Mastodawn

I have a bit of time on my hands, so let's do another 24h round of #AskAnAstrophysicist, but this time it's a thematic one.

⭐ What do you want to ask an astrophysicist about stars? ⭐

(I am a professional astrophysicist, part of whose work concerns itself with high mass stars & their winds and I've also taught a variety of astro university courses)

Boosts welcome. I may not be able to reply to all in case of many questions.

#SciComm #WissKomm

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Quixoticgeek May 13

@vicgrinberg what does the night sky look like from space ? Getting above the atmosphere, with the naked eye how would it appear? Is the milky way still distinct ? All the photos I see tend to include earth.

#AskAnAstrophysicist

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Dr. Victoria Grinberg May 13

@quixoticgeek it's going to be pretty much the same - the stars are very far away and our atmosphere very thin, so get to outside of it does not change much in what we see. What we get rid off are the effect of the atmosphere - the twinkling is because of atmospheric effects (similar effect to warm air above a hot street), the stars themselves don't twinkle! So the view is in a way clearer.

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Richard Paul 6d ago

@vicgrinberg @quixoticgeek I had the honor of having this explained to me for the first time by Dr. Nancy Grace Roman. And we were standing in front of the Hubble Space Telescope when she did it!

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Dr. Victoria Grinberg

@Spacehistory @quixoticgeek oh wow 😍😍😍

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Richard Paul 6d ago

@vicgrinberg @quixoticgeek There was nothing more fun than watching Dr. Roman muscle her way through the National Air And Space Museum in time to catch a bus. Just this tiny, little 90 year-old woman zipping past 7000 tourists to get where she was going.

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Richard Paul 6d ago

@vicgrinberg @quixoticgeek Also fun was watching all of the young astrophysics Ph.D. candidates who were working as docents for the summer, running up to her and offering to walk her to the ladies room. She was like Mick Jagger in that museum!