Links to Other Sites of Interest

Humanity and Space Science:

  • Ancient Astronomy
  • Space Weather Center
  • Hubble Space Telescope
  • From Stargazers to Starships
  • Spacecraft
  • Space Images

Education

The Solar System:

  • The Sun
  • Aurorae
  • The Inner Planets
  • The Asteroid Belt
  • The Outer Planets
  • Radioastronomy
  • Near Earth Object Impacts

Other Planetary Systems:

  • Exatrasolar Planet Search
  • Pulsar Planets
  • Search for Habitable Planets

The Milky Way Galaxy:

  • Planets around other stars
  • The Interstellar Medium
  • Cyber Space
  • Webstars

The Universe:

  • Black Holes
  • Amazing Space
  • Cosmic Mystery Tour

Life in the Universe:

  • NASA Astrobiology
  • SETI Institute
  • Federation of American Scientists
  • Space Colonization?

NASA Space Science Themes:

  • Origins
  • Structure and Evolution of the Universe
  • Exploration of the Solar System
  • Sun-Earth Connections

Dr. Möbius' Research Interests:

  • Space Physics Homepage
  • Experimental Space Plasma Group
  • Cosmic and Heliospheric Learning Center

Sites of Local Interest

  • NH Astronomical Society
  • Christa McAuliffe Planetarium

Humanity and Space Science:

Ancient Astronomy: Humanity's observations and attempts to relate such reports to possible events in the sky. One famous example is the attempt to track down which event was related to the Star of Bethlehem. There are two more sites talking about the Wise Men and the Star of Christ and being open to several interpretations: the "Stars" of Bethlehem.

From Stargazers to Starships: A nice presentation on Astronomy from early times to spaceflight can be found on this site.

The Stonehenge rock circle has most likely been an ancient observatory. After the reunification of Germany airial photography has opened up the eastern part of Germany to new archeological surveys. Circles much older (≈ 3000 years) than Stonehenge have been found, which are thought to be similar observatories. See the recent article in National Geographic.

Hubble Space Telescope: The wonders of far-away objects are brought to us through HST Images by Subject (Pictures from Hubble Space Telescope). The observations range from planets, to many starsystems, to black holes and galaxies. There is also a page with all News Items on Hubble findings.

Want to see satellites in the sky? There are several websites that provide you with satellite visibility predictions, for example the NASA Satellite Overpass Predictor or Heavens Above. The International Space Station can bea very prominent object in the sky.

Space Weather Center: With more information on the Sun and on the Earth's environment we move moved into a position to track Space Weather. The Space Weather Center at NOAA is improving the tools towards a moderate forecast in the near future. A key region that needs to be understood for this endeavor is the Earth's Magnetosphere. For the insurance industry's take on space weather and how it can impact the earth, visit the Swiss Space Weather site.

Spacecraft: Currently various spacecraft are checking out objects in our solar system:

Current and possible future projects that Professor Möbius is involved with are:

Space Images:

Education

Exploration in Education: Download electronic picture books, tutorials, and reports on space science topics. A program of the Special Studies Office at the Space Telescope Science Institute.

Thursday's Classroom: A "connection between NASA's latest research and the classroom environment" Includes information and lesson plans on NASA projects and research topics.

A Tutorial in Radioastronomy can be found at the Haystack Observatory.

Interested in a Planetarium visit? Check out what is up at the Christa McAuliffe Planetarium.

The Solar System

The Whole Nine Planets: The Nine Planets Website by the Lunar and Planetary Institute of the University of Arizona is a comprehensive introduction to our solar system.

The Sun: Taking its place at the center of our solar system, the sun makes life on Earth possible in many more ways than one.

Aurorae: Related to the Sun's Activity is the Aurora Display in the Earth's polar regions

The Inner Planets:

Asteroids, Comets and Meteorites:

If you want to learn about Meteors, Meteoriods and Meteorites as well as some other features in the Solar System, check out the Meteor Web Site of the Hawaian Observatory.
Meteorites hitting the moon produce visible explosions. NASA plans to have a software for amateurs available soon.

The Outer Planets:

Fun Project: Make icosohedral (20-sided) models of the Sun, Venus, Earth, our Moon, Mars, Jupiter, Ganymede, and Callista by printing out the JPEGs on this page from the Views of the Solar System site!

Radioastronomy:

Near Earth Object Impacts:

Planetary Systems Around Other Stars

The Nine Planets Website by the Lunar and Planetary Institute of the University of Arizona also features an extensive collection of links to sites with information on extrasolar planets.

Follow the search for regular planets around other stars. More than 100 planets have been identified (up to 2003) and counting!
The Astronomical Society of the Pacific has compiled a nice tutorial about extrasolar planets.

This search was started by the observation that planets orbit even a pulsar. On this subject there is a special Pulsar planets homepage.

Both NASA and ESA work on space missions to detect habitable planets around stars in the cosmic neigborhood.
• NASA has the Discovery class mission Kepler
• ESA works on the large scale mission Darwin.

The Milky Way Galaxy

Interstellar Medium: Space is not empty, but what is between the stars? See the first learning page about the Interstellar Medium. It has been compiled by a pair of former UNH students.

Learn about the formation of stars from a guided tour with pretty pictures.

Cyber Space: Designed for students by students! Lot of great information.

Webstars: Astrophysics in Cyberspace: A thorough compendium of links to many sites, broken down into topics.

When stars collide, a video clip that explains what happens.

The Universe

Take a cyber tour of the universe with the Galaxy Zoo.

Black Holes: There are quite a few Black Hole sites out there. But beware, not everything is good information! You may want to visit Stephen Hawking on the Web. Take a cyber tour to a black hole and learn plenty of no-nonsense stuff on black holes.

Amazing Space: Great site that provides a set of web-based activities from the Hubble Space Telescope Institute.

Cosmic Mystery Tour: An extertaining multimedia guide to the cosmos from the University of illinois.

StarChild: This site offers information at the basic level. The site includes a glossary and multi disciplinary games like planet tac toe, Mathy Way and Solar System Shuffle.

Imagine the Universe: Similar in concept to StarChild, but aimed at students aged 14 and up.

Find out how the entire universe is being mapped out by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the 2DF Survey. The search for the first galaxies is on! Check out a recent article in National Geographic.

Browse a comprehensive description of the current hot Big Bang model and the relevant observations.

The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) is providing the most detailed pictures of the "Baby Universe" thus far. Learn about this journey to the beginning of our universe!

The first 3D map of Dark Matter in the universe was just published in early 2007.

Life Elsewhere in the Universe?

NASA Astrobiology: A reliable source for studies on possible extraterrestrial life

SETI Institute: If you are interested in the ongoing search for possible life in other places in the universe, check them out.

Federation of American Scientists: Visit here if you want to follow the ongoing debate about potential findings of past life signs on Mars.

Planetary Society: To do a search on their files, enter your search criteria (for example, "extraterrestrial" and "life") and you will be presented with information from several sides of the debate.

Life in extreme conditions on Earth: Research in this area is opening up new possibilities for extraterrestrial life forms!

Finding Earth-like planets in orbit around other stars. This is a challenging task. Find out how you can do it from the Planet Quest website.

We may also ask ourselves whether it is worth and/or feasible to attempt colonization of space or any of the bodies in our solar system besides Earth. As part of an Astronomy Honors Project Nicholas Burns has compiled a few sources on space colonization.

NASA's Space Science Themes:

Currently, there are four major Space Science themes which are pursued under NASA's sponsorship:

  1. The search for Origins of everything, the universe, the galaxies, the stars, the planets, and the origin of life. With our involvement in the measurement of the composition of cosmic matter (solar wind, interstellar gas, cosmic rays), we are part of this enterprise.
  2. The Structure and Evolution of the Universe. With the work of the Gamma Ray Astronomy group UNH is also part of this research topic.
  3. The Exploration of the Solar System with its visits to other planets, their moons and other bodies in the solar system is the one topic that we are connected to the least. Nevertheless, this is an exciting topic to learn about.
  4. Finally, the unraveling of the Sun-Earth Connections is a theme that hits home. We find out about the things that an active sun can do to Earth. Remember, the Sun is not just the star that gives us warmth and light, with explosions and cosmic rays it can upset the Earth's environment, produce beautiful Aurorae (Northern [Southern) Lights) or can even create havoc in our electric power grids. This is a topic that a large fraction of the Space Science group in Morse Hall is working on.

Each one of these themes lends itself as a starter for a nice Term Paper!

(If you need help with getting your Term Paper into great shape, take advantage of the services that the UNH Writing Center is offering you!)

Dr. Möbius' Research Interests:

The research specialty of Professor Möbius is Space Science -- that is, the study of the closer neighborhood of the Earth and the Sun with satellites and spaceprobes. This research is sponsored and structured in the United States through NASA. The latest mission is the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) was launched in October 2008.

Prof. Möbius' research field can be found through the Space Physics Homepage. If you are interested in what is going on in his research group in Morse Hall, check out the Experimental Space Plasma Group homepage. You will find out in which projects he and his colleagues are involved and how students can get their own experience through research.

There is a brand new Cosmic and Heliospheric Learning Center that features explanations in layman's terms for most of these research areas. Windows to the Universe also features sections on the Advanced Composition Explorer, one of Dr. Möbius' projects.

Sites of Local Interest: