Unlocking the Secret of the Sun’s Temperature
1858 Drawing of the Eclipsed Sun as Seen from Brazil We have been talking about the sun. With the European Space Agency’s and NASA’s...
top of page
Search
Douglas MacDougal
- May 15, 2021
- 4 min
Charles Greely Abbot Finally Captures the Solar Constant
Prowling in used bookstores can yield gratifying surprises. I’ve always had an eye for the musty treasures in the history of astronomy,...
30 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Mar 9, 2021
- 4 min
Earth and Apophis in the Cosmic Velodrome
Well whew it missed us. I think you are not surprised, though, because everybody who looked at its trajectory knew it would miss Earth by...
15 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Feb 26, 2021
- 1 min
Charles Greeley Abbot and the Smithsonian’s Hunt for the Solar Constant - Part II
Welcome to Part II of our story. The picture above shows Charles Greely Abbot reading his pyrheliometer. I enjoy pictures of how science...
18 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Jan 21, 2021
- 8 min
Charles Greeley Abbot and the Smithsonian’s Hunt for the Solar Constant - Part I
Charles Greely Abbot As we slowly climb out of the current steep sunspot minimum, it is worth reflecting upon some long-standing...
34 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Oct 1, 2020
- 4 min
Alas Babylon! Mars Draws Near
As Mars draws near, my thoughts turn to . . . Babylon. What’s this? Why Babylon? When the world absorbs the amazing photographs and data...
30 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Jul 28, 2020
- 9 min
An Exceptional Visitor Comes to Town: Comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE
It's like something out of Children of the Corn. Everyone standing in the broad park at the top of a hill not far from my house looking...
15 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- May 17, 2020
- 2 min
Remember 'Omuamua?
On the occasion of our second interstellar visitor to our solar system, 2I/Borisov, I was reminded of a talk I gave a year ago to a...
26 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Apr 1, 2020
- 4 min
One Hundred Years Ago this Spring: Lighthouse Stars, Island Universes, and the Great Debate of 1920
A century ago in Washington DC, at a National Academy of Sciences’ symposium put together by George Ellery Hale, Heber Curtis and Harlow...
4 views0 comments
Douglas MacDougal
- Mar 1, 2020
- 2 min
The Unpleasantness of Being in the Way
Earth occasinally gets in the way of big nasty rocky things travelling through space. It seems like that daunting reality hasn't been...
13 views0 comments
Copyright © 2020 - 2024 Douglas MacDougal
bottom of page