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Astronomers Without Borders has a new look! AWB's new logo illustrates the global nature of astronomy and how we're all connected through this universal interest. Figures representing people of different shades from around the world hold hands in a circle that encompasses the Earth. As the circle appears to rise into the sky, the figures transform into stars. We are all one, together in the cosmos. In fact, we are one with the stars as well; as Carl Sagan famously pointed out, we are partially made from elements created in supernova explosions so we are, as he said, "star stuff." One People, One Sky!
Stephane Vetter of France and Andreas Max Böckle of Austria are the first-prize winners in the fourth annual International Earth and Sky Photo Contest organized by The World at Night (TWAN) in collaboration with the Education and Public Outreach group at the National Optical Astronomy Observatory and Global Astronomy Month, a project of Astronomers Without Borders.
Astronomers Without Borders is pleased to announce the recent addition of Tim DeBenedictis to its Board of Directors. Tim’s passion for astronomy has been evident since he began writing astronomy software during his high school days, followed by his 1993 graduation from MIT with a degree in Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Science. Although Tim started his career focused on engineering and technology during the “dot com era,” he turned his eyes back to the stars as product architect for Carina Software from 2004 through 2010, where he oversaw the development of the Voyager Astronomy software. Tim was also one of the two principal designers behind the award-winning SkyVoyager iPhone app. In 2009 Tim founded Southern Stars, producer of the very popular SkySafari astronomy apps that include both planetarium programs and integrated telescope control using remote devices.
April 2013 was both National Poetry Writing Month (NaPoWriMo) in America and Global Astronomy Month (GAM) worldwide. For poets with an astronomy interest, as well as astronomers trying their wings at poetry, this combination was a creative moment and a new genre, AstroPoetry, blossomed as never before.
GAM 2013 held the fourth edition of Cosmic Concert on 28 April. Italian pianist and composer, Giovanni Renzo, gave a live performance which was streamed online. The audience was in for a spectacular journey through space that started on the night of 7 January 1610, when Galileo Galilei pointed his telescope at the sky and very soon after that discovered four satellites that orbit around Jupiter, upsetting forever the geocentric conception of the Aristotelian universe. After a close encounter with nebulae, pulsars and black holes, the journey took us to the farthest reaches of the Universe. While the music flowed on, astronomical videos were shown creating a breathtaking atmosphere.
Join AWB's leaders in taking a look at Global Astronomy Month 2013 (GAM 2013), the latest edition of the world's largest annual global celebration of astronomy. Ask questions and comment live during the program.
The International Dark-Sky Association and Loch Ness Productions have created “Losing the Dark”, a short planetarium show about light pollution. The show is available at no charge for education. It introduces and illustrates some of the issues regarding light pollution, and suggests simple actions people can take to help mitigate it.
Mike Simmons, AWB’s president and founder, recently chatted with astronomer, Dr. Pamela Gay, and Georgia Bracey of CosmoQuest, about Global Astronomy Month (GAM), April 2013, in the Google Plus hangout of Learning Space. “It’s a global event,” Mike said. “It’s like a star party where you’ve got people talking to each other all night long, then they begin asking where in the world they are.” GAM promotes “Star Peace,” Mike said, a core mission motivated by AWB’s motto, One People, One Sky. Mike highlighted many of GAM’s upcoming 31 global events inspired by the extraordinary successes of the International Year of Astronomy in 2009.
A gorgeous new video captures aurorae, sunsets and moonsets, star trails, lightning storms, and other views of Earth from space. Christoph Malin, one of the participating photographers in AWB’s program The World at Night, complied The ISS Image Frontier: Making the Invisible Visible from photographs taken from the International Space Station by astronaut Dr. Don Pettit.
The Amateur Astronomers’ Association (Bombay) is happy to announce a Messier Marathon event on the night of Saturday, 9 March 2013. AAA marathoners participate as part of the AAA (Bombay) group and not in their individual capacity. They will be assisted by experienced amateur and professional astronomers. All AAA marathoners will receive a participation certificate after the event.
(Image credit: Katja Zanella Kux. Click here for a larger version)
What place on Planet Earth most closely resembles Mars? It could well be the northern Sahara desert near Erfoud, Morocco. And while Hatim Madani, the new AWB National Coordinator for Morocco, has no immediate plans for travel from his home in Casablanca to Mars, on a weekend in February he and his colleagues did participate in a close analog of a visit to the Red Planet—the MARS2013 Mars Analog Field Simulation.
Astronomers Without Borders has just reached a major milestone: as of mid-February, the AWB Google+ page passed the 10,000 followers mark.
Google+ is a multilingual social networking and identity service. As of December 2012, it had a total of 500 million registered users, of whom 235 million are active on a monthly basis.
The AWB Google+ page provides a highly convenient means for accessing and sharing your favorite highlights from AWB activities. To check out the AWB action on Google+ and to follow, click here.
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