Date: April 30, 2010
Title: Astrotips
Podcaster: The TecnoCasters
Organization: TecnoCasters – http://www.tecnocasters.com/
Description: The TecnoCasters discuss several recent news items about astronomy and technology, as well as providing tips for new amateur astronomers.
Bio: TecnoCasters is the best technology podcast in Spanish. Hosted by Juan D. Guevara, Pedro Riveroll, Lorena Galan and Raul Mitre, TecnoCasters offers a funny and friendly point of view about the gadgets and technology you’ll come across in your ordinary day.
Produced simultaneously in the US and Mexico, TecnoCasters is an international podcast, specially created for the Spanish speaking audience in the world and or for all of those who want to improve their Spanish speaking skills and love technology at the same time.
Today’s sponsor: This episode of “365 Days of Astronomy” is sponsored by George Brickner in honor of astronomers everywhere.
Transcript:
Hello everyone and welcome to this Episode of 365 days of Astronomy. My name is Juan Guevara Torres ( Follow him on twitter @guevarajd ) , Host of TecnoCasters – the best technology podcast En espanol and with me my co-hosts:
– Haydee Durand ( Follow her on twitter @hdurand )
– Raul Mitre ( Follow him on twitter @jrmitre )
Hello Guys!
You can be in touch with us our website www.tecnocasters.com, via twitter twitter.com/tecnocasters
We are very happy and thrilled to be here with you all once again. We want to thank Nancy Atkinson, Senior Editor of Universe Today and Producer of Astronomy Cast for letting TecnoCasters be a part of such a cool project like the 365 Days of Astronomy.
Please check out www.365daysofastronomy.com for more information about this podcast and the many ways you can support this effort.
Astro-News – Raul Mitre:
Mysterious radio waves emitted from nearby galaxy (Source newscientist.com)
There is something strange in the cosmic neighbourhood. An unknown object in the nearby galaxy M82 has started sending out radio waves, and the emission does not look like anything seen anywhere in the universe before.
“We don’t know what it is,” says co-discoverer Tom Muxlow of Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics near Macclesfield, UK.
The thing appeared in May last year, while Muxlow and his colleagues were monitoring an unrelated stellar explosion in M82 using the MERLIN network of radio telescopes in the UK. A bright spot of radio emission emerged over only a few days, quite rapidly in astronomical terms. Since then it has done very little except baffle astrophysicists.
It certainly does not fit the pattern of radio emissions from supernovae: they usually get brighter over a few weeks and then fade away over months, with the spectrum of the radiation changing all the while. The new source has hardly changed in brightness over the course of a year, and its spectrum is steady.
Yet it does seem to be moving – and fast: its apparent sideways velocity is four times the speed of light. Such apparent “superluminal” motion has been seen before in high-speed jets of material squirted out by some black holes. The stuff in these jets is moving towards us at a slight angle and travelling at a fair fraction of the speed of light, and the effects of relativity produce a kind of optical illusion that makes the motion appear superluminal.
Could the object be a black hole? It is not quite in the middle of M82, where astronomers would expect to find the kind of supermassive central black hole that most other galaxies have. Which leaves the possibility that it could be a smaller-scale “microquasar”.
A microquasar is formed after a very massive star explodes, leaving behind a black hole around 10 to 20 times the mass of the sun, which then starts feeding on gas from a surviving companion star.
Microquasars do emit radio waves – but none seen in our galaxy as bright as the new source in M82. Microquasars also produce plenty of X-rays, whereas no X-rays have been seen from the mystery object. “So that’s not right either”, Muxlow told New Scientist.
His best guess is still that the radio source is some kind of dense object accreting surrounding material, perhaps a large black hole or a black hole in an unusual environment. Perhaps the phenomenon also happens occasionally in our galaxy, but is more common in M82 because it is a”starburst” galaxy – a cosmic cauldron where massive stars are forming and exploding at a much higher rate than in the Milky Way, creating a lot of new black holes.
Astro-Tips – Haydee Durand (Tips for the new Astronomer) (Source http://www.rocketroberts.com/astro/first.htm)
How to buy a telescope.
Here are some tips on how to buy a telescope :
a) Have realistic expectations:
DON’T EXPECT a small telescope to show images like those you may have seen in magazines. Those pictures are likely from the Hubble Space Telescope or some other large professional telescope. If you are expecting “video game” or “Hollywood” type images with amazing detail and vivid color, you will be in for a letdown.
What can you expect to see?
The Moon
Mercury
Venus
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Pluto
Some Stars
b) Don’t blame the telescope for things it can’t control!
Many beginners don’t realize that a telescope’s performance is often at the mercy of local ambient conditions. Other than the obvious (clouds, fog, etc.), there are several other major factors which limit how much can be seen, like the air, pollution.
When you look at an astronomical target, you are seeing it through the Earth’s atmosphere, which essentially is an “ocean of air”. Very often the atmosphere is highly unsteady, due to thermal variations in the upper atmosphere, air currents near the ground, etc. All of this means that an image passing though it will be distorted to some degree, so be patient.
c) What telescope we recommend? Get a Galileoscope. This is a cheap telescope designed for beginners. For more info visit http://www.galileoscope.org
Well, that is all for us today. Be sure to check www.365dayofastronomy.org to keep up with this podcast!!
My name is Juan Guevara Torres, host of TecnoCasters, and … thanks for listening!
Website: www.tecnocasters.com
End of podcast:
365 Days of Astronomy
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