Discoveries using the telescopes on Mauna Kea

[TomK]

Comet or asteroid?

Too tired to post a comment, but this is work being done by the IRTF on Mauna Kea:

https://goo.gl/u4kF95

"“At the time, the assumption was that Phaethon probably was a dead, burnt-out comet, but comets are typically red in color, and not blue. So, even though Phaeton’s highly eccentric orbit should scream ‘dead comet,’ it’s hard to say whether Phaethon is more like an asteroid or more like a dead comet.”"[8)]

[dan d]

Pretty cool,and maybe one of a kind. Who would have thought when we were kids watching the moon landing ,that some day we would land an orbiter on a asteroid and fly thru the tail of a comet ,and bring back data to earth.

An interesting time to observe the cosmos
Aloha


HPP

[PaulW]

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/30/scien...y-way.html

Long but very interesting story about the massive black hole at the center of our galaxy - Mauna Kea plays a part.
TomK, I was surprised to read about the gas clouds travelling that fast, is that something unusual?

[TomK]

Paul - no, it's not unusual when you talk about the gravitational effects near a massive black hole. However, this is our nearest super-massive black hole and the other ones are all in other galaxies. Their distances mean we can't look in great detail so we're left with our own black hole. There are others in the Galaxy but none are anywhere near as massive as Sag A.

In addition, whether it's a molecule, dust cloud, planet or star, they all follow the laws of orbital mechanics, so if they are in the same orbit as the gas clouds you mention, they'll be moving at the same speeds. Worth thinking about - even when you consider that the speeds they are moving at seem excessive, they are still only a fraction of the speed of light.

[PaulW]

"Dr. Genzel’s team found that the gas clouds circle every 45 minutes or so, completing a circuit of 150 million miles at roughly 30 percent of the speed of light."

That really boggles my mind, that's Earth to Sun in half an hour or so.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Oumuamua, the extraterrestrial object discovered by Pan-STARRS on Haleakala is back in the news. Two researchers have suggested the object might in fact be a solar sail, possibly - - on a reconnaissance mission. This is not the hair brained babbling of a couple of crackpots:

A new study by a pair of astronomers from the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) has taken it a step further, suggesting that 'Oumuamua may actually be a light sail of extra-terrestrial origin. The study was conducted by Shmuel Bialy and Prof. Abraham Loeb. Whereas Bialy is a postdoctoral researcher at the CfA's Institute for Theory and Computation (ITC), Prof. Loeb is the director of the ITC, the Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science at Harvard University, and the head chair of the Breakthrough Starshot Advisory Committee.
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2018-11-oumuamua-e...solar.html

Alternately, he states that it is possible that hundreds of such probes could be sent so that one of them got close enough to Earth to study it. The fact that the Pan STARRS-1 survey barely detected 'Oumuamua at its closest approach could be seen as an indication that there are many other such objects that were not detected, bolstering the case for 'Oumuamua being one of many such probes.

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

Sunrise on Mauna Kea.
(Hawaii Astronomy Club)

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DrqCIQFWwAAt6NP.jpg

[dan d]

I wonder which club. We used to have a hilo astro club,and there is a astro club at the UH. And us WHACOS of course.


HPP

[HereOnThePrimalEdge]

dan d -
I saw it on Twitter, here’s a link to the original post:
https://mobile.twitter.com/antonioparis/...2253936641

[dan d]

http://www.bigislandvideonews.com/2018/1...o-our-sun/



New exoplanet found orbiting Bernards star. At -150 deg not a tropical planet. Keck telescope.
Aloha


HPP