Pinwheel Galaxy photos to be shown at Purdue, Jefferson H.S.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Purdue's College of Education will celebrate the International Year of Astronomy on Tuesday (Feb. 17) at the Lafayette Jefferson High School's planetarium with an unveiling of two mural-sized images of the well-known spiral galaxy Messier 101.
The images of the galaxy, also known as Pinwheel Galaxy, are from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, Spitzer Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory.
(Media-Newswire.com) - WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Purdue's College of Education will celebrate the International Year of Astronomy on Tuesday ( Feb. 17 ) at the Lafayette Jefferson High School's planetarium with an unveiling of two mural-sized images of the well-known spiral galaxy Messier 101. The images of the galaxy, also known as Pinwheel Galaxy, are from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, Spitzer Space Telescope and Chandra X-ray Observatory.
These images will be added to the College's current collection of five large, limited edition Hubble photos already on display in Beering Hall.
The current collection was donated to the College of Education by 1968 graduate Margaretha ( Peggy ) Motes McBride, a former teacher and director of the Muncie Community Schools Planetarium. Her connections with NASA and Hubble enabled the College of Education to obtain the additional prints.
After the initial event at Jefferson, the new images will be permanently hung with the current collection at Beering Hall.
As part of the celebration, Courtney McManus, a junior in aeronautical and astronautical engineering and co-op employee at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, will provide an educational presentation for Jefferson astronomy students.
"Since this is the International Year of Astronomy celebrating 400 years of the use of telescopes to view the skies, I'm really excited that my students and I get to see Hubble Space Telescope images up close and in print," said Bill Huston, planetarium director and science teacher at Jefferson. "Most high school science students are aware of the Hubble Space Telescope, but viewing the images on a computer screen doesn't really show them all the detail that comes from this great telescope.
"Having the opportunity to view the galaxy up close and in person is very special. I can say that we all are excited to get a chance to really see some fine detail of the sky."
The International Year of Astronomy 2009 celebrates the 400th anniversary of Galileo first turning a telescope to the heavens. From Galileo's first spyglass, telescopes have grown ever larger and better, and have moved to mountaintops and to space. NASA's observatories represent astronomy's achievements over four centuries.
One 6-foot-by-3-foot image shows three full-color photos that showcase the galaxy's features in the infrared light observed by Spitzer, the visible light observed by Hubble, and the X-ray light observed by Chandra.
The images show the details of the spiral structure for which the galaxy is famous and the underlying giant clouds where stars are born, as well as the hidden locations of black holes and exploded stars.
This story was released on 2009-02-17. Please make sure to visit the official company or organization web site to learn more about the original release date. See our disclaimer for additional information.