Building a career path in astronomy

Working with the telescopes of the physics department, I have been able to build up the interest of students to astronomy. Some students even say, “Let’s shift to physics” after seeing what we do with the scopes. Although it is very much interesting, a lot of students are still intimidated by the science and math side of such a course. Most of the time people just don’t really know how to go about in astronomy.

For the Philippines, astronomy is not well known – unfortunately. Also, being in an archipelago affects the flow of information so people outside Manila have lesser chances of knowing about astronomy.

I’ve been interested in astronomy since elementary school that I’ve decided to take astronomy when I get to college. Since there was no BS Astronomy course offered anywhere that I knew I took the next big thing – Physics. In astronomy (professional) you have to have a good background in physics, also you should be good in math or in database programming, so taking physics was a logical step.

Fortunately my professors at Silliman University were enthusiastic about my interest in astronomy (I was even called ‘astroboy’). It took some time though before I decided to have a serious path in astronomy. I began making contacts with people in Manila: Dr. Cynthia Celebre of PAGASA, James Kevin TY of Astronomical League of the Philippines; Erika Valdueza of UP Astrosoc. I also contributed to the Philippine Journal of Astronomy. I took my OJT at PAGASA Dumaguete. It was not till my 3rd year in college that I heard of RTU and its BS Astronomy technology and MS Astronomy programs. Having heard that, I was glad since I wouldn’t have to worry about which school abroad should I look for in going into astronomy.

Later, I joined the IYA 2009 Astronomy Olympiad just to test myself on how far I’ve gotten with astronomy. With no teacher to advice me, I turned to books. Luckily, Silliman has the biggest library so I had a good number of books to assist me. I joined the competition and was surprised that I actually won (books rule! ).

Currently I am working on finishing my undergraduate studies then I plan to go to Mandaluyong and take up MS Astronomy. I continue to keep myself connected with people who are linked to Philippine Astronomy.

I plan to take a career path in research astronomy (hopefully in the Keck observatory in Mauna Kea, Hawaii).

JPPS Explores the Night Sky

Annual Meteor Showers

Here's a little something for the meteor watchers:

There are meteor showers that regularly occur in every year. How we know when and where this meteor showers occur is simple. There are streams of debris from comets that pass along the Earth's orbit. This debris are called meteoroids. Now, the Earth ends up almost at the exact position after one revolution. And because the Earth ends up in exactly the same place it reaches the meteoroid stream in almost exactly the same time and the same place in its orbit. When this stream of debris come in contact with the Earth's atmosphere, a meteor shower is produced.

To help you locate meteor showers, they are usually named after their radiant (i.e., Leonids meteor shower can be found in Leo; Delta Aquarids radiate from the delta star of Aquarius).
 Here is a list of the prominent meteor showers (visible to the Philippines). There are other showers aside from this but they have very low ZHRs.

January:

Quadrantids Meteor Shower 

Quadrantids, as you may have noticed, does not resemble any of the 88 constellations. This is because the Quadrans Muralis, in which it is named from, is an obsolete constellation. This is located somewhere along Hercules, Bootes and Draco.
Peak: January 3/4
Active Period: January 1 - 6
ZHR (Zenithal Hourly Rate, the amount of meteors per hour during the peak): 90

April:

Lyrids Meteor Shower

Originating from the debris of comet Thatcher. This meteor shower originates from the constellation Lyra which rises up in the east at around 11:30.
Peak: April 22
Active Period: April 19 - 24
ZHR: 12


May:

Eta-Aquarids Meteor Shower

This meteor shower radiates from the Eta star of the constellation Aquarius. It's parent comet is the famous Halley's comet.
Peak: May 5/6
Active Period: May 1 - 8
ZHR: 45

June:
Lyrids Meteor Shower (June Lyrids)
Another meteor shower originating from Lyra.
Peak: June 15/16
Active Period: June 10 -21
ZHR: 9 - 10

July:

Delta Aquarids

Radiating from Aquarius' Delta star. It's parent comet is unknown. This shower produces bright yellow meteors.
Peak: July 28/29
Active Period: July 15 - Aug 15
ZHR: 19

Capricornids

This meteor shower produces bright yellowish fire balls. They strike the atmosphere slowly at an average of 15 miles per second.
Active Period: July 29 - 30
ZHR: 15


August:

Perseids Meteor Shower

Originating from the comet Swift-Tuttle
Peak: Aug 12/13
Active Period: Jul 25 - Aug 18
ZHR: 80



October:

Orionids Meteor Shower

Coming from the same meteoroid stream as Eta Aquarids, the Orionids belong to the debris of Halley's comet. Radiating from Orion, the hunter.
Peak: October 21
Active Period: Oct 16 - 26
ZHR: 25

November:

Taurids Meteor Shower (and Leonids)

A fascinating meteor shower that appears as two showers in one. It is a combination of Taurids and Leonids. Comet Encke is the source of this shower and Comet Temple-Tuttle.
Peak: Nov 5 and 17/18
Active Period: Nov 4 - 7 and Nov 15 - 19
ZHR: 8 and 10



December:

Geminids Meteor Shower

The most prominent and the most reliable of the annual meteor showers. This meteor shower comes from debris of the asteroid 3200 Phaeton. This shower creates a multi-colored display of meteors, most bright white, and then yellow, and then blue, red and green.
Peak: Dec 13/14
Active Period: Dec 17 - 15
ZHR: 80

I would be posting the rest of the minor meteor showers later. Good luck and clear skies!

Lunatic

Last Thursday, April 22, me and some of my friends in the church gathered to witness the Lyrids meteor shower. While waiting for the peak time, we set our eyes on the moon. Luckily we had a decent camera with us. I tinkered about with the settings until I was able to get a clear image of the moon and its craters. :)

here is a picture of my first successful astrophotography shot. I used a Canon Powershot S3 IS.

A Night at the Mountain Tops of Valencia

Last night, Mar 29, me and some friends of kuya Moe went up to the mountaintops of Valencia to have a stargazing session. They've been doing it for quite some time, but never really knew how to maximize their stargazing - that's why they hauled me in.

The place had a perfect view of the eastern horizon, overlooking Dumaguete city and the sea. The skies were cloudy though for that night, but that didn't stop us. They had two refracting telescopes that haven't been used effectively. Some of the adjustment screws were missing and the tripod wasn't stable. I brought my binoculars along only to find out it was damaged and my eyepiece fell off.

Anyways, I managed to set up both scopes and targeted the most visible object at that time - the moon. The moon was almost full so the brightness was kinda a pain in the eye. We were able to view the craters of the moon and observe the mares. I also showed them Sirius, Procyon and Mars in the sky, forming like a giant Orion's belt. Later, Saturn came to view and I worked on getting the telescope to focus on it. When I was able to focus on Saturn using a 10mm eyepiece, we were able to see Saturn and its bright rings, as well as two of its moons.

The event would have been better with clear skies, but I'm happy to have pleased and amazed others with the Wonders of the Night Sky! :)

Armed and Ready :)

Last Thursday, me and my 1st year research assistants were preparing for doing my thesis. We had nothing to do for the mean time so we sat down and ate Mr.Chips. Suddenly, we saw Jupiter clear out from the clouds, so we immediately rushed to assemble the department's Celestron 8 (which we call Big Bertha).

When we focused on Jupiter, we were able to notice the Great Red Spot (Whoa!). After Jupiter, we looked around and trailed on to the Orion nebula. I recalled the view of the Trapezium from UP, and wanted to share it to them. Our telescope wasn't able to resolve the image well enough, but still we could distinguish the four baby stars surrounded by a cloud of interstellar gas.

Later that evening, Saturn came out and we all enjoyed looking at its rings (We even forgot about the thesis). Unfortunately, clouds began to cover up our view. So we began doing nothing.

I decided to check on the old telescopes that were in the cabinet (talk about dusty). I looked around for their mounts and found three equatorial mounts, I don't know which mount was for which telescope. Later, I was able to figure out which telescope belonged to which mount. Unfortunately, they were quite rusty and dusty. We set up one of the old telescopes and I thought my assistants how to do tracking.

We were all excited about having all 5 department telescopes functional that my assistants gave the old ones names after big bertha. One was given Berting, the other was called Bertot (i actually called it Milk shake).

Now that all 5 telescopes are ready, we are excited for our next stargazing session! :)

IYA 2009 National Astronomy Olympiad

Last February 18-20, I traveled to Manila to participate in IYA 2009 National Astronomy Olympiad, held at UP NISMED. I represented region seven in the nationals, since I was blessed to win the Regional level in Cebu, last Feb 21. I was blessed further by becoming champion of the olympiad in the national level.

The IYA 2009 National Astronomy Olympiad  was held at the UP NISMED auditorium in UP Diliman, last Feb 19. The categories for the competition were: multiple choice, open ended1 and open ended 2 , and practical/hands-on.

Here are some pics I took from my cellphone since I wasn't able to bring a camera with me:

 

UP observatory at UP NISMED which housed a 16inch  reflector given by the Japanese.

A picture of me receiving the first-prize.

UP NISMED Auditorium

IYA 2009 National Olympiad banner

Sir Jun giving a lecture on the equatorial mount

sir Bamm and sir Jun