Astronomy Days returns to NC Museum of Natural Sciences – WRAL.com
Raleigh, N.C. — Astronomy Days lands again at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences this weekend with something for everyone in the family.
The free annual event, a partnership with the museum, Raleigh Astronomy Club and NASA, runs on Saturday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and on Sunday from noon until 5 p.m.
Visitors can create a rocket, learn about the animals of the constellations, create their own Mars rover and watch researchers use everyday supplies to build a comet.
This year’s theme is Earth 2020 and Ocean Worlds, and the moons of Jupiter and Saturn will be a focus of many of the weekend’s talks. These icy satellites contain three ingredients crucial to life: liquid water, organic molecules and energy. Europa, the smallest of the four Galilean moons orbiting Jupiter, contains liquid water ocean, twice as much as Earth’s, sloshing beneath an icy shell several miles thick.
Special guests from the American Museum of Natural Sciences in New York, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, as well as the University of Arizona, UNC Chapel Hill, N.C. State, Duke and Appalachian State, will present on those icy worlds as well as the search for life elsewhere in the Solar System.
Educators from NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia will be in the museum’s special exhibits gallery on the second floor of the Natural Exploration Center section. Visitors can also meet astronaut Doug Wheelock (call sign “Wheels”) and hear about his 178 days in space.
Look for me in the Astronomy & Astrophysics Research Lab on the third floor of the Nature Research Center section of the museum. Visitors are invited to pitch in and help museum researchers measure the curvature of spiral arms in galaxies with a citizen science project called Spiral Graph.
You can also experience OpenSpace, interactive software that enables you to visualize and explore the Universe.
I’ll also be giving several talks throughout the weekend on 2019 in space exploration on the communications network that delivers images and data back from missions exploring the solar system and beyond as well as ensuring the astronauts aboard the International Space Station are just a (video) call away.
Also join me for a behind the scenes look at the Artemis program, which is preparing to take the first woman and next man back to the Moon.
I recently visited with engineers, technicians, and NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine at the Michaud Assembly Facility near New Orleans for the rollout of the Space Launch System booster and engine assembly and test facilities at the Stennis Space Center just over the border in Mississippi.
More information including a full schedule of exhibits, activities and presentations is available on the museum website.
