View from Denver, Colorado at midnight on 2009 February 28. Pointer marks Epsilon Aurigae.
Epsilon Aurigae excitement builds as the next minimum of this mysterious stellar system nears (August 2009). The German astrophysicist Hans Ludendorff (1873-1941) brought epsilon Aurigae to the attention of the world astronomical community early in the 20th century, with the publication of two seminal papers that characterized the eclipses of 1847-48, 1874-75, and 1901-02.
But Ludendorff's papers apparently had never been translated into English. Therefore, to assist in the work of the Epsilon Aurigae Eclipse Campaign 2009-2011, I have translated from German to English Ludendorff's two main papers on epsilon Aurigae,
"Untersuchungen ueber den Lichtwechsel von epsilon Aurigae," Astronomische Nachrichten (A.N.), Vol. 164, pp. 81-114 (1904), and
"Bearbeitung der Schmidtschen Beobachtungen des Veraenderlichen epsilon Aurigae," A.N., Vol. 192, pp. 389-406 (1912).
My English translations, and the original articles in German, are now available for downloading from Jeff Hopkins's HPOSoft website, at http://www.hposoft.com/EAur09/EAurPEPRef.html.
(Look under the heading, "Conversions of Ludendorff's 1904 and 1912 publications from German to English by Roger Mansfield of Astronomical Data Service".)
For further information about the Epsilon Aurigae Eclipse Campaign 2009-2011, click on Dr. Robert E. Stencel's Epsilon Aurigae Eclipse Campaign Homepage at http://mysite.du.edu/~rstencel/epsaur.htm.
And be sure to read Dr. Stencel's feature article, "The Very Long Mystery of Epsilon Aurigae," beginning on p. 58 in the May 2009 issue of Sky & Telescope!
Predicting Iridium Flares is a webpage that predicted the Iridium flares visible from Boulder, Colorado U.S.A. during the period Sunday, April 27 through Saturday, May 3, 2008.
This webpage page was prepared for use by attendees at the Division on Dynamical Astronomy (DDA) 2008 Meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS), April 28 - May 1, as hosted by the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), 1050 Walnut Street, Suite 300, Boulder, Colorado 80302.
The webpage was provided as a supplement to my DDA 2008 poster presentation, "Predicting Iridium Flares." Click on http://home.att.net/~sky_watcher/ to see the Iridium flare predictions that were made for the DDA meeting. (A concise, half-page, printed summary flyer was also distributed to attendees at the DDA meeting, via the registration desk.)
For more information about the DDA 2008 meeting, click on http://dda.harvard.edu/.
To see the followup article, "Predicting Iridium Flares," which was published in the May 2008 issue of PTC Express, monthly newsletter of Parametric Technology Corporation, click on http://www.ima kenews.com/ptcexpress/e_article001094851.cfm?x=bcG4481,b3jsqcsB,w.
Mathcad Worksheets by Astroger describes twelve Mathcad worksheets available for downloading from Mathsoft's website. These worksheets implement key algorithms in dynamical astronomy and astrodynamics. Go to http://home.att.net/~astroger/.
Topics in Astrodynamics describes my astrodynamics textbook of the same name, and provides resources toward using the book to teach a two-semester course sequence, Astrodynamics I and Astrodynamics II. Go to http://home.att.net/~astrotopics/.
Orbital Mechanics with Mathcad lists the lesson plan topics for my five-day, eight-hours-per-day course for space professionals in Colorado Springs*. For further information go to http://home.att.net/~astrocourse/.
*Other venues besides Colorado Springs are possible. Inquire at the e-mail address at the end of the astrocourse webpage.
Space Ornithology is a webpage that documents my contributions to artificial Earth satellite observation as regards (a) writing and publishing the Space Birds computer program in 1987, and (b) coining the term space ornithology as the study of the space bird population (satellites in low-Earth orbit visible with the naked eye), and (c) publishing sixteen quarterly issues of the Space Ornithology Newsletter during 1988-1991. Go to http://www.spaceornithology.com.
In the decade after the launch of Sputnik I, the U.S. Air Force took great strides in space technology under the leadership of military space pioneers such as General Bernard A. Schriever. New career fields opened up for satellite controllers and for orbital analysts. Professional space training for these new space career fields was set up at Keesler Air Force Base, Mississippi.
I attended two courses as a part of this new "Cold War" professional space training: the three-week Space Operations Officer Course and the eight-week Orbital Analyst Course. My fire for orbital mechanics was kindled at the first course and intensified at the second. In my post-service career, I actively and successfully sought opportunities to do orbital mechanics for a living, and to teach orbital mechanics (i.e., astrodynamics) as well.
Much of the orbital mechanics that I was doing applies to natural celestial bodies and space probes as well as to artificial Earth satellites. And so my interests began to encompass dynamical astronomy as well as astrodynamics. These Astroger Webpages are thus devoted to both fields.
*Astroger is the union of the letters in "Astro" and the letters of my first name, "roger". Astroger is pronounced "Astro-jer" (soft "g"). It is actually a word, perhaps a contraction of "astrologer." I take "astroger" not to mean an astrologer, but rather "one who calculates trajectories using the principles of orbital mechanics."
(c) 2009 by Astronomical Data Service. Last updated 2009 May 25.
E-mail: astroger@att.net
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