Category Archives: Science

Soaring in Kentucky in 2019

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There were two bald eagles soaring over the Ohio River in Louisville, Kentucky one Saturday this past October.  My wife and I saw them while we were taking a walk on a brisk, fall day.  They were wheeling far overhead in a perfect azure sky.  It was October 12.  The eagles were not soaring over some remote part of the Ohio River—they were on the river where it passes right between the downtowns of Louisville on one side, and Jeffersonville, Indiana on the other.  Below the eagles were bridges, boats, cars, buildings, parks, and lots of people out enjoying the day. The first time I ever saw a bald eagle in the wild was also on the Ohio River.  This was in the early 2000s, when my family was exploring a remote area west of Leavenworth, Indiana.  Then, a few years later, when my college’s observatory was located in Otter Creek Park, on the river well south-east of Louisville, everyone … Continue reading →

Bones in Space – Solarblack

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Solar Orbiter In February 2020 an Irish company will showcase to the world its innovative use of burnt bone charcoal. ENBIO has developed a use for charred bone with its unique product Solarblack. This product will bring heatshields for spacecraft to another level. ESA’s Solar Orbiter is due to launch on February 5th. Bones in space – Solarblack high technology for the next decade. Solarblack The application of Solarblack to heatshields is for the thermal protection of spacecraft working in the harsh environs of space. Yes, the Solar Orbiter space probe will soon be on its way to study the sun. Its duty is to  inform us more fully about the origins of spaceweather. The mission will  to being a  manmade probe closer to our star than ever  before. The word Solarblack suggest bright and dark. The brightest thing you can think of i.e. the Sun and the darkest colour of all, pure black. This product is a Thermo optical … Continue reading →

Goodnight to the Lake of Death

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This entry is part 15 of 16 in the series Lunarcy

Often I show image covering from Aristoteles to Hercules in sunrise. But here I want to zoom in on a small area of that region this time at sunset. Just above center in this image is the crater Burg (41km dia.) in the center of the rough hexagon of Lacus Mortis (155km). The detail in the eastern wall of Burg is nicely displayed here along with several of the diverse rimae on the floor of this Lacus. Below Burg are two wonderful craters, the flat floored Mason (44km) on the right and Plana (46km) with the little central peak to the left. That central peak, with the 3km impact crater on the south side, is only the tip of what was once a much larger mountain but for the lava flooding of this crater that filled up the interior. The only feature on the floor of this crater seen here is a small (2.5km dia.) crater at the tip of … Continue reading →

Religious Scientists: Sr. Mary Kenneth Keller B.V.M. (1913-1985) – Computer Science

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This entry is part 11 of 11 in the series Religious Scientists of the Catholic Church

When I was little, my dad bought an Apple II+ computer.  Every Christmas, my uncle would send us a pack of computer games on 5.25-inch floppy disks. We spent countless hours playing those games on its primitive green pixelated screen.  It was fun to play games made by somebody else, but even better was when I learned to make the computer do what I wanted it to do, with a little programming.  I learned a very simple computer language called Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code, or BASIC.  With it, I made my own games, limited only by my imagination and skill.  For the freedom that programming in BASIC gave me, I have to thank a nun: Sr. Mary Kenneth Keller. Biographical Sketch: She was born Evelyn Marie Keller on Dec 17, 1913 (different sources disagree on this date) in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1932, she joined the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, where she took the name Mary … Continue reading →

Blaise Pascal: to God through Math

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There is something whose existence is known to many, but that is infinite, and thus ultimately unknowable.  In the words of one person who has studied this thing extensively, exploring it is similar to exploring the universe.  We can learn more and more about it, and yet, because it is infinite, what we learn amounts to nothing in comparison to what there is to learn. The thing I am talking about here is pi (π): the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter, as in C = πD.  The mathematician David Chudnovsky, who developed algorithms for calculating pi to billions of digits, made the comparison between it and the universe. Mathematics is a form of knowledge that is terribly undervalued today.  Try saying something really favorable about mathematics to a group of people.  See what reaction you get.  Even highly-educated people feel free to talk about how they do not like math or are not good at … Continue reading →

Specola Guestbook: Dec 1, 1911 – Charles G. Abbot

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This entry is part 25 of 29 in the series Specola Guestbook

Since its founding in 1891, many people have passed through the doors of the Vatican Observatory.  A quick perusal of our guestbook reveals several Names, including Popes, nobel laureates, astronauts, actors, and saints. Today’s guestbook entry is from the first of December, 1911, when Charles G. Abbot made a visit. Next to his name, Charles Greeley Abbot (1872-1973) wrote, “Director Astrophysical Observatory, Washington D.C.” At the time of his visit, he was director of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO). He was the observatory’s second director, succeeding its founder Samuel Pierpont Langley in 1907. In 1928 he would become the fifth Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, but also remained director of the SAO until his retirement in 1944. While director of the SAO, Abbot oversaw the construction of an observatory facility atop Mount Whitney, in California.  His research focused mostly on the Sun and solar radiation.  He participated in several eclipse expeditions.  He carefully measured the quantity and character of solar … Continue reading →

Across the Universe: Christmas Presence

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This entry is part 51 of 190 in the series Across the Universe

This column was first published in The Tablet in December, 2007) We first published it here in 2015. Job is not a book most people think of for the Christmas season. But there’s an echo of the angels’ Christmas song to the shepherds when God asks Job (in Chapter 38, verse 7) if any human can claim to have been around at the moment of creation, that time “when the morning stars sang together, and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy.” The song of the morning stars is poetry of the highest order. Kepler referred to the motions of the planets among those stars as “the music of the spheres.” In one of my favorite childhood novels, A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L’Engle (who, sadly, died this past year [2007]), her young hero actually encounters, in person, the singing spirits of stars. The image reminds us that in its essence, creation is a source of joy; and a lot of fun. … Continue reading →

Religious Scientists: Fr. Roger Boscovich S.J., F.R.S. (1711-1787) – Atomic Theory

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This entry is part 10 of 11 in the series Religious Scientists of the Catholic Church

Fr. Roger Joseph Boscovich S.J. was one of the last great polymaths. His areas of study and work include physics, mathematics, atomic theory, celestial mechanics, geodesy, philosophy, theology, architecture, poetry, and more. Biographical Sketch Ruđer Josip Bošković was born May 18, 1711 to a merchant family in Dubrovnik, in what is today Croatia.  He attended the Jesuit school in Dubrovnik. In 1725, he traveled to Rome to study at the Roman College, and in 1731 entered the Jesuit order. He was ordained a priest in 1744. He showed aptitude for mathematics and the natural sciences, and from 1740-1759 served as a professor of mathematics at the Roman College.  It is during this time that he made many of his more significant scientific contributions.  In 1742, Pope Benedict XIV requested Boscovich’s input on a little problem. The dome of St. Peter’s Basilica was developing cracks.  Boscovich recommended securing the dome with iron bands, which was then implemented successfully. This led him … Continue reading →

Smart Phones from Eels

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Have you used electrical technology today?  Something with a battery?  Something that sent information over wires?  Or wirelessly?  You surely used a smart phone, or the internet, or something plugged in to a wall outlet.  Perhaps you just listened to the radio. Where did this technology come from? The electric battery, so important to so many devices, started it all.  Alessandro Volta created the first one around the year 1800.  Studying electric eels led him to the principles of battery construction.  Volta’s battery (and yes, the term “voltage” comes from his name) was the first good way to generate a steady flow of electricity.  With it, electrical technology took off.  With batteries, people could communicate rapidly, by sending electrical signals over wires.  The telegraph was the start of that; now we have the internet.  We have electric cars, thanks to improvements both in batteries and in the electric motors that move those cars.  Michael Faraday’s discovery that electricity and magnetism … Continue reading →

Specola Guestbook: Dec 13, 1910 – Maurycy Rudzki

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This entry is part 20 of 29 in the series Specola Guestbook

Since its founding in 1891, many people have passed through the doors of the Vatican Observatory.  A quick perusal of our guestbook reveals several Names, including Popes, nobel laureates, astronauts, actors, and saints. Today’s guestbook entry is from December 13, 1910, when Maurycy Rudzki made a visit. Next to his name, Maurycy Pius Rudzki (1862-1916) wrote, “k.k. Sternwarte Krakau” (The Royal Observatory of Krakow). [n.b. Moritz is a variation of Maurycy] Rudzki was a geophysicist who directed the department of geophysics and meteorology at Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. He was the first person to be formally called a professor of geophysics. He established the first seismological observatory in Krakow, and in 1904 started the bulletin, Resultate der meteorologischen, seismologischen und magnetischen Beobachtungen an der k.k. Sternwarte in Krakau. His research included seismology, oceanography, meteorology, and cartography.  In geophysics, his research focused on elastic anisotropy as it pertained to the propagation of seismic waves.     … Continue reading →

Religious Scientists: Sr. Miriam Michael Stimson O.P. (1913-2002); Structure of DNA

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This entry is part 9 of 11 in the series Religious Scientists of the Catholic Church

In 1962, Francis Crick, James Watson, and Maurice Wilkins received the Nobel Prize for discovering the double-helix structure of the DNA molecule.  This work could not have been done without the discoveries of numerous other scientists, many of whose contributions have gone unrecognized. One such unsung hero in the quest for the building blocks of life was a Catholic nun at a humble Michigan university: Sr. Miriam Michael Stimson, O.P. Biographical Sketch: Marian Emma Stimson was born into a devout Catholic family in Chicago on December 14, 1913. She attended Sienna Heights College in Adrian, Michigan. In 1935, she joined the Adrian Dominican Sisters, taking the name Miriam Michael. She received a B.S. in Chemistry from Siena Heights College in 1936. She continued her studies at the Institutum Divi Thomae in Cincinnatti, where she received her M.S. in 1939. She then joined the chemistry faculty at Siena Heights College, simultaneously working toward her Ph.D. at Institutum Divi Thomae, which she … Continue reading →

Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau – Google Doodle Scientist

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There is a new “Google Doodle” for a scientist today—Joseph Antoine Ferdinand Plateau.  You have probably seen it.  Google states that his work “led to the birth of cinema”.  Well, guess what?  According to an old edition of the Catholic Encyclopedia, Plateau was “a sincere Christian, faithful to all the duties of a practical Catholic”. If you are interested in his work, the journal Physics in Perspective published an article on him in 2012: “The Life and Work of Joseph Plateau: Father of Film and Discoverer of Surface Tension”.  Click here for an excerpt.  Click here to get the entire article from Physics in Perspective.  The entire article is also freely available via EBSCO, through many public and academic libraries. Plateau was born in 1801 and died in 1883.  According to Physics in Perspective, “Plateau dedicated himself passionately to the study of … soap membranes until 1844, when he gradually became blind.”  Thus for much of his career Plateau could … Continue reading →