NASA Hubble repair mission- meeting the "Repair man" of Hubble

During the school year time is scarce. It has to be hunted for and captured like an elusive animal. However, despite this crisis of time, I still managed to go to a three hour lecture given by astronaut John M. Grunsfeld at a local hotel. It was worth every second. Grunsfeld and his team had just returned from a mission to repair and re modify the Hubble space telescope, making this latest mission Grunsfeld's fifth time in space. Grunsfeld modestly calls himself "the repair man of Hubble", though I can't think of any other repair men who attended MIT and later Cal Tech.

I found Dark Matter to be the most interesting topic of discussion tonight, and it brought me back to the good old days of seventh grade me visiting the Stanford Astrophysics and Cosmology center, and spending the entire time talking with a freshman at Stanford about Dark Matter and Energy.

Grunsfeld's arm was in a sling, after his space suit pulled his arm when working on the Hubble recently. Essentially John Grunsfeld has achieved every supermarket shopper's goal: having the best answer to the question you're asked at the checkout line: "So, what happened to your arm?".

"Oh, you know, just pulled it while replacing CCD cameras on a space telescope the other day. No big deal."

Meteorites and Computer Programming

Today I gave a small, fun presentation in Science class on meteorites. More importantly, I used Scratch to make a meteorite trajectory simulation. A few years ago MIT created a simple program called Scratch that kids could use to create games, animations, etc. This program was what first got me interested in programming, and inspired me to move on to other programming languages. Its simple building block style makes it a joy to use, as kindergartners can make programs as well.

One of the best things is that on the Scratch Website you can post everything you make in a single click. For me presentation, I made a short quiz on meteorites, and put it online. Then, the students used laptops and took the quiz. It worked flawlessly. You can take my quiz here.

The Night Sky in a Shoe Box

I know its been far too long since my last update, however we all need a break every once in a while.

According to the polls, a slight majority of readers wanted more posts on Astronomy, which honestly surprised me. So, I took a look at what I could do that would be fun, interesting, and relatively easy so readers at home could follow along.

I decided to use the concept of using LEDs (Light Emitting Diodes) to represent stars, and put that idea to the test. You can take any star constellation you wish, but I choose the Big Dipper because of its fame, and it could be done quickly and efficiently. I chose these little green LEDs because they don't break or blow out as easily ans others, and they are extremely inexpensive. I bought them from Mouser Electronics (see them here) for $0.06 each, but that's partly because I buy by the hundred.

You will need to solder for this project, so please follow the safety instructions here. I burned a hole through my rubber glove doing this project, so please, for your sake, do not skip the safety part.

So, let's get started. You can print out any astronomy picture you want, but make sure you plan where you want to put the LEDs ahead of time. This makes constellations ideal, and many of the LED locations are already marked for you. Also, be sure that the LEDs are not too far away from each other, otherwise you will need to use additional wiring to connect the LEDs.

Glue your image onto the top of a shoebox, make sure you have plenty of room for the LEDs and wires. I tried to use the tip of my soldering gun to puncture holes in the box, however I ended up using my trusty dremel tool to drill the holes.



Place your LEDs inside the holes, facing outward. Be sure to test each LED before inserting them in, I ended up having to replace a few after I soldered, which can be a real pain.



Make sure each anode and cathode are aligned (positive and negative). You can do this easily by remembering to connect them from the short leds coming out of the LEDs' bottom to the next LED's long one. Short-to-long, otherwise it will not work at all. Before soldering, use a glue gun to make sure the LEDs will not fall out.

Solder the LEDs together one by one (remember short-to-long). Once again, please work with adequate protection against the fumes and the very hot soldering gun. As stated earlier, instructions can be found here.





I chose to use alligator clips to connect to batteries. Be sure to experiment with different power supplies based upon what LEDs you used and how many.

Now, you can package it all up into the original shoebox and flip it on.



Be sure to let me know what you want in future posts by voting on the poll!

Water on Mars!

NASA's Phoenix lander just found water on Mars, a huge step forward for NASA. The water was found in solid form (ice) in tiny chunks that would evaporate into gas.

This will hopefully stimulate more funding and exploration into NASA's space program.

See the CBS piece written here: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/31/tech/main4312431.shtml

Harnessing the Most Powerful Telescopes on your Computer-LIVE

A few years ago, I was given perhaps the kindest and most cruel gift I had ever gotten, a SLOOH 50 minute time card. With a few clicks of the mouse I was able to harness extremely powerful dome telescopes and use them live. I witnessed some of the most beautiful and remarkable masses that were once outside my reach. I gawked at nebulae, stared in wonder at galaxies, and gazed at other planets. I could do all of this LIVE, taking pictures along the way. I had the universe at my fingertips, and I fell in love.

Then, it was all snatched away, almost instantly as the "You are out of credits" sign smugly grinned up at me. It was gone.

Two years later I now have a "Commander" membership for $99.99 a year. The planets have trembled in my presence. Galaxies retreated at my gaze. I was in control, and I still am. I am the master of the universe, I am Brennon.

Of course, anyone can be master of the universe (its really not that hard), its all there for you at Slooh.com. Almost every night, I use their telescopes in Chile, Australia, and the Canary Islands. With the Commander ranking, you get your own webpage to show off your pictures. At www.myslooh.com/brennonw I have over 500 pictures, growing rapidly.

See you there,



Brennon