Our Universe is big, beautiful… and mostly invisible!

A team of scientists has studied the galaxy cluster Abell 2744, nicknamed Pandora’s Cluster. They have pieced together the cluster’s complex and violent history using telescopes in space and on the ground, including ESO’s Very Large Telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope. Abell 2744 seems to be the result of a simultaneous pile-up of at least four separate galaxy clusters and this complex collision has produced strange effects that have never been seen together before.

Full article in Sinhalese:

Open publication

Click here for English version.





Credits:
Text - ESO/UNAWE
Image - ESO
Translation: UNAWE-Sri Lanka (Rangitha Kuruppu)

Astronomy in the Desert!

Professional astronomers have powerful telescopes that can take amazing pictures of the Universe. But to get the most out of the telescopes, they have to think carefully about where they put them on Earth.

Full article in Sinhalese:

Open publication

Click here for English version.

Credits:
Text - ESO/UNAWE
Image - ESO
Translation: UNAWE-Sri Lanka (Rangitha Kuruppu)

Space Scoop launched in Sri Lanka

Universe Awareness has started a collaboration with the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and NASA Chandra X-ray Observatory to produce the astronomy news service - Space Scoop - that are written specifically for children aged between 7 and 11 years old. Space Scoop is meant to feed children's curiosity about the Universe.

UNAWE - Sri Lanka launched Space Scoop in Sinhalese making it possible for all the Sinhalese reading children to learn latest in astronomy. The effort was launched during the June 2011 meeting of Sri Lanka Astronomical Association.

UNAWE Sri Lanka hope to translate Space Scoop in to Tamil in near future and to publish the articles in local papers.


Who can use this service?

Children — In a world where children are sometimes more technically savvy than grown-ups, Space Scoop is meant to feed their curiosity about the Universe, by allowing them to access ESO releases in their own language.

Parents — They can read about the latest discoveries in astronomy and explain them to children who are younger than seven years old or who do not use computers on their own.

Teachers — They can use Space Scoop as a resource in the classroom to discuss the latest discoveries.

UNAWE - Sri Lanka Coordinator introducing Space Scoop.

Call for volunteers: Translating science articles from English to Sinhalese and Tamil

We are looking for volunteers who could help us to translate science article from English to both Sinhalese and Tamil. The articles are focused on kids. The articles will be published in our website and we are working on getting them published in the print media too.

If you are interested, please write to me directly at: thilina.heenatigala (AT) yahoo.com

Cheers!

Thilina Heenatigala

General Secretary - Sri Lanka Astronomical Association

UNAWE - Sri Lanka efforts featured on UNAWE International website

UNAWE - Sri Lanka was launched in 2009 and held couple of successful events. Many thanks for Carolina Odman for featuring UNAWE - Sri Lanka efforts on UNAWE International website.

Outreach session at Girls' Home

UNAWE - Sri Lanka coordinator; Thilina Heenatigala celebrated his birthday with an UNAWE program for Girls' Home.

Read the full report with photos at Universe Cafe blog.

Galle Astronomy Workshop

An astronomy workshop was held in Galle (South) Sri Lanka on the 26 – 27 of March 2010 for students and teachers of Sacred Heart Convent. The workshop was conducted by Sri Lanka Astronomical Association as a part of UNAWE – Sri Lanka, Saturn Observation Campaign, Dark-Sky Astro-Tourism project and pre-Global Astronomy Month (GAM) program.

The workshop is one of the long running annual programs in Southern Sri Lanka and this is the 7th consecutive time it’s been held. About 150 students and 20 teachers participated in the workshop.

Read full report with images.

UNAWE supports Naming X contest

2010 celebrates the 80th anniversary of the discovery of Pluto and marks the 1st year anniversary of Venetia Burney Phair’s death, on 30th April 2009, aged 90.

Venetia was a young schoolgirl, living in Oxford, England in 1930, when she came up with the name ‘Pluto’ for the newly discovered Planet X. Venetia was interested in classical mythology as well as astronomy and considered the name, that of the Roman god of the Underworld, appropriate for such a presumably dark and cold world. To celebrate her insight, and the global endeavour that is astronomy, a new competition has been launched: ‘Naming X’, to find the next influential student or school group with the creative and scientific talent to suggest a suitable name (and reasons for it) should the same opportunity of naming a planetary or celestial body arise, like it did for Venetia.

More info and winners: http://venetiaburneyphair.blogspot.com/p/competition.html

UNAWE - Sri Lanka launched with Girl Guides

The first UNAWE - Sri Lanka program was held on 8 August 2009 for Girl Guides at Holly Family Convent, Dehiwala. About 50+ girls in grades 6 - 9 and teachers joined for an evening of celestial experience.

The program started with an introduction to the night sky conducted by Thilina Heenatigala. It was followed by an introduction on how to use star maps by Dimuth Waliwitiya. The girls were divided into two groups and the conductors took them for a ride through the night sky, introducing constellations, planets. The students were given a chance to find constellations using star maps on their own as well. The evening concluded with a dinner together with the guides.

You can download a full report of the experience here.

UPDATE: Report of the event featured on UNAWE website.