles in diameter.

Okay:

The NASA 731 glider is a prototype for a Martian airplane.

[Titana]

Cosmos 731 was a Soviet photo surveillance satellite launched from the Baikonor cosmodrome aboard a Soyuz rocket. It also carried an x-ray and/or gamma-ray experiment capsule.


Edit: To seek beat me again....

[Arneb]

To seek beat me again....

Yeah, these things happen :mad: ...even to ToSeek himself :shifty:

The original resolution of this (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpegMod/PIA06170_modest.jpg) wonderful Iapetus image (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA06170) was 732 m/pixel before jpeg compression (also known as Hoaglandisation :D ).

[ToSeek]

The current mass of Voyager 1 is estimated to be 733 kilograms.

[antoniseb]

734 km. The perigee of Microlab 1: an American minisatellite that was launched by a Pegasus rocket carried aloft by an L-1011 aircraft

[ToSeek]

The current mass of Voyager 2 is estimated to be 735 kilograms. (The difference is due to the amount of maneuvering fuel used.)

[Arneb]

Upon landing on Venus (15 June 1985), the Vega 2 spacecraft (http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=1984-128E) encountered a temperature of 736 K.

[ngc3314]

Infrared astronomer Eric Becklin was returning to Honolulu from observing atop Mauna Kea when the Boeing 737 he was in suffered a structural failure and began to shed parts of the cabin skin. (Very close inspection of contemporary news photos may show him). The experience apparently didn't sour Becklin on Boeing products, as he went on to direct the SOFIA project built around a 747.

[ToSeek]

Star CD-53 738 has a planet with at least 2.54 times the mass of Jupiter orbiting it at roughly Mars's distance.