#36 - June 2015

The Discussion: A cloudy but fun-filled AstroCamp dominates the
discussions this month with glimpses of the planets and a hurried
Messier Marathon in between gaps between the clouds. Nick Howes’
talk inspires reflections on the threat of asteroids and comets
and how amateur astrophotographers can contribute to science.


The News: This month we take a look at NASA’s new draft 2015
Technologies Roadmap and discuss the advances in robotics, space
propulsion, power transfer and nanotechnology that NASA hope to
seed. Next up is some research from NASA’s Jet Propulsion
Laboratory that suggests the discolouration on Europa’s surface
might be irradiated salt from the moon’s subsurface ocean.
Finally, we take a look at the discovery, using ESO’s VLT, that
globular clusters in the Centaurus A galaxy are far heavier than
they should be – perhaps harbouring vast amounts of dark matter.


The 5 Minute Concept: Just a hundred years after Newton’s notion
of Universal Gravitation, John Mitchell proposed an idea so
futuristic that it was barely even noticed until Einstein showed
the universe has space-time geometry. Then, in 1972, the
predictions of Newton, Einstein and Mitchell were revealed as the
mind-bending reality of black holes.


The Interview: This month we welcome back Dr Joe Liske from the
European Southern Observatory to talk about the New Technologies
Telescope that tested new ways to build ever larger telescopes
and paved the way for the monster observatories we see today.


Q&A: Listeners’ questions via email, Facebook & Twitter
take us on a journey into the astronomy issues that have always
plagued our understanding or stretched our credulity. This month
Ralph & Paul answer:


If there is life elsewhere in the solar system, where do you
think it is most likely to be?Louisa Martin, Brisbane Australia,
via email.