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Monthly Meetings 2003
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Altitude: 50 Meters (more or less)		   Updated Nov. 3, 2003
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Monthly Club Meetings (Second Tuesday of Month at 7:30 p.m.)

Location

Through September 2003:
Doyle Conner Building
1911 S.W. 34th Street (at S.W. 20th Avenue)
Gainesville, Florida USA
After September 2003:
Powell Hall Exhibition Center (of the Florida Museum of Natural History)
Located near S.W. 34 Street & Hull Road intersection
(Western edge of UF campus in UF's Cultural Plaza)
Gainesville, Florida USA

[Directions and Map to Powell Hall]
Note: Again, please note that beginning with the 2003 October meeting, the AAC meets in Powell Hall.

Click on date to see details

DATE (2003)     GUEST SPEAKER               TITLE OR TOPIC


January*   14   Michael Toomey              History Needs a Home
February   11   Dr. Howard L. Cohen         The Sky Above, The Land Below 
March      11   Dr. James Webb              Gravitational Waves: Seeing the Universe in a New "Light"
April       8   Dr. Remigio Trujillo        The Amateur Astronomer
May        13   Dr. Karen L. Jenson         Spectroscopic Methods in the Investigation of
                                            the Interstellar Medium
June       10   Tom Clark                   Amateur Telescope Making                          
July        8   Vic Menard                  Realigning Newtonian Collimation
August     12   Joe Haldeman                Mars and Martians in Science and Science Fiction
September   9   Roy H. Johanson, Jr.        Mars: Is It the Next Logical Step?
October    14   Tom Crowley                 An Introduction to Amateur Radio Astronomy
November** 11   Dr. Holgar Stoeck           The Accelerating Dark Matter                          
December   13   None (Holiday Party)        Help Celebrate Our 16th Anniversary

*The January meeting will be held at the Florida Museum of Natural History (Powell Hall)
on the UF campus rather than at the Doyle Conner Building.
**Time of meeting is 7:00 p.m. rather than our usual 7:30 p.m. time.

Details of 2003 Meetings


Tuesday, January 14, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EST

Speaker: Michael Toomey, AAC Member

E-Mail: mike@floridastars.org

Title: History Needs A Home

Location: Florida Museum of Natural History (Powell Hall) on the University of Florida Campus (SW 34 Street and Hull Road)

(Note this is not our usual Doyle Conner meeting place.)

Directions: For directions and map to Powell Hall, see the Museum's contact page (or just click here for map)

Preview: The legacy of telescope-maker Alvan Clark has kept his refracting telescopes operating for over 100 years. While antiquated for many scientific purposes, the history, craftsmanship, educational merits and celestial views have not been diminished. Many of Clark's telescopes have become absent from the astronomy community by acquisition, while others have been mishandled or even thoughtlessly discarded. However, many more still operate in their original houses, such as the 40-inch refracting lens at the Yerkes Observatory, while others have been restored for public exhibit. Recently, AAC member Michael Toomey acquired a "comparatively small" 10-inch Alvan Clark refractor in need of restoration and a new home.

Mr. Toomey will present some history of Alvan Clark telescopes, specifications of this model and discuss possible futures for this telescope. The presentation will include some interesting mechanisms of this telescope, including its lens, a filar micrometer and a five-prism spectrometer (with explanations of their uses, of course). The audience will appreciate firsthand that they really don't make things like they used to!

About the Speaker: Michael Toomey has been an AAC member since 1998. He is currently the club's Membership Chair. He and his wife, Heidi, are editors of the FirstLight newsletter.

Tuesday, February 11, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EST

Speaker: Dr. Howard L. Cohen, Associate Professor of Astronomy, Dept. of Astronomy, Univ. of Florida

E-Mail: cohen@astro.ufl.edu

Title: The Heavens Above, The Land Below

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: Last year the Australian continent offered visitors a glimpse of a sunset total eclipse of the Sun, breathtakingly dark skies above, and magnificent scenery below. Dr. Cohen will present slides of his trip to see the skies above, including the total eclipse of the Sun from the Australian outback, a visit to Siding Springs Observatory (Australia's major optical observatory), the Henbury Meteorite Crater Reserve (a recent impact site with about a dozen craters), plus spectacular views of the "land down under."

About the Speaker: Dr. Cohen is an Associate Professor of Astronomy at the University of Florida. He helped found the AAC in 1987 and is a recent vice president. Dr. Cohen has been a frequent AAC speaker and contributor to the AAC newsletter. He currently serves on the AAC Excutive Board. The Australia trip was one of several he has helped escort in recent years with Continental Travel Capers Travel & Cruises in Gainesville. His talk will note future tours he plans to escort, trips which combine sights of the heavens above with views of our beautiful planet below. (Dr. Cohen's next escorted tour is to Iceland, where an annular solar ec lipse occurs, with a cruise up the magical Norwegian coast to above the Arctic Circle where the midnight sun shines.)

Tuesday, March 11, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EST

Speaker: Dr. James Webb, Associate Professor, Dept. of Physics, Florida International University (FIU) and Director, SARA Observatory

E-Mail: webbj@fiu.edu

Title: Gravitational Waves: Seeing the Universe in a New "Light"

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: With the development of General Relativity as the leading theory of gravity, Einstein also opened up a new window through which to observe the Unvierse: Gravitational Waves. Einstein himself derived the equations for gravitaional waves in General Relativity, but thought they might be unobservable since they are very weak. However, recently physicists, astronomers and engineers are completing instruments designed to detect these signals from space, and if successful, will open up one of the most important windows to the cosmos imaginable. With every new waveband of light astronomers observe we have learned new things about the universe. But all of the electromagnetic windows reveal things about the temperature of matter, and the exterior characteristics. Gravitational waves promise to show us inside black holes, neutron stars, as well as a glimpse of the earliest times in the universe. Join Dr. Webb in looking at the nature of gravity, the generation of gravitational waves, the instruments used to detect them, and most of all, what new things we hape to see!

This lecture is for general audiences, no physics or astronomy degrees needed! Dr. Webb will be happy to answer questions afterward.

About the Speaker: Dr. Webb is Associate Professor in the Department of Physics Astronomy Program at the Florida International University (FIU) in Miami. He is also the director of the Southeastern Association for Research in Astronomy (SARA) and an active member of the Southern Cross Astronomical Society (SCAS).

Tuesday, April 8, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Dr. Remigio (Remi) Trujillo

E-Mail: secretary@floridastars.org

Title: The Amateur Astronomer

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: "Once bitten by the astronomy bug, the enthusiast faces a variety of dilemmas."

Dr. Trujillo's talk will focus on answering questions such as:

During his talk, Dr. Trujillo will review the contributions of some great amateur astronomers. Historically, the first astronomers were amateurs, from the ancient civilizations (Egyptians, Mayas, Aztec) to Galileo, Halley, Hershel, Clark, Shoemaker and Levy to name a few.

About the Speaker: We are pleased to announce that our very own Dr. Remigio (Remi) Trujillo will be our guest speaker. Remi wanted to be an astronomer but was sidetracked and, instead, became an atomic and molecular physicist. Astronomy and telescope making is an avocation that Remi pursues during his free time. Remi is a very active member of the AAC just recently serving as Program Director. Currently, he leads the club's third Tuesday of the month's Amateur Telescope Maker's Workshop. This workshop is a hands-on event that helps amateur astronomers develop astronomy-related items and accessories.

Tuesday, May 13, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Dr. Karen L. Jenson

E-Mail: kjensen@chem.ufl.edu

Title: Spectroscopic Methods in the Investigation of the Interstellar Medium

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: Dr. Jensen will explain how everywhere one "looks" out into space, the light we "see" coming from distant stars exhibits a peculiar pattern of "missing" absorption bands from its ultraviolet and visible spectra, along with additional emission bands in the infrared. Some absorption bands were first identified eighty years go, but more have been characterized in the years since for a total of 127 bands confirmed, but only two have been tentatively identified. She will explain two different kinds of bands: DIB ("Diffuse Interstellar Bands") and UIR ("Unidentified Infrared"). She will explain where they are found, their origin or possible source, current laboratory methods, and how these spectra may be compared directly with existing astronomical observations.

About the Speaker: Dr. Jensen is a native Floridian growing up at Cape Canaveral as a "space brat." Her father was an electrical engineer at the Cape. Her parents gave Dr. Jensen her first telescope when she was eight: a 3-inch Edmund reflector (which she still treasures). Dr. Jensen completed her undergraduate and graduate work in Physical Chemistry from the University of North Dakota subsequently going to work at the Kennedy Space Center for Lockheed Space Operations. Her last assignment was spent supervising orbiter payload activities for Challenger's last four flights, and she was a member of the Pad B inspection team investigating the destruction of Challenger, representing Orbiter Engineering.

After several years as a medical physicist in the functional brain-imaging realm of neuroscience, Dr. Jensen's interest in astronomy and astrophysics was rekindled. Performing research in spectroscopy and astrochemistry, she has most recently received her Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Florida. Dr. Jensen is also an active member of the AAC.

Tuesday, June 10, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Tom Clark

E-Mail: tom@amateurastronomy.com

Title: Amateur Telescope Making

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: Mr. Clark will present a light-hearted slide show illustrating what makes a good home-made telescope and the difference between a poor design and a superb instrument. His talk will be appropriate both for the general audience as well as telescope makers. Part of his talk will be devoted to showing the construction of his dome observatory which will house his soon-to-be completed 42-in Dobsonian* which, he predicts, will rival his 36-in "Yard Scope" in viewing quality.

About the Speaker: Tom Clark is Editor and Publisher of Amateur Astronomy Magazine. Mr. Clark has built hundreds of scopes of all sizes even up to a 36-inch telescope dubbed the "Yard Scope" that gives fantastic views of deep sky objects.

Mr. Clark retired from a 32-year career as a machinist and tool-and-die maker in 1997. He has been a telescope maker since 1984 and the owner of Techtron Telescopes since 1987. He retired from commercial telescope making in 2000. He resides in the Chiefland Astronomy Village, a North Florida community of astronomers that hosts many observing events. Mr. Clark and his wife, Jeannie, travel extensively to star parties all over the United States writing articles for their magazine. They have led astronomical trips to Australia as well. Under the direction of Mr. Clark, Amateur Astronomy Magazine has been publishing for over ten years.

*Dob or Dobsonian After John Dobson, a telescope maker and member of The San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers, who made a telescopes out of simple, readily available parts. The Dob design is actually a Newtonian telescope on an altazimuth mount (rather than an equatorial mount).
    [Note: In a Newtonian telescope light is reflected from a concave mirror onto a plane mirror and through a hole in the side of the body of the telescope. An altazimuth mount allows motion both horizontally and vertically whereas an equatorial mount allows motion parallel with the Earth's axis of rotation.]
    The Dob has become popular among amateur astronomers for its low cost, low weight, and simple design that makes possible inexpensive, relatively large aperture telescopes. This telescope design, however, is generally unsuitable for astrophotography or high magnifications since the mount is generally not motor driven. Large Dobs are, nevertheless, huge "light buckets" ideal for observing deep sky objects.

Tuesday, July 8, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Vic Menard

E-Mail:

Title: Realigning Newtonian Collimation

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: Mr. Menard has several astronomy books and articles published. His most recent article, Realigning Newtonian Collimation, is the subject of tonight's presentation. Mr. Menard will revisit the basics of Newtonian collimation, dispel the myths, and quantitatively define how and why the new model works.

Vic Menard About the Speaker: Mr. Menard has been an amateur astronomer since 1967. His current telescope collection includes a 1986 5-inch f/5 Jaeger's achromatic refractor (built for Halley's Comet), a 1988 6-inch f/8 AstroSystems Christen triplet apochromat on an old Byers 58 mounting, and a 1999 22-inch f/4.1 GoTo StarMaster Dobsonian. After a year of observing with the 22 (and about a dozen years with various 20-inch scopes), Mr. Menard published My Favorite Deep Sky Go-To Tour also referred to as "The List."

Vic's 22-in Dob (click to enlarge)

Note: "The List" is also available in pdf format

In 1983 he founded "The Local Group", an association of deep sky observers from the Sarasota-Bradenton, Florida, area. Mr. Menard continues as its chairman and editor of the club newsletter also named "The Local Group." He was the founding president of Tectron Telescopes in 1987. He and Tom Clark, a noted telescope maker, designed and produced several large aperture, lightweight, fork equatorial and Dobsonian telescopes, and a collimating tool set which was well-received in the astronomical community.

Mr. Menard, along with Tippy D'Auria, co-authored Perspectives on Collimation, in 1987. The fourth edition, New Perspectives on Newtonian Collimation was released in 1998. About 11,000 copies are currently in circulation.

Tuesday, August 12, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Joe Haldeman, Science Fiction Writer

E-Mail: haldeman@earthlink.net

Title: Mars and Martians in Science and Science Fiction

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: The talk is about how both science and science fiction (good and bad) have intertwined over the past century. Schiaparelli's brilliance as an observer inadvertently led to Lowell's detailed "scientific" fantasy of a living Mars, which spawned a subgenre of science fiction that eventually paid science back by infecting girls and boys like young Carl Sagan with a thirst for astronomy. This interchange goes on today.

About the Speaker: Joe Haldeman is an award winning writer of science fiction. He has won every major award for his science fiction, including four Hugos and five Nebulas. His book, FOREVER PEACE, won the Hugo, Nebula, and John W. Campbell Awards in 1998, the first such "triple crown" in 22 years.

His latest book is GUARDIAN, a hard-science fiction novel set in 1894, 1952, 2004, and points beyond. This novel follows a Victorian woman from the 1880s to the distant future and into parallel universes.

His previous novel, THE COMING, is set in Gainesville, Florida, and involves the Astronomy Department at UF fifty years from now.

His best-known novel, THE FOREVER WAR, which will be made into a TV miniseries next year, is a Vietnam metaphor set in an interstellar conflict.

Joe claims his job is "all part-time" but he and his wife, Mary Gay, have been teaching at MIT for twenty years where he is an adjunct professor and teaches writing every fall semester.

Joe spends part of the rest of the year in Gainesville, is a long-time member of the AAC and has spoken to the club on many past occassions. He has been an amateur astronomer since the Mars opposition in the mid-1950s. Joe has considered himself a full-time writer since 1970 and tries to write a little every day even while teaching at MIT. Joe also has other pastimes including painting and drawing. He has several exhibits of his paintings in Gainesville in the last few years. In fact, during the month of April 2003, some of Joe's latest artwork was on display at the gallery at Books, Inc., 505 NW 13 Street, Gainesville, Florida.

For more on Joe including a list of his books and numerous awards, see his biographical page.

Tuesday, September 9, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Roy H. Johanson, Jr., NASA Engineer

E-Mail:

Title: Mars: Is It the Next Logical Step?

Location: Doyle Conner Building, 1911 S.W. 34 Street, Gainesville, FL

Preview: The presentation will begin with several slides that the public normally has not seen of Sonic Booms, and "Physics-In-Action" representations. Next, the audience will get a look at the role of the Un-manned Satellites' contribution towards exploring MARS including a recent video footage of an actual Delta II Launch through Spacecraft Separation. Roy will then move to why we need the Space Station and its role in the voyage to MARS, and finally, one of the plans NASA is currently entertaining for going to the Red Planet. The presentation ends with a music video summarizing man's efforts for exploration called "Thank God Dreams Survive."

About the Speaker: Roy is the Lead Ground/Airborne Support Equipment Systems Engineer for the NASA Expendable Launch Vehicle and Payload Carriers Program. He has been with NASA since 1971, and has participated in the Apollo, Skylab, Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (ASTP), Viking I & II Missions to Mars, Helios mission to the Sun, Voyager Mission to the Outer Planets, Mars, the Unmanned Delta, Atlas/Centaur, and Titan programs, and the Shuttle program. He has served as Lead Ground Support Systems Engineer for Cryogenics and Gasses, Vehicle Manager for the Space Shuttle Atlantis (OV-104), Project Manager for the Shuttle Processing Data Management System, and was responsible for the implementation of computer technology to the processing floor of the Shuttles at Kennedy Space Center. He has also been Project Manager for the Advanced Communications Technology Satellite Test Team, Lead Mechanical and Propulsion Engineer for the NASA Expendable Launch Vehicle Operations Division, and Lead Ground Systems Engineer for all of NASA Expendable Launch Vehicles Systems Group. Roy has received many Outstanding Awards during his career with NASA.

This is Roy's second presentation to the AAC. He spoke to the club about "An Inside Look at the Processing of the Space Shuttle" back in June 1999.

Tuesday, October 14, 2003, 7:30 p.m. EDT

Speaker: Tom Crowley

E-Mail: crowleytj@hotmail.com

Title: An Introduction to Amateur Radio Astronomy

Location: Powell Hall (Lucille T. Maloney Classroom), UF Campus, Gainesville FL

NOTE: Beginning October 2003, our monthly meeting location changes to POWELL HALL.

Preview: Mr. Crowley will present a brief history of radio astronomy, explain what has been discovered through radio astronomy, and discuss several projects that an amateur can accomplish at home. He will also explain how it is possible for an amateur radio astronomer to do real science with a small radio telescope in an economical way.

About the Speaker: After serving as its president for over five years, Mr. Crowley is currently President Emeritus of the Society of Amateur Radio Astronomers (SARA). During the collision of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 into Jupiter, he led an extremely successful international project with other amateur radio astronomers to detect the comet impacts into Jupiter at the decametric frequencies.

Mr. Crowley recently retired after a forty-year career in information technology and international telecommunications. He began his career as an Engineer at IBM and moved into Sales Engineering and Management. Then during the telecom boom of the 90's, he worked in various management capacities out sourcing information technology and building out an European fiber network.

Mr. Crowley is a former resident of Atlanta, Georgia. Since retirement he and his wife, Lynn, are enjoying traveling in their RV and spending time at their vacation home in the Chiefland Astronomy Village.

Tuesday, November 11, 2003, 7:00 p.m. EST

NOTE TIME CHANGE — MEETING AT 7:00 P.M. (see below)

(People wishing to meet for dinner at Rafferty's, should therefore meet one-half hour earlier than usual—at 5:30 p.m. rather than 6:00 p.m.)

Speaker: Dr. Holgar Stoeck

E-Mail: Holger@phys.ufl.edu

Title: The Accelerating Dark Matter

Location: Powell Hall (Lucille T. Maloney Classroom), UF Campus, Gainesville FL

NOTE: Beginning October 2003, our monthly meeting location changes to POWELL HALL.

WARNING: Miss Saigon will be playing at the UF Center for Performing Arts on the same evening (7:30 p.m.) as our November meeting. People planning to attend the AAC meeting should plan accordingly and arrive at Powell Hall early to avoid very heavy traffic and difficulty parking.

TO HELP AVOID PARKING PROBLEMS, THE AAC WILL START THIS MEETING AT 7:00 P.M.
RATHER THAN AT OUR USUAL 7:30 P.M. TIME.

(We suggest you arrive by 6:45 p.m. at the latest.)

Preview: The discovery of the expanding universe by Edwin Hubble in the 1920's changed the view of how our universe developed and gave rise to a large number of cosmological models to predict the way the universe will take. The latest discovery of the fact that our universe is not only expanding, but that this expansion is also accelerating, was ground shaking to the whole field of cosmology. It also strongly supports the idea of dark matter in the universe which is now seen as the driving force of the acceleration.

Dr. Stoeck's talk will give an introduction to the expanding and accelerating universe, discuss some of the ideas of what dark matter could be, and will illustrate examples of how one could find dark matter on Earth.

About the Speaker: Dr. Stoeck specializes in experimental high energy physics with particular emphasis in the search for new meson resonances and exotic matter. His web page is: http://www.phys.ufl.edu/~holger


Saturday, December 13, 2003, 6:00 p.m. EST (dinner served at 6:30 p.m.)

Speaker: None but lots of fun!

Title: "Holiday Party" and Celebration of AAC's 16th Birthday!

Location: Home of Mark Barnett, 3111 NW 18 Place, Gainesville, Florida, (352) 373-2244

Maps : 640x512 [Col, B/W],  800x640 [Color, B/W],  1024x768 [Color, B/W]

Preview: AAC will hold its annual December holiday party — a potluck dinner. (There will be no regular Tuesday meeting in December.) Club will buy drinks and paper products. (There will be a food sign up sheet at our November meetings — see below.)

Food to Bring If you miss signing up at the November meetings, please respond to webmaster@floridastars.org and indicate what food dish you will bring:

Last year we celebrated our 15th anniversary. This year we celebrate our club's 16th anniversary. Good food, games, slide show and our traditional astro slide quiz, lots of prizes, sci fi space music and more!

Begins approximately at sunset. Lasts till whenever.

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