Quote:
Originally Posted by Suzy
That looks an interesting book Gary, thank you for posting. One of those famous radio sources would have to be the pulsar in the crab nebula. When they first came across this strange signal they didn't know what to make of it (ET calling home perhaps - must have crossed their minds), and then they finally worked out what it was. We rely on it heavily don't we!
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Hi Suzy,
Jocelyn Bell Burnell, who made that discovery in the Crab Nebula in 1967,
originally nicknamed the source LGM-1 which stood for "Little Green Men 1".
As has been pointed out in this post -
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...66&postcount=6
Bell Burnell will be giving a free public lecture in Melbourne this coming
December.
She will then be back in Adelaide on July 19 2011 where I note she will
be one of two keynote speakers at the 15th International Conference for
Women Engineers and Scientists.
Alas I don't see Brisbane on her schedule, as obviously it would be a wonderful
opportunity to meet this famous astrophysicist.
Australia, of course, has a long association with radioastronomy.
In the west of Sydney, a place called Badgery's Creek was the home of the
Fleurs field station where in 1954 the Mills Cross Telescope was built by
CSIRO and eventually operated by the School of Elec Eng at Sydney Uni to
look at radio sources. A succession of other radiotelescope arrays were
built there.
See
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/news/newsle..._of_Fleurs.htm
See
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mills_Cross_Telescope
One of the dishes that was used at Fleurs is now up near "The House" at the
Astronomical Society of New South Wales own dark sky property called
Wiruna which is near the tiny town of Ilford.
See
http://www.asnsw.com/wiruna/rt.asp
If you ever get an opportunity to travel down to Narrabri in the central
north of NSW, I wholeheartedly recommend a visit to the state-of-the-art
Australia Telescope Compact Array which is an incredibly impressive
facility staffed and used by some of the best and brightest minds in the
country.
Best Regards
Gary