Astronomy Simulations and Animations

Virtual Star Explorer - Astronomy Games For Kids Introduction The Virtual Starship StarView enables you to take a fantasy flight among the stars in the Sun's immediate neighborhood. It will tell you what the Sun looks like from Sirius and Altair. It will even provide you with stereoscopic views and astronomical data which you can use to select a star that is likely to have Earthlike planets. Using the View Window The view window occupies most of the area of the StarView applet. When the program starts, your ship is located at the Sun, and the nose is pointed in the direction of Earth's north pole. Interpreting Star Data Information on the currently selected star appears just beneath the view window. Operating the Mode Switches Four mode switches are located at the bottom of the StarView applet. Coordinate Systems Before using the navigation controls, it is first necessary to understand the StarView coordinate systems. Your ship has its own coordinate system.

The Universe at Your Fingertips 2.0 DVD-ROM: AstroShop A Collection of Activities and Resources for Teaching Astronomy (on a DVD-ROM) Edited by Andrew FraknoiPublished by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific Wholesale and international orders please contact service {at} astrosociety.org or call customer service at 1-800-335-2624. This DVD-ROM is the most comprehensive resource and activity guide for teaching basic concepts and activities in space science ever published. It includes: 133 field-tested hands-on activities, from programs and projects around the US,17 topical guides to to the best sources of information in print and on the web,52 background articles on astronomy and education,12 short videos with instructions for doing some of the most often-used activities, and10 recommended sequences of activities to help students learn some of the topics most often found in the K-12 curriculum. Themes and topics include: Click here for the full table of contents (pdf file).

Go with the Flow! :: NASA Space Place EarthViewer on the App Store Dark Side of the Earth 200 miles above Earth's surface, astronaut Dave Wolf -- rocketing through the blackness of Earth's shadow at 5 miles a second -- floated out of the Mir Space Station on his very first spacewalk. In this short, he describes the extremes of light and dark in space, relives a heart-pounding close call, and shares one of the most tranquil moments of his life. When we were putting together our live show In the Dark, Jad and Robert called up Dave Wolf to ask him if he had any stories about darkness. And boy, did he. Dave told us two stories that became the finale of our show. Back in late 1997, Dave Wolf was on his first spacewalk, to perform work on the Mir (the photo to the right was taken during that mission, courtesy of NASA.). Out in blackness of space, the contrast between light and dark is almost unimaginably extreme -- every 45 minutes, you plunge between absolute darkness on the night-side of Earth, and blazing light as the sun screams into view.

REBROADCAST: Space Celebrate the 35th anniversary of the launch of Voyager 2 (it rocketed off Earth on 8/20/77 carrying a copy of the Golden Record), and tip your hat to the Mars rover Curiosity as it kicks off its third week on the red planet, with a rebroadcast of one our favorite episodes: Space. We've been space-crazy the past few weeks here at Radiolab -- from cheering on the scientifically epic landing of the Mars rover earlier this month, to staying up late to watch the Perseid meteor showers, to reliving a stomach-churning spacewalk with an astronaut in our live show In the Dark. We've been happily turning our thoughts and gazes skyward all summer long. So before the nights get too chilly, grab a blanket, cue up Space, and stare into that vast, glittering, perspective-shaking darkness with us.

Origins: Series Overview Origins: Back to the Beginning September 29, 2004 NEIL deGRASSE TYSON (Astrophysicist): A hellish, fiery wasteland, a molten planet hostile to life, yet somehow, amazingly, this is where we got our start. How? How did the universe, our planet, how did we ourselves come to be? How did the first sparks of life take hold here? Right now, we're all eavesdropping on the birth pangs of the cosmos. DAVID SPERGEL (Princeton University): ...how big it is, how old it is, what's it made of, and what were the processes that made galaxies, that made us. NEIL deGRASSE TYSON: So a furious race is on to solve the ultimate mystery. ANTHONY READHEAD (California Institute of Technology): The spirit of competition is one of the things, of course, that drives scientists. Keep our fingers crossed. NEIL deGRASSE TYSON: And as our new vision of the universe emerges, strange ideas reveal themselves. STAN WOOSLEY (University of California, Santa Cruz): Stars are the ultimate alchemist. Hello. ARNO PENZIAS: Oh, yeah.

Origins: Series Overview Origins: Back to the Beginning September 29, 2004 NEIL deGRASSE TYSON (Astrophysicist): A hellish, fiery wasteland, a molten planet hostile to life, yet somehow, amazingly, this is where we got our start. How? How did the universe, our planet, how did we ourselves come to be? Right now, we're all eavesdropping on the birth pangs of the cosmos. DAVID SPERGEL (Princeton University): ...how big it is, how old it is, what's it made of, and what were the processes that made galaxies, that made us. NEIL deGRASSE TYSON: So a furious race is on to solve the ultimate mystery. ANTHONY READHEAD (California Institute of Technology): The spirit of competition is one of the things, of course, that drives scientists. Keep our fingers crossed. NEIL deGRASSE TYSON: And as our new vision of the universe emerges, strange ideas reveal themselves. STAN WOOSLEY (University of California, Santa Cruz): Stars are the ultimate alchemist. NEIL deGRASSE TYSON: Those elements are the building blocks of life. Hello.

The NASA App for Smartphones and Tablets Application Description The NASA App showcases a huge collection of the latest NASA content, including images, videos on-demand, NASA Television, mission information, news & feature stories, latest tweets, ISS sighting opportunities, satellite tracking, Third Rock Radio and much more. The NASA App is available free of charge on the iOS App Store from Apple or on Google Play for Android. Features › Get the NASA App for iOS on the App Store → › Get the NASA App for Android on Google Play → The Universe at Your Fingertips 2.0 DVD-ROM: AstroShop A Collection of Activities and Resources for Teaching Astronomy (on a DVD-ROM) Edited by Andrew FraknoiPublished by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific Wholesale and international orders please contact service {at} astrosociety.org or call customer service at 1-800-335-2624. This DVD-ROM is the most comprehensive resource and activity guide for teaching basic concepts and activities in space science ever published. It includes: 133 field-tested hands-on activities, from programs and projects around the US,17 topical guides to to the best sources of information in print and on the web,52 background articles on astronomy and education,12 short videos with instructions for doing some of the most often-used activities, and10 recommended sequences of activities to help students learn some of the topics most often found in the K-12 curriculum. Themes and topics include: Click here for the full table of contents (pdf file).

Jewels of the Night The Jewels of the Night is a hands-on, teacher-tested activity for middle school and older students. Students measure the color and brightness of stars in the Jewelbox Cluster from a color image. They determine the age of the cluster by plotting their measurements in a color-brightness diagram. The activity develops classification and graphing skills and fosters observation, communication, and cooperative learning skills. Students are exposed to ideas about the nature of stars, temperature and color, stellar evolution, the time scales of astronomical phenomena, and how astronomers can determine the ages of objects in the universe. The activity is designed to be printed for use in the classroom. The Jewels of the Night activity was developed by NOAO astronomers working together with Tucson teachers. National Optical Astronomy Observatories, 950 North Cherry Avenue, P.O.