A Night Watchman's Journey:  My Adventures as a Comet Discoverer and Sky Watcher.

David H. Levy, internationally renowned Canadian astronomer and science writer is famous for his co-discovery in 1993 of the Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, which collided with the planet Jupiter in 1994. Levy has discovered 22 comets, and written over 34 books. The asteroid (3673) Levy was named in his honour.

Ontario Science Centre, Wednesday June 5 at 7:30 pm
doors open at 6:30 pm
Imperial Oil Auditorium
Refreshments, astrophoto display of comets, RASC booth, and astronomy demos in the Great Hall
RASC Recreational Astronomy Meetings are held in the Imperial Oil Auditorium at the Ontario Science Centre. Free admission & parking after 6:00 PM.

Rachel Ward-Maxwell, PhD candidate, McMaster University

Breaking the Law: Re-interpreting the Structure and Dynamics of Molecular Clouds

Talk by Rachel Ward-Maxwell, PhD candidate, McMaster University

Giant molecular clouds are the birthplace of stars; however, the true nature of these clouds remains a great mystery.  The first step towards achieving a greater understanding of star formation is exploring the structure and evolution of the clouds in which they form.  Using simulations of molecular clouds, we are able to reproduce the results of recent observations and demonstrate that the scaling relations commonly used to describe the structure of all molecular clouds hold only for special cases.  We show that turbulent, transient, globally unbound structures are capable of forming stars, despite common assumptions to the contrary, thus having implications for several major unanswered questions in star formation.  Talk by Rachel Ward-Maxwell, PhD candidate, McMaster University

RASC Speaker's Nights are held in the Imperial Oil Auditorium at the Ontario Science Centre. Free admission & parking after 6:00 PM.

Blake Nancarrow delivered a presentation during the 10 April 2013 Recreational Astronomy Night meeting encouraging RASC Toronto Centre members to visit this CAO this summer. The slide deck and flyer are available for downloading.

The month of May surely means good skies are around the corner. We'll be about to take advantage, at last.

And get out the binoculars!

Look from two comets in the late evening or early morning, C/2012 F6 (Lemmon), and C/2011 L4 (Pan-STARRS). Enjoy the final looks at Jupiter; but Saturn all night long. Try for a very young Moon near Venus and Jupiter on 10 and 11 May. View or image the great conjunction of Mercury, Venus, and Jupiter 25 through 27 May. Turn the telescope to Canes Venatici, Ursa Major, Coma Berenices, Corvus, Virgo, Leo. Challenge targets lie low in Centaurus, Lupus, and Hydra. Watch Col. Hadfield land on 13 May.