For the International Year of Astronomy, the Australian Space Academy issues you an Invitation to Astronomy.
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The 62nd United Nations General Assembly declared 2009 as the International Year of Astronomy. This year is also the 40th anniversary of the first manned lunar landing, and the 400th anniversary of man's adventure into telescopic astronomy by Galileo. The Astronomical society of Australia has organised public lectures at major cities throughout Australia. For more details from the Australian node see IYA2009. |
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Toward the end of 1609 Galileo Galilei turned his telescopes toward
the skies, and changed the history of astronomy. Among his many
discoveries were craters on the moon, the phases of Venus, the moons of
Jupiter and dark spots on the Sun. For more history see
CSIRO outreach. |
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The 9th Australian Space Science Conference will be held in Sydney. Jointly sponsored by the National Committee for Space Science and the National Space Society of Australia, it will cover the areas of space science, space engineering, space industry, government space and space education and outreach. More details can be found at ASSC-9. Details of previous conferences can be found at Australian Space Science Conference |
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The premier of Western Australia will launch the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research. A joint venture between the University of Western Australia and Curtin University, and funded by the Western Australian government, ICRAR will focus on the development of the science and engineering necessary for the International Square Kilometre Array (SKA) radiotelescope and will undertake projects related to the variable universe and the concentration of neutral hydrogen throughout galaxies. For more information see ICRAR. |
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COSMOS Magazine, the Australian Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, CSIRO and NASA have cooperated to send a message toward the planet Gliese 581d in the constellation of Libra from the Tidbinbilla tracking station near Canberra. To send a message go to Hello From Earth. |
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NASA Astronaut Dr K Megan McArthur will give talks at Scitech and the University of Western Australia. Dr McArthur was most recently involved in the Space Shuttle mission to perform the final service on the Hubble Space Telescope. For more details see UWA. |
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The 27th General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union will be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. For more details see IAU. |
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A total solar eclipse will occur in a track that crosses northern India, China and out into the Pacific Ocean. In Australia only the tip of Cape York will see this eclipse as a small partial event. This will occur just before 0330 UT. For more details see Eclipses@NASA. |
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Forty years ago Apollo 11 touched down at Tranquillity Base on the moon and Neil Armstrong become the first person to set foot on the lunar surface, with the famous quotation "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind". Australian ground stations at Parkes, Carnarvon, Tidbinbilla and Honeysuckle Creek were instrumental in supporting this mission. The CSIRO radio astronomy observatory at Parkes was responsible for bringing TV coverage of the event to the world. For more details see APOLLO 11, The Dish, Carnarvon Space and CROtrak. |
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The 9th Australian Mars Exploration Conference will be held in Adelaide at the University of South Australia. Presentations will concentrate on issues of forging, nurturing and developing the pioneering culture and methods required to explore Mars. The keynote speaker will be Dr Chris McKay from the NASA Ames research centre in California. More details can be found at AMEC 2009. |
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This is the second expedition supported by the NASA Exploration Systems Mission Directorate (NASA Ames) and the Mars Society of Australia. It is an educational outreach program, aimed at teachers and students, to explore remote and extreme environments. This second expedition will be led by Dr Chris McKay from NASA Ames and MSA engineer and Mars-Oz project manager, David Willson. It will explore space facilities, past and present, and Mars analog sites in outback South Australia. More details can be found at SBA 2009. |
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The 2009 Annual Scientific Meeting and General Meeting of the Astronomical Society of Australia will be held at the University of Melbourne in Victoria. For more details see ASA2009. |
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An international conference entitled "The Many Faces of Centaurus-A" will be held in Sydney. For more details see ATNF. |
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Macquarie University in Sydney will host the conference "Legacies of the Macquarie/AAO/Strasbourg Ha Planetary Nebula project". For more details see Macquarie University Astronomy. |
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A penumbral lunar eclipse may be visible to dedicated observers as an asymmetric shading across the moon. The northern half of the lunar disc is the portion that will be shaded by the Earth, and the greatest extent of the eclipse will occur around 1438 UT. This minor eclipse will be visible throughout all of Australia. For more details see Eclipses@NASA. |
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An annular solar eclipse will be visible across a track that crosses the Indian ocean and central Indonesia. With the exception of Tasmania this will be visible as a partial eclipse from Australia between roughly 0900 and 0930 UT. The eastern half of Australia will see the eclipse terminated by sunset. For more details see Eclipses@NASA. |