Formation and stability of the solar tachocline in MHD simulations

thesi

Saptarshi’s visit to different Nakshatras:

Summary In several ancient Indian texts a mention is made of the movement of the Saptarshi constellation (Big Bear or Big Dipper) in the sky, visiting each nakshatras for 100 years. Saptarshi is said to visit a nakshatra if the nakshatra is in the middle of the stars in the first part of Saptarshi. Since astronomical objects except planets are more or less stationary in the sky, this is generally considered a fanciful statement devoid of astronomical meaning. We show that this may not be so. We show that the visit of Saptarshi to different nakshatras may be a very significant astronomical observation. The transition is not a constant of time since it depends on the proximity of the Saptarshi to the North Pole, which changes due to Earth"s precession and relative sizes of different nakshatras. We show that since 8000 BC, Saptarshi has visited 5 different nakshatras and for one of them, the transition happening in the span of roughly 100 years. We show that this interpretation allows dating of this belief which is consistent with other evidences of the Harappan civilisation and date different Saptarshi Era with calendar dates

The impact on education of Astronomical Olympiads and the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomical Olympiads and similar competitions for highschool students have been run in some countries for more than half a century, and last year marked the tenth anniversary of the largest such competition with global reach, the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics. The effect of these has been to reach out to a large number of school students who might not otherwise have considered astronomy as a subject; help maintain a high, guided standard of astronomy education even in countries where astronomy is not (or no longer) on the curriculum; and to encourage those students who participate to strive harder and pursue astronomy further by giving them goals to aim for, rewarding their efforts with medals, recognition and participation in the international events in interesting locations and, above all, showing them that there are many other students just like them both in their own country and around the world. Many of the students go on to careers in astronomy education or research. We believe that Astronomy Olympiads are a very valuable element in the astronomy education framework which can be used to further the common goal of sustaining and growing the astronomical community

The impact on education of Astronomical Olympiads and the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomical Olympiads and similar competitions for highschool students have been run in some countries for more than half a century, and last year marked the tenth anniversary of the largest such competition with global reach, the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics. The effect of these has been to reach out to a large number of school students who might not otherwise have considered astronomy as a subject; help maintain a high, guided standard of astronomy education even in countries where astronomy is not (or no longer) on the curriculum; and to encourage those students who participate to strive harder and pursue astronomy further by giving them goals to aim for, rewarding their efforts with medals, recognition and participation in the international events in interesting locations and, above all, showing them that there are many other students just like them both in their own country and around the world. Many of the students go on to careers in astronomy education or research. We believe that Astronomy Olympiads are a very valuable element in the astronomy education framework which can be used to further the common goal of sustaining and growing the astronomical community

The impact on education of Astronomical Olympiads and the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomical Olympiads and similar competitions for highschool students have been run in some countries for more than half a century, and last year marked the tenth anniversary of the largest such competition with global reach, the International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics. The effect of these has been to reach out to a large number of school students who might not otherwise have considered astronomy as a subject; help maintain a high, guided standard of astronomy education even in countries where astronomy is not (or no longer) on the curriculum; and to encourage those students who participate to strive harder and pursue astronomy further by giving them goals to aim for, rewarding their efforts with medals, recognition and participation in the international events in interesting locations and, above all, showing them that there are many other students just like them both in their own country and around the world. Many of the students go on to careers in astronomy education or research. We believe that Astronomy Olympiads are a very valuable element in the astronomy education framework which can be used to further the common goal of sustaining and growing the astronomical community

Teacher’s misconception in curricular astronomy

Misconceptions about astronomy concepts are found quite regularly in students, even after they have taken astronomy courses. There are numerous reasons for this [1, 2]. The authors in this paper have focused on the possibility that the existence of these misconceptions could be attributed to the misconceptions of the teacher-instructor and its transmission down to the students that he/she has been teaching. Keeping this in mind, the authors have prepared a questionnaire consisting of assertions split into 5 sections. The teacher-instructors were asked to gauge the truthfulness of the assertions in a survey. The responses to the section on Calendars and the section on Sun and Moon are covered in this article. It was concluded that the respondents of the survey face serious skill deficits in imparting conceptually correct astronomical knowledge to their students. This deficit in skill is not only due to a lack of information on the subject but also due to an inability/unwillingness of the teacher-instructor to make logical inferences/extensions from the knowledge he/she does possess on the topic

International Conference on Oriental Astronomy 9

This book discusses the study of astronomy in different cultures, applied historical astronomy and history of multi-wavelength astronomy, and the genesis of recent research. It contains peer-reviewed papers gathered from the International Conference on Oriental Astronomy 9 (ICOA-9) held at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Pune, India. It covers the areas like megalithic and other prehistoric astronomy, astronomical records in ancient texts, astronomical myths and architecture, astronomical themes in numismatics and rock art, ancient astronomers and their instruments, star maps and star catalogues, historical records and observations of astronomical events, calendars, calendrical science and chronology, the relation between astronomy and mathematics, and maritime astronomy. This book will be a valuable complement to a future generation of students and researchers who develop an interest in the field of Asian and circum-Pacific history of astronomy