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Topics for discussion were made by President Jerry Wilson:
On 7/25/2020 11:21 PM, Jerry wrote:
>
> Monday, July 27
> First Quarter Moon occurs at 8:33 A.M. EDT, making this evening is an excellent time to consider some lunar observing. With moonrise occurring in the afternoon, the Moon will still be high in the south at sunset and won’t set until after midnight. Even a small telescope or pair of binoculars will bring out immense detail on our satellite’s face, which appears to observers on Earth as half in daylight and half in darkness during this phase. The line dividing the two is called the terminator, and it’s an excellent starting point for your observing campaign. Along this line, features will appear with the sharpest contrast, as taller mountaintops and crater rims catch the sunlight, while lower-lying areas remain in shadow. Along the terminator at First Quarter are several craters, including Archimedes, Ptolemaeus, Alphonsus, Arzachel, and Maginus.
>    Also visible are several darker “seas,” or maria, which are actually the smooth remnants of ancient lava flows. Among those that are easy to spot at First Quarter are the isolated Mare Crisium in the Moon’s upper right quadrant (for Northern Hemisphere observers), as well as Mare Serenitatis, Mare Tranquillitatis, and Mare Fecunditatis, which form much of the large, dark region to Crisium’s lower left.
>
> Tuesday, July 28
> If you have a larger telescope with an aperture 10 inches or greater, this morning after moonset (around 1 A.M. local time) is the perfect time to observe the famous Eagle Nebula (M16), home to Hubble’s famous Pillars of Creation. Of course, you won’t get quite that good a view, but you’ll still enjoy this beautiful emission nebula and its embedded star cluster (NGC 6611) in detail, particularly if you’re set up for even some simple astrophotography.
>    M16 is roughly 25° high at 1:30 A.M. local time for northern observers. You’ll find it in the same region of the sky as bright Jupiter and Saturn, so swing your scope to the planets before or after for some stunning views. A low-power eyepiece will make finding the nebula easier once you’re in the right region of sky, about 6.5° southeast of magnitude 3.3 Sinistra (Nu [ν] Ophiuchi). Once you’ve spotted the Eagle, you can increase the magnification and use averted vision — looking slightly away from the region you want to see — to bring out its dimmer, delicate detail. It may even appear to glow with a faint green light to your eye.
>
> Wednesday, July 29
> The Southern Delta Aquariid meteor shower peaks early this morning with a maximum rate of about 20 meteors per hour. The best time to watch for meteors is an hour or two before sunrise — at 4 A.M. local time, the shower’s radiant in Aquarius will be about 30° high in the south-southwest for observers at mid-northern latitudes. You’ll find the radiant about 17° northwest of the bright star Fomalhaut in Piscis Austrinus.
>    Early morning meteor hunters will also get an added bonus: Jupiter and Saturn both lie nearby in Sagittarius. Jupiter shines at magnitude –2.7, while Saturn is magnitude 0.1. Both make great targets with binoculars or a small telescope, which will reveal Saturn’s rings and, depending on when you look, three or four of Jupiter’s largest moons. Io disappears behind the giant planet’s western limb about 4:10 A.M. EDT, emerging from the shadow 6:50 A.M. EDT. The sky will likely be too bright for East Coast observers to catch its reappearance, but those in western states stand a good chance of seeing the tiny moon pop back into view.
>
> Thursday, July 30
> Neptune, Mars, and Uranus create a trio of planetary delights early this morning. By 1:30 A.M. local time, all three are well above the southeast horizon, with the Red Planet blazing at magnitude –1. It’s currently among the dim stars of Pisces the Fish, but you can use two nearby bright stars to find it: Draw a line between Hamal in Aries and Fomalhaut in Piscis Austrinus, and Mars is the only bright object halfway along it.
>    27.5° west of Mars is magnitude 7.8 Neptune — you’ll need at least binoculars to see its small, bluish disk, but a telescope is better. And just 23° east-northeast of Mars is magnitude 5.8 Uranus. Keen-eyed observers may see it without optical aid from a dark location, but binoculars or a small scope will bring its gray disk into view for anyone to enjoy.
>    Follow the line from Mars to Uranus further still, and you’ll hit the sparkling Pleiades. This open star cluster is easily recognizable and requires no optical aid to enjoy. Many mistake it for the Little Dipper because of its small, dipper-shaped configuration, but the former is both larger and currently much higher overhead in the north, sprouting from the North Star (Polaris) at the end of its handle.
>
> Friday, July 31
> Step outside an hour before sunrise this morning to view Venus and Mercury, preceding the Sun in the eastern sky. At that time, Venus is 24° high, while Mercury is just 3° above the horizon. The two will gain altitude with time but the sky will continue to brighten as well.
>    Although its phase is increasing, magnitude –4.6 Venus is receding from Earth. This morning, it appears 43 percent lit, but its disk is only 27" across. It’s located about between the bright stars Aldebaran in Taurus and Betelgeuse in Orion, just northeast of a line between the two. It’s nearly level with magnitude 3 Alheka, Taurus’ zeta star.
>    Mercury, at magnitude –0.7, is 68 percent lit and 6" wide. It’s located in Gemini the Twins, whose bright stars Castor and Pollux glow nearby. Pollux is just 7° northeast of the planet. See how long you can follow the planets and stars into the brightening dawn.
>
> The Earth has a new mini-moon, for a while anyway. Near Earth asteroid 2020 CD3 has been captured into an Earth orbit. It actually orbits the sun in an orbit very near to earth’s orbit. It was spotted by Catalina Sky Survey on February 19 of this year, as a dim object moving swiftly across the sky. Multiple observations have confirmed that it has been gravitationally bound to the Earth for about 3 years. The object is very small and faint at about 2 to 3.5 meters in diameter. The orbit is not stable so that it will soon be flung away from the Earth. This is the second NEO known to have captured as a mini moon. The first was 2006 RH120 which orbited the Earth from June 2006 to September 2007. 2020 CD3 is expected to leave Earth orbit this year.
>
> Five years since its historic flyby of Pluto and 18 months since meeting Arrokoth, NASA’s New Horizons is now involved in a new astronomical endeavor. Together with the Subaru Telescope, it will observe yet-to-be-discovered celestial bodies and maybe even visiting ones.
>    New Horizons is in a region of space known as the Kuiper Belt, which is believed to be rich in fragments of the Solar System’s formation known as small bodies. Despite large numbers of these objects, finding them is a challenge because they are tiny and spread out over large distances.
>    “We are using the Subaru Telescope because it is the best in the world for our search purposes. This is due to its unique combination of telescope size – one of the very largest anywhere – and Hyper Suprime-Cam’s (HSC) wide field of view, which can discover many Kuiper Belt objects at once,” Dr Alan Stern of the Southwest Research Institute, the principal investigator of the New Horizons mission, said in a statement.
>    The area being studied by Subaru’s HSC is equivalent to 18 full moons in the sky. Astronomers estimate that hundreds of new Kuiper Belt objects will be discovered in this way and about 50 will be observable with New Horizons.
>    Kuiper Belt objects from Subaru’s point of view will appear fully illuminated by sunlight. From New Horizons' perspective, it will be only partly illuminated as it is much closer to these objects than Earth. This difference will provide researchers with important data about these cosmic fragments.
>    “The search area is within the Milky Way, and thus there are many nearby stars including bright ones, which make the observations even more difficult. The observation team is doing its best to take high-quality data by utilizing the unique capabilities of the Subaru Telescope, and to investigate the origin of the Solar System together with New Horizons,” added Dr Tsuyoshi Terai, a core member of the observation team and a support astronomer for the Subaru Telescope in charge of HSC.
>    It is certainly possible that one of the newly discovered objects is in the right orbit for a future rendezvous with New Horizons. For example, Arrokoth was discovered in 2014, 12 years after the spacecraft was launched.
Even without another flyby, New Horizons continues to provide insight beyond its core mission of studying Pluto. Just last month, it was used to perform the furthest parallax experiment yet.
> The above article is from IFLScience! by Alfredo Carpineti.

> Helicopter_Still_Image-web.jpg
> Name  Ingenuity
> Main Job > A technology demonstration to test the first powered flight on Mars. The helicopter will ride to Mars attached to the belly of the Perseverance rover.
> Launch Window> July 30 - Aug. 15, 2020
> Launch Location> Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida
> Landing> Feb. 18, 2021
> Landing Site> Jezero Crater, Mars
> Length of Mission> One or more flights within 30 days
>> Key Objectives
> • Prove powered flight in the thin atmosphere of Mars. The Red Planet has lower gravity (about one- third that of Earth) but its atmosphere is just 1% as thick, making it much harder to generate lift.
> • Demonstrate miniaturized flying technology. That requires shrinking down onboard computers, electronics and other parts so that the helicopter is light enough to take off.
> • Operate autonomously. Ingenuity will use solar power to charge its batteries and rely on internal heaters to maintain operational temperatures during the cold Martian nights. After receiving commands from Earth relayed through the rover, each test flight is performed without real-time input from Mars Helicopter mission controllers.
>> Dimensions
> • Height: about 19 inches (0.49 meters)
> • Rotor system span: about 4 feet (1.2 meters)
>> Key Features
> • Weighs 4 pounds (1.8 kg)
> • Solar-powered and recharges on its own
> • Wireless communication system
> • Counter-rotating blades spin about 2,400 rpm
> • Equipped with computers, navigation sensors, and
> two cameras (one color and one black-and-white)

> Program Management
> The Mars 2020 Project and Mars Helicopter Technology Demonstration are managed for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Washington, by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), a division of Caltech in Southern California.
> At NASA Headquarters, David Lavery is the program executive for the Mars Helicopter. At JPL, MiMi Aung is the Mars Helicopter project manager and J. (Bob) Balaram is chief engineer.
> For more information about the Mars Helicopter and NASA’s Mars Exploration Program,
> visit: mars.nasa.gov/technology/helicopter