Starship Asterisk*

just me wrote:Can someone explain how Jupiter at opposition can be at its "almost annual closest approach to planet Earth"?
It seems more likely to me that Jupiter is closest to Earth when they are both on the same side of the sun.

montylc2001 wrote:
Mr. Colas, as per my previous post have you gentlemen thought of masking Io to get an image of a eruption plume?

NoelC wrote:I wonder if the pros are doing what the amateur planetary imagers have been doing - take LOTS of short photos, use software to choose the best, then average the best to reduce noise. I imagine that a well-funded highly sensitive professional grade camera would beat the pants off of the webcams amateurs use for sensitivity and resolution, and thus we see images this good from the ground. Is there more info on the process used for this image somewhere?

On another subject, what is it about the Pic du Midi site that makes one want to change careers and go work there?

-Noel

NoelC wrote:I wonder if the pros are doing what the amateur planetary imagers have been doing - take LOTS of short photos, use software to choose the best, then average the best to reduce noise.

I imagine that a well-funded highly sensitive professional grade camera would beat the pants off of the webcams amateurs use for sensitivity and resolution, and thus we see images this good from the ground.

herbraab wrote:Unbelievable image! Hard to imagine that this was done with a ground based telescope, and not from space!

Cheers,
Herbert

neufer wrote:

islader2 wrote:
When I first bought my modest telescope, the first celestial item that I looked for was Jupiter==so that I could see its Galilean moons. What an experience. I was hooked, albeit I had to hike to a dark spot. Thanks for the memories, editors.

You had to hike to a dark spot to observe Jupiter & its moons

I would have thought that you could do that even in the middle of New York City.

alphachap wrote:why is my image so small? was much bigger when uploaded!

orin stepanek wrote:
They must have done some pretty nifty construction to set this observatory in the mountain top like they have.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soci%C3%A9t%C3%A9_Ramond wrote:

Members of the Société Ramond lay the first stone
of the Pic du Midi de Bigorre observatory in 1878.

<<The Société Ramond (Ramond Society) is a French learned society devoted to the study of the Pyrenees. It is named after the French politician, geologist, botanist and explorer Louis Ramond de Carbonnières (January 4, 1755 Strasbourg – May 14, 1827) and is based in Bagnères-de-Bigorre. The society was formed in 1865 in Bagnères-de-Bigorre by Henry Russell (1834–1909), a French-Irish eccentric who made many first ascents in the Pyrenees; Émilien Frossard (1829–1898); and Charles Packe (1826–1896). They first came up with the idea for a society to be modelled on the recently formed Alpine Club in London (1857) and argued that all candidates for membership should have climbed at least one Pyrenean peak of three thousand metres or more.

The society was responsible for the construction of an observatory on the Pic du Midi de Bigorre. The Société Ramond put all of its funds towards the project, as well as organising a subscription from its members. The first stones of the observatory were laid in 1878, but by 1882, as a result of spiralling costs that were beyond its relatively modest means, the society yielded the observatory to the French state, which took it into its possession by a law of 7 August 1882.

The First World War slowed down the activities of the society, although it still continued to publish Explorations pyrénéennes. The bulletin ceased publication around the Second World War and it was only in 1968 that it was again published.>>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pic_du_Midi_de_Bigorre wrote:

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<<The Pic du Midi de Bigorre or simply Pic du Midi (altitude 2,877 m) is a mountain in the French Pyrenees famous for its astronomical observatory, the Observatoire du Pic du Midi de Bigorre (Pic du Midi Observatory), part of the Observatoire Midi-Pyrénées (Midi-Pyrénées Observatory). The observatory is located at 42°56′N 0°8′E, placing it very close to the Greenwich meridian.

The 8 meter dome was completed in 1908, and housed a mechanical equatorial reflector. In 1946 Mr. Gentilli funded a dome and 60 cm, and in 1958 a spectrograph was installed.

A 106-centimetre telescope was installed in 1963 funded by NASA, and was used to take detailed photographs of the surface of the Moon in preparation for the Apollo missions. In 1965 the astronomers Pierre and Janine Connes were able to formulate a detailed analysis of the composition of the atmospheres on Mars and Venus, based on the infrared spectra gathered from these planets. The results showed atmospheres in chemical equilibrium. This served as a basis for James Lovelock, a scientist working for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, to predict that those planets had no life - a fact that would be proven and scientifically accepted years after.

A 2 meter telescope, known as the Bernard Lyot Telescope was placed at the observatory in 1980 on top of a 28 meter column built off to the side to avoid wind turbulence affecting the seeing of the other telescopes. It is the largest telescope in France. The observatory also has a coronograph, which is used to study the solar corona. A 60-centimetre telescope (the Gentilly's T60 telescope) is also located at the top of Pic du Midi. Since 1982 this T60 is dedicated to amateur astronomy and managed by a group of amateurs, called association T60.

Saturn's moon Helene (Saturn VII or Dione B), was discovered by Pierre Laques and Jean Lecacheux in 1980 from ground-based observations at Pic du Midi Observatory, and named Helene in 1988. It is also a trojan moon of Dione.>>

Ann wrote:I'm surprised at Ganymede's position in relation to Io, and also in relation to the banding of Jupiter. We apparently see Jupiter so that its equator is "in the middle" - that is, the horizontal bands on Jupter or not seen to form any kinds of "arcs". But Ganymede appears to be far away from this "midplane" of Jupiter. Don't Ganymede and Io orbit in the same general plane? And does Genymede orbit in a plane which is quite different from Jupiter's own rotation around its axis?