JAXA is holding a mail delivery experiment by further taking advantage of the super high-speed and large volume communication performance of the Wideband InterNetworking engineering test and Demonstration Satellite "KIZUNA" (WINDS) in collaboration with a cloud computing system of SOFTBANK Telecom Corp. On Feb. 14 (Sun.), St. Valentine's Day, the KIZUNA, which if flying at an altitude of about 36,000 km, will send your love message on your behalf. Male senders are welcomed. We are accepting your registration up to 9:00 a.m. on February 12
Link to the upcoming launch of a mission to study the Sun, spring equinox, Sun-Earth Day, and more in CalendarLearn about summer teacher workshops and institutes, online courses for teachers, Houston and Kennedy workshops, and more at Workshops and CoursesFind out about National Lab Day and Sun-Earth day, free presentations in Houston on habitable planets, the ASP Conference, and more in EventsDiscover the IPY STEM Polar Connections program, the Balloonsat student competitions, the Girls on Ice program, take a photo on Mars, summer research experiences for teachers, and more in Get InvolvedConnect to online astronomy games and animations, earthquake resources, kids climate website, a tour of Jupiter's Galilean moons, and more in ResourcesRead about an asteroid collision, NASA's new plans, nuclear fusion, the Spirit rover on Mars, a meteorite impact, global warming records, and dark matter and dark energy in Mission News and Science
As budgets get tighter and educational requirements grow broader, it's become more difficult to find science and math databases that won't devour the entire library budget. However, there's one digital database that provides standards-based instructional resources, K-12 lesson plans, digital downloads, streaming video, and 2.0 collaborative tools for math and science and, best of all, it's free.
The nature.com iPhone application allows you to access science news stories and the latest published research from Nature Publishing Group on your iPhone wherever you are. As new articles are published they're pushed straight to your iPhone where you can read the full text immediately or just save them for later.
An Android app is planned for later this year.
27 January 2010
This free public presentation is part of the Cosmic Exploration Speaker Series at the Lunar and Planetary Institute. Kasting's presentation is the third in this year's theme, "The search for meaning, for planets, for life." Videos of the last two presentations are available online.Check out the display at the Library entrance on this topic.
SAOImage DS9: Astronomical Data Visualization Application
The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory has announced the availability of the new public release of SAOImage DS9 6.0.
SAOImage DS9 is an astronomical imaging and data visualization application. DS9 supports FITS images and binary tables, multiple frame buffers, region manipulation, and many scale algorithms and colormaps. It provides for easy communication with external analysis tasks and is highly configurable and extensible.
Compare the characteristics of the Sun, Earth, and Moon, and explore the patterns of their motions through hands-on activities. Use tools to collect observations, and predict the changing patterns in the seasons, phases, tides, and more. Addresses the new TEKS 4.8 (C) and 5.8 (C, D). For 4th and 5th grade teachers.
Use observational data to investigate models of the motions of the Earth and Moon, and explore a variety of hands-on activities to build a deeper understanding of seasons, lunar phases, and the ocean tides. Addresses the new TEKS 8.7 (A, B, C). For 8th grade teachers.
Observe the characteristics of the objects in our solar system and model their formation. Analyze and compare data from the planets, and compare their characteristics with extra-solar planets. Addresses the new high school TEKS standards for ESS 5 (A, B, C, D, E, F). For Earth and Space Science high school teachers.
Fee: $30 (includes extensive presentation materials, reference materials, hands-on lesson plans for the classroom, refreshments, and lunch)
Francis is the Director of Education at the San Diego Air & Space Museum. He is the co-author of two award-winning space history books, Into That Silent Sea, and In the Shadow of the Moon. These books chronicle the first eight years of American and Russian manned spaceflight, focusing on the human stories of the earliest spacefarers.
20 January 2010
Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer
Hallway Displays
The displays along the hallway in front of the Library have been changed. Currently there are lunar maps from Kaguya data, Haiti geologic maps, HiRISE imagery and other posters. Take a walk along the corridor occasionally because the displays are always changing.
HiRISE News
HiRISE Digital Terrain Models (DTMs) are now available on the Planetary Data System (PDS). NASA is taking suggestions from the public on where the HiRISE camera should target using the HiWish tool.
The idea to take suggestions from the public follows through on the original concept of the HiRISE instrument, when its planners nicknamed it "the people's camera." The team anticipates that more people will become interested in exploring the Red Planet while their suggestions for imaging targets will increase the camera's already bountiful science return. Despite the thousands of pictures already taken, less than 1 percent of the Martian surface has been imaged.Students, researchers and others can view Mars maps using a new online tool to see where images have been taken, check which targets already have been suggested and make new suggestions.
The Exoplanet Data Explorer is an interactive table and plotter for exploring and displaying data from the Exoplanet Orbit Database. The Exoplanet Orbit Database is a carefully constructed compilation of quality, spectroscopic orbital parameters of exoplanets orbiting normal stars from the peer-reviewed literature, and updates the Catalog of Nearby Exoplanets.
The purpose of The Extrasolar Planets Encyclopaedia is as a "Working tool providing all the latest detections and data announced by professional astronomers, useful to facilitate progress in exoplanetology." Both resources provide links to additional resources, the Encyclopedia provides a bibliography.
Virtual Journals
The Virtual Journal of Nuclear Astrophysics and the SEGUE Virtual Journal are used as examples of virtual journals in the paper "The Virtual Journals of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics" by Richard H. Cyburt, Sam M. Austin, Timothy C. Beers, Alfredo Estrade, Ryan M. Ferguson, Alexander Sakharuk, Hendrik Schatz, Karl Smith, and Scott Warren in the latest D-Lib Magazine.
The research area of nuclear astrophysics is characterized by a need for information published in tens of journals in several fields and an extremely dilute distribution of researchers. For these reasons it is difficult for researchers, especially students, to be adequately informed of the relevant published research. In an attempt to address this problem, we have developed a virtual journal (VJ), a process for collecting and distributing a weekly compendium of articles of interest to researchers in nuclear astrophysics. Subscribers are notified of each VJ issue using an email-list server or an RSS feed. The VJ data base is searchable by topics assigned by the editors, or by keywords. There are two related VJs: the Virtual Journal of Nuclear Astrophysics (JINA VJ), and the SEGUE Virtual Journal (SEGUE VJ).
13 January 2010
Holiday
Monday, January 18, is a holiday. The LPI will be closed. Celebrate the memory of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Explore! is designed to engage children in space and planetary science in the library and informal learning environments.This Web site provides hands-on activities and supporting resources such as presentations, recommended books, and Internet resources for librarians and other informal educators. We invite you to use these products to engage children of all ages in the wonders of rockets, space colonies, our solar system, how our planets were shaped, staying healthy in space, and more! The materials are free for educational use and designed specifically for the library setting and informal educational venues.
Solar System Tour Images
The Solar System Tour images by the Cornell Spacecraft Planetary Imaging Facility (SPIF) are now on Flickr. The set contains 192 photos and nine videos.
The SETI Seminar Series is a weekly scientific colloquium held in Mountain View Calif. Over 70 talks are in the archive including:
Icy Bodies of the Outer Solar System: What Does The Spectroscopy Tell Us? Dale CruikshankSurface modifications by winds on Earth, Mars, Venus, and Titan Ron GreeleyMars: The water story and prospects for life Michael CarrSpecial Panel: LCROSS Mission - the first results of the impact Tony Colaprete, Jennifer Heldmann and Diane WoodenRedox Chemistry in Large Impacts and the Origin of Life Jay Melosh
New & Noteworthy from the LPI Library using an RSS reader.
4 February 2010
