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Astronomy

What is astronomy? Astronomy is the study of objects like planets, stars and groups of stars. It is about studying how natural objects in space, move and what they are made of. Overall it is the study of space and the natural objects that are usually outside the Earth's atmosphere.   It typically includes the study of objects such as: Planets Stars more types of astronomy...

The word "astronomy" comes from the Greek "aster" meaning star and the suffix "_nomy" meaning "laws of" the Greek word Nomos means law. Did you know... that another word for Astronomy is "Uranology" from the Greek goddess Urania who was one of the muses of astronomy. image: Bologna University Library

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Why is astronomy important? Astronomy has value in three important ways: It has a cultural, technological and scientific value. Culturally astronomy is important in terms of how it influences the human creativity. The objects of the study of astronomy have been used to inspire poetry, music and mythology and more recently books and movies.

Applications of astronomy The technology of astronomy is probably the thing we think of first when thinking astronomy, the technology of astronomy is about the tools and techniques for studying the stars and planets. Astronomy helps to inspire more sophisticated pieces of optical equipment. for example the development of digital cameras may have relied on a developing more sensitive cameras for telescopes.   Astronomy is also important in simply understanding where we are placed in the universe. Dealing with such questions such as where we came from and how we got here. Astronomy provides us with theories on how planets, galaxies and the universe has been and where it is going. It is about making predictions from observation.

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News about Astronomy. Search Google News for astronomy Many reports that arrive in the news are about extreme things: some of the most distant objects in the universe. the most extreme conditions on stars or planets the largest stars exploding. black holes being discovered. new discoveries, unusual objects. Astronomy news often is about pioneering efforts and collaborations with other countries. It also focuses on new astronomical tools and space craft. Astronomy stories available at Nature & Science News ClearlyExplained.Com

recent astronomy research is typically conducted at universities or instutes such as: ANU research school of astronomy and astrophysics Harvard Univeristy Department of Astronomy Oxford University Astrophysics Institute of Astronomy - Cambridge

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How astronomy is studied or classified Astronomy is one of the easiest practical sciences to start investigating. It requires only your eyes looking into the night sky. Astronomy now can be studied in some very specific ways: astrobiology - is concerned with how life or principles of life or elements that might relate to outside of earth. astrochemistry - is about studying the chemical reactions and molecules that make up celestial objects astrophysics - is concerned often about the basic physics of the movement of whole astronomical objects like planets or stars but also at the processes that make stars work eg solar physics. astrogeology - is mainly concerned with the geology of other planets. for example comparing earth geology with mars geology   A major tool in astronomy are the space craft sent into space as either space telescopes or actual robots that land on other planets. image credit: NASA/JPL Cassini space probe at saturn

Astronomy is done mostly by focusing and collecting tiny amounts of light coming from vast distances using a telescope. Often astronomy uses light that cannot be seen with our normal eyes. For example infrared , UV, X-rays and radio waves. radio telescopes image credit: NASA More recently astronomy has been trying to detect gravity waves that are produced by very massive objects such as black holes or large stars. Another very important tool in astronomy is plain old mathematics and with it computers to deal with the huge amount of data that is collected.

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What is the history of astronomy? The history of astronomy is indeed very long. What do we mean by the history of astronomy? Usually it is about the peoples and cultures of the past that first investigated the movement of the stars. It is about the personalities or the cultures that made some of the first observation. A useful timeline of astronomical events throughout history from Physical Sciences Information Gateway. some highlights include: -4800 BC Astronomical calendar stones near the Egypt-Sudan border. 1543 AD Copernicus produces his great publication "De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium" 1995 Jupiter visited by Galileo space probe more...

The history of astronomy deals with the changes of the way cultures think about our place in the universe. For example the idea of the earth being the centre of the solar system ( geocentric) A useful overview of the history of models of the solar system for example can be found at Purdue University Physics Department. Also of astronomical interest is something called Archaeoastronomy. This is a special type of history of astronomy that considers more of the archaeolgical evidence of astronomical societies and cultures.

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The future of astronomy? Astronomy is likely to continue well into the future. In a sense the future lies out ther ein the stars. Telescopes and instruments will continue to improve in sensitivity in the coming years. More discoveries will be made, new theories will be developed to try and explain how the universe works. For example the latest Space telescope the James Webb Space Telescope is likely to provide even more discoveries about the nature of the universe.

One of the major issues in astronomy is figuring out exactly what dark matter is, astronomers claim that close to 90% of the universe is made of this mysterious material. The most likely candidates seem to be particles, but which ones is the key question.

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