Magnetars

Mighty Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system, is also a powerful radio transmitter! The dynamo driving Jupiter’s radio emission is a strong magnetic field.

Throughout history, women have had a tough time breaking into the physical sciences. And when they do, their contributions may go unnoticed for decades. This is the story of Ruby Payne Scott, the first female radio astronomer.

The Atacama desert in Chile is one of the driest places on earth. It’s also the site of a new telescope called the Atacama Large Millimeter Array.

Dip a teaspoon in a pulsar, and pull out the equivalent of a full ocean tanker! Add the amazing fact that a pulsar can rotate up to 700 times a second and you have one of the most exotic objects in the Universe.

Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, actually has water ice in craters near the planet’s poles. Does the Moon also harbor water ice? It would be nice to have a ready-made source of water when astronauts return to set up a permanent lunar colony.

What does a man do who’s bored with his hobby? Build the world’s first radio telescope in his mom’s backyard, of course!

Two days after Christmas 2004, spacecraft detected a giant flash of energy from thousands of light years away – the biggest, brightest explosion astronomers had ever seen. What was it?

Light pollution is a problem for optical astronomers. There is a problem just as severe for radio astronomers – radio frequency interference. Communications towers, satellites, and even home electronics like your iPod produce signals that swamp sensitive radio telescopes!

20/20 vision is a good thing. It means you can read a letter that’s about 1/4th of an inch high from a distance of 20 feet. Put that letter in Los Angeles. Now what if you could read it standing in New York? The Very Long Baseline Array can!

While some astronomers look for transmissions from other civilizations to search for evidence of life in the Milky Way, others search for interstellar chemicals that are necessary for life: organic molecules.