- The Astronomy Channel is a new concept in educating and inspiring our youth and the general public about the science of astronomy using a high-technology mobile observatory.
- The Astronomy Channel consists primarily of a high-quality 3" to 14" amateur grade telescope coupled to the latest technology in low-light surveillance video cameras (Adirondack Video Astronomy’s Stellacam II) and recent technology in LCD monitors, computers, software, DVD’s, and portable sound equipment to produce an environment capable of capturing its audience and educating many people at once.
- The Astronomy Channel is capable of showing objects that are a conservative estimate of ~16X dimmer than the human eye can see through a telescope using eyepieces. The system provides amazing views of objects outside our solar system such as star clusters, nebulae, and many galaxies. This makes the 14" telescope equivalent to nearly a 60" diameter telescope using eyepieces, but The Astronomy Channel is far more than simply a telescope and a monitor.
- The Astronomy Channel difference is a custom-prepared 2+ gigabyte PowerPoint package involving hundreds of man hours of development time that answers the most common questions asked by the public through the use of animations, videos, images, and text from such agencies as NASA and the Space Telescope Science Institute.
- The Astronomy Channel is capable of operating in a split screen mode with (2) 21" monitors. The near real-time telescope image is displayed on the right screen while simultaneously displaying a PowerPoint presentation on the left screen that teaches about the object displayed on the right screen!
- The Astronomy Channel also makes use of other astronomy-related software packages.
- The Astronomy Channel works especially well in comparison to other portable telescopes when the system is used in the vicinity of bright lights or under nominal urban and suburban light-polluted conditions.
- The Astronomy Channel is fully self-contained with its own power supply and is capable of operating for up to six hours at nearly any location that is minivan accessible.
- In addition to astronomy, the pubic is also given detailed answers on many aspects of manned-space projects, physics, and engineering.
|
