Tag Archives: Stars

Podcast #38: Dr Pieter Kotzé at ScopeX 2018

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Welcome to episode 38 of the Urban Astronomer Podcast. This episode features the last part of our physics feature on the lifecycle of a star from dust cloud to super nova, and the 3rd of the ScopeX 2018 public lectures. Physics Over the past few episodes we’ve been trying to understand how a random cloud of dust and gas can turn into a supernova. In this segment, we finally get to witness our supernova, but that’s just brought up more … Continue reading →

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Podcast #30: Stellar Evolution and Nuclear Fusion

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Welcome to episode 30 of the Urban Astronomer Podcast. This week’s episode features the 2nd part of our look at how stellar evolution can lead to a supernova explosion, inspired by listener requests to present more serious science and physics explainers. Last time we looked at the formation of a stellar nursery, so today we look inside that nursery at the birth of a new star. For fans of the interviews with people who have some connection to astronomy in South … Continue reading →

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Why can’t you see any stars on the moon?

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Ah, but you can if you wait till night time!  You can’ t see any stars in photographs taken from the Apollo missions because they were all taken in broad daylight.  As any photographer will tell you, a camera can only cope with a narrow range of brightnesses, so that the aperture setting and shutter speed are very important if a photograph is not to be over- or under-exposed for given lighting conditions.  In this age of automatic point-and-click digital … Continue reading →