meet the astronomers!

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Meet the Astronomers!

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Meet the Astronomers!. This picture was made using time lapse photography. It shows the apparent motion of the stars around Polaris over the course of the night. But the stars are not really moving! It is the earth that is rotating!. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Page 1: Meet the Astronomers!

Meet the Astronomers!

Page 2: Meet the Astronomers!

This picture was made using time lapse photography. It shows the apparent motion of the stars around Polaris over the course of the night. But the stars are not really moving! It is the earth that is rotating!

This picture was taken fairly close to the Equator. How can you tell??

Page 3: Meet the Astronomers!

It also looks to us like the sun is revolving around the earth.

Page 4: Meet the Astronomers!

It’s not surprising that for thousands of years, people believed the earth to be the center of the universe.

Page 5: Meet the Astronomers!

You can do a demonstration with an umbrella. If you are spinning the umbrella above you, or if you yourself are spinning beneath a stationary umbrella, it will look the same!

Page 6: Meet the Astronomers!

It wasn’t until people began to apply MATHEMATICS to the problem that the real picture started to become clearer.

As technology advanced and people started looking through telescopes, they gathered more and more evidence showing that the earth is NOT the center of the universe.

We now know that the sun is the center of the solar system, and that the solar system is just one tiny place in the vast universe.

Let’s meet some of the astronomers from history to get an idea of how this happened…

Page 7: Meet the Astronomers!

Developed the Geocentric Model of the (Earth at the center)Universe, adhered to for over 1500 years.

Ptolemy Ancient Greece

"geo" = Earth

("tall uh me") 127 - 145

He devised complex loop-de-loops that explained the “wandering” motion of the planets against the more uniform apparent motions of the stars.

Page 8: Meet the Astronomers!

Nicolaus CopernicusPoland1473 - 1543Developed the Heliocentric Model of the Solar System, at first very controversial. The sun was correctly placed in the center of the solar system, but Copernicus mistakenly thought planetary orbits were perfect circles.

"Helio" = sun

Page 9: Meet the Astronomers!
Page 10: Meet the Astronomers!

Italy1564- 1642One of the first to explore the skies with a telescope. Found evidence that supported the heliocentric viewpoint. Was forced by the Church to say he was wrong, then was placed under house arrest for the last ten years of his life.

Galileo Galilei

moons of Jupiter phases of Venus

Page 11: Meet the Astronomers!

Tycho BraheDenmark1546 - 1601Developed his own (incorrect) model of the Solar System, but is important for his 20 years of extremely accurate and preciseastronomical observations.

Page 12: Meet the Astronomers!

Johannes KeplerGermany1571 - 1630Brahe's assistant; Kepler used Brahe's precise observations to formulate his Three Laws of Planetary Motion.

Page 13: Meet the Astronomers!

KEPLER'S LAWS OF PLANETARY MOTION

1. Planetary orbits are elliptical, not perfect circles.

2. When closer to the sun in its orbit, a planet will move faster than when it is farther.

3. Planets which orbit closer to the sun travel faster than planets orbiting farther from the sun.