Tuesday, 24 October 2017

The Triple Star System, Gliese 667.































 Gliese 667A                   GlieseCb and GlieseCc                                               Gliese  667B                           Gliese 667C                                                                                                



Gliese 667 is a triple star system located 23.2 light years away from Earth, in the constellation of Scorpio. The Three stars, Gliese A, Gliese B and Gliese C all have a mass smaller than our own Sun and can be seen by the naked eye which appears as a single faint star in the night sky. The two brightest stars in the system, Gliese 667A and Gliese 667B is a binary star system, orbiting each other, separated by a distance of 12 AU. AU is a astonomical unit which tells us the distance from Earth to the Sun. So 12 AU, would represent roughly, 93,000,000 x 12 to calculate the distance in miles or 150,000,000 x 12 to calculate the distance in kilometers. The closest the pair of stars ever come to each other is about 5 AU, the orbit between the two stars takes about 43 years to complete. The third star in the system Gliese 667C orbits around the binary stars at a distance around 230 AU. The largest star in the system Gliese 667A is slightly smaller than our own Sun but has roughly the same volume of mass and is catagorised as being a brown dwarf star. Gliese 667B is the second largest star in the system, containing 70% the size and mass of our own Sun. Gliese 667C is the smallest star in the system and is roughly three times smaller in mass when compaired to our Sun. Gliese 667C is a red dwarf star or an M-type star with a outer atmosphere temperature of around 3,700 kelvin. Two planets have been found orbiting in the vicinity of Gliese 667C. The extrasolar planets orbiting Gliese C are named Gliese Cb and Gliese Cc. When on the surface of the extrasolar planet Gliese 667cc, Gliese 667C would look 3 times bigger in comparison when veiwing the Sun from the surface of Earth.












Sunday, 22 October 2017

Statue of David by Michelangelo.



























King David is regarded in biblical texts as a humble, honest and dedicated king whilst serving the needs and will of the people he ruled over at the time. Davids father Jesse was a farmer and lived in Bethlehem, he was of the tribe of Judah and his family are belived to have stemmed from the genology of Jesus Christ. Jesse had eight sons including David. In Biblical texts it is thought that the prophet Samuel was sent by God to find the next King of Isreal. The prophet presented each of Jesse's sons to God until God asked the prophet Samuel to annoint David, King over Isreal.

Hebrew prophets regarded him as the ancestor of the future messiah and according to the new testament he was the ancestor of Jesus. As Biblical texts go, the basic story of David goes that David was handed into the hands of King Saul ( King of Isreal ) to protect and take care of the King as one of his royal armour bearers. One of the most recognised stories about David is the story of David and Goliath, which tells us of a time when the Philistines and the Isrealites came to war with each other. The giant known as Goliath from the Philistines, challanged the Isrealites to send out their most decorated champion to fight him in a head to head battle. David stepped forward and killed Goliath with no more than a slingshot and a few stones.

The marble sculpture was created between 1501 and 1504 by  the Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet Michelangelo. This masterpiece stands around 17ft tall, located at the Galleria dell'Accademia ( Gallery of the Academy of Florence ) in Florence, Italy.

Sunday, 15 October 2017

The Majestic Moon's of Jupiter.













Image of Jupiter and two of its largest moons. 

Jupiter's largest moon's Io and Europa were first discovered by Galileo Galilei whilst he was making observations of the night sky with his own personal telescope in 1610. The mythological character Zeus was another representation of the planet Jupiter, therefore Galileo named the two moon's of Jupiter after two lovers of Zeus, Io and Europa. Galileo recognised that not all celestial bodies orbited the Earth, this realisation would change the course of history forever. At the time of his discovery most astronomers believed that the Earth was at the centre of the Universe, now atronomers had to consider that Earth was simply apart of a much bigger Universe than previously thought. 400 Years later we have discovered 69 moons that orbit Jupiter with the use of Space Probes like the one that captured this stunning image. 

The image was captured by Nasa's JUNO Space Probe on September 1st 2017.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Roman Tkachenko.

Link to image.