Investigate: Measure the Size of a Galaxy
Have you ever wondered how big a galaxy is? They contain millions to billions of stars but what does that really mean for size?
Reading about sizes in a book is one thing, but what if you could make an observation of a galaxy and then measure its size?
Find the Moon Missions
Did you know that 6 Apollo missions landed on the Moon? The first was Apollo 11 in 1969. The last was Apollo 17 in 1972.
Stars That Go Bang!
Supernovae are exploding stars which increase in brightness very suddenly and unexpectedly.
Keep Watch on Asteroids
Asteroids are small, rocky objects that orbit the Sun. Most are located between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. This area of our Solar System is known as the Asteroid Belt.
Gravity Simulator
Is gravity the same everywhere? Experiment with how the ball reacts in each of the Solar System locations by dropping or throwing the ball. How similar or different is each location to Earth?
Jan Eldridge
Credit: inSCIght Magazine Photography.
All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Occupation: Theoretical astrophysicist
Research Areas: Numerical Modelling, Stellar Evolution, Binary Stars
Wanda Díaz-Merced
Credit: IAU/M. Zamani
Occupation: Astronomer
Research Areas: Sonification, Black Holes
Carlos Frenk
Early Life
Carlos was born in Mexico. He is the son of a German-Jewish immigrant father and a Mexican-Spanish mother. Half of Carlos’ family are musicians, the other half are doctors. Carlos was interested in maths and nature when he was young. He did not feel that music or medicine would suit him. Carlos has an undergraduate degree in physics from the University of Mexico. He started off studying engineering. He switched to physics when he realised that he was more interested in “why things work?” than “how?”.
Year born: 1951
Research Areas: Supercomputer Simulations, Galaxy Formation
"Scientists are sceptics. But the main thing is you have to be a rebel, because otherwise you don’t contribute to new ideas."
Anna Scaife
Early Life
Anna grew up in Cheshire, UK. She has an undergraduate masters’ degree in Physics from the University of Bristol. Anna studied for a PhD in astrophysics at the University of Cambridge. There, she got hooked on astronomy. This was the first time she had the chance to work with a radio telescope.
Research Areas: Radio-Astronomy, Artificial Intelligence
"There are very few projects in science generally, not just in astrophysics, that have data sizes like the SKA [(Square Kilometre Array)]."