Starship Asterisk*

MadCat-75 wrote: why is there a cross and no ring/circle of light? sincerely yours, Heiko

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Einstein_Rings.jpg wrote:
<<In observational astronomy an Einstein ring is the deformation of the light from a source (such as a galaxy or star) into a ring through gravitational lensing of the source's light by an object with an extremely large mass (such as another galaxy, or a black hole). This occurs when the source, lens and observer are all aligned. The first complete Einstein ring, designated B1938+666, was discovered by collaboration between astronomers at the University of Manchester and NASA's Hubble Space Telescope in 1998.



Hundreds of gravitational lenses are currently known. About half a dozen of them are partial Einstein rings with diameters up to an arcsecond, although as either the mass distribution of the lenses is not perfectly axially symmetrical, or the source, lens and observer are not perfectly aligned, we have yet to see a perfect Einstein ring. Most rings have been discovered in the radio range.>>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four-leaf_clover wrote:
<<It has been estimated that there are approximately 10,000 three-leaf clovers for every four-leaf clover. It is debated whether the fourth leaflet is caused genetically or environmentally. Its relative rarity suggests a possible recessive gene appearing at a low frequency. Alternatively, four-leaf clovers could be caused by somatic mutation or a developmental error of environmental causes. They could also be caused by the interaction of several genes that happen to segregate in the individual plant. It is possible all four explanations could apply to individual cases.

Certain companies produce four-leaf clovers using different means. Richard Mabey alleges, in Flora Britannica, that there are farms in the US which specialize in four-leaf clovers, producing as many as 10,000 a day (to be sealed in plastic as "lucky charms") by feeding a secret, genetically-engineered ingredient to the plants to encourage the aberration (there are, however, widely-available cultivars that regularly produce leaves with multiple leaflets) . Mabey also states that children learn that a five-leaved clover is even luckier than a four-leaved one. Five-leaf clovers are less commonly found naturally than four-leaf clovers; however, they, too, have been successfully cultivated.>>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Luck_of_the_Fryrish wrote:
<<"The Luck of the Fryrish" is the fourth episode in season three of Futurama. It originally aired in North America on March 11, 2001. The episode opens in the mid-1970s, where a young Yancy Fry is jealous of his newborn brother Philip, and copies him in anything he can. In the year 3000, Fry is getting fed up with his bad luck in a horse rally. In a flashback, Fry discovers a seven-leaf clover, which grants him extraordinary luck and allows him to beat his brother in any contest, from basketball to breakdancing. Fry sets off, with Turanga Leela and Bender, to find his clover in the ruins of Old New York and makes his way to his old house.

Back in the 1980s, a teenage Fry hides the seven-leaf clover inside his Ronco record vault in his copy of The Breakfast Club soundtrack. In the year 3000, Fry remembers the combination, but when the safe is stuck, Bender opens it up for him. Unfortunately, Fry discovers that the clover is missing, concluding that Yancy must have stolen it. They happen across a statue of whom they believe to be Yancy, with the seven-leaf clover in his lapel. The inscription: “Philip J. Fry - First person on Mars” angers Fry because he believes Yancy stole his name and his dream.

"That clover helped my rat-faced brother steal my dream of going into space."

• 

Professor Farnsworth pulls up a biographical movie about “Philip J. Fry,” where the crew learns that he was a millionaire rock star astronaut, and is now buried (with the seven-leaf clover) in Orbiting Meadows National Cemetery, a graveyard orbiting Earth. A furious Fry sets off to rob Philip J. Fry's grave and recover the clover. The story jumps back to the early 21st century, where an adult Yancy is rummaging through his missing brother’s music to find something to play at his wedding. Yancy discovers the seven-leaf clover and takes it.

Fry, Leela and Bender reach the grave site, and start digging, but Fry knocks loose some moss that is covering part of an inscription on Yancy's tombstone, and begins to read. The story jumps back to Yancy, who is discussing naming his newborn son with his wife. Yancy didn't keep Fry's clover; instead, he gave it to his newborn son and named him Philip J. Fry II. The inscription on the tomb reads “Here Lies Philip J. Fry, named for his uncle, to carry on his Spirit.” Bender finds the clover, and he offers to mess up the corpse, but Fry returns the clover to his nephew’s grave as "Don't You (Forget About Me)" by Simple Minds (from the Breakfast Club soundtrack) rolls over the end credits.>>

Case wrote:The Einstein Cross does not show in a DSS2 image (RA 22h40m30.241s, Dec +03d21m30.92s).
The APOD image makes it seem like the quasar outshines the galaxy, but the DSS2 image shows a rather regular galaxy image without super-bright portions. Is that just resolution, or is the quartet enhanced in the APOD?

Chris Peterson wrote:

Case wrote:The Einstein Cross does not show in a DSS2 image (RA 22h40m30.241s, Dec +03d21m30.92s).
The APOD image makes it seem like the quasar outshines the galaxy, but the DSS2 image shows a rather regular galaxy image without super-bright portions. Is that just resolution, or is the quartet enhanced in the APOD?

The resolution is so low in the DSS2 image compared with the WIYN image that the lensed quasar components are completely unresolved. I'd say that what you're interpreting as the galaxy core in the DSS2 image is, in fact, the lensed quasar, and it does outshine the galaxy.

elipongo wrote:Einstein's Cross??? The man was Jewish! Is this an official name? I would vote for it to be named Einstein's Square or something else less incongruous.

The Einstein Cross or Q2237+030 or QSO 2237+0305 is a gravitationally lensed quasar that sits directly behind ZW 2237+030, Huchra's Lens.
It is quadruply imaged, hence its name, Einstein Cross, forming a nearly perfect cross, with the lensing galaxy at its center.

elipongo wrote:I speak not of the geometrical figure, but rather about the word itself. Cross derives from the Latin Crux, a wooden frame used for executions.

Chris Peterson wrote:

elipongo wrote:Einstein's Cross??? The man was Jewish! Is this an official name? I would vote for it to be named Einstein's Square or something else less incongruous.

Einstein may have had a Jewish heritage, but he was pretty obviously an atheist by most definitions- at the very least, he had no conventional religious convictions. So I don't think he'd much mind! In any case, the shape is very appropriately called a "cross"- a geometric shape that has no intrinsic religious significance. It isn't called a "Latin cross", which is an important symbol for Christians. Nor a Coptic cross, Greek cross, swastika, or any of the dozens of other specific crosses that usually have symbolic meaning.

APOD Robot wrote: The Einstein Cross Gravitational Lens

Explanation: Most galaxies have a single nucleus -- does this galaxy have four? The strange answer leads astronomers to conclude that the nucleus of the surrounding galaxy is not even visible in this essay . The central cloverleaf is rather light emitted from a background quasar. The gravitational field of the visible foreground galaxy breaks light from this distant quasar into four distinct images. The quasar must be properly aligned behind the center of a massive galaxy for a mirage like this to be evident. The general effect is known as gravitational lensing, and this specific case is known as the Einstein Cross. Stranger still, the images of the Einstein Cross vary in relative brightness, enhanced occasionally by the additional gravitational microlensing effect of specific stars in the foreground galaxy.

<< Previous APOD

Discuss Any APOD

Next APOD >>

[/b]