Common Space Acronyms In Astronomy and Aeronautics

Further Reading: Astronomy

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Celestial Mechanics ... This device mechanically computes the positions of celestial bodies "with reference to the observer's position on the surface of the earth." Claudius Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (c.120 CE) was an ancient astronomer and astrologer in early Imperial Roman times who wrote several books on astronomy... The most significant of these was the Almagest, which remained the most important book on predictive geometrical astronomy for some 1400 years...

Theoretical Astronomy ... Astronomy is a branch of science, but unlike other sciences, which have Earth-based laboratories in which controlled experiments are performed, astronomy has its labs located in the heavens far beyond the reach, let alone control, of the terrestrial observer... Ptolemy's Almagest, although a brilliant treatise on theoretical astronomy combined with a practical handbook for computation, nevertheless includes many compromises to reconcile discordant observations... Theoretical astronomy is usually assumed to have begun with Johannes Kepler (1571–1630), and Kepler's laws...

Ultraviolet Astronomy ... Ultraviolet line spectrum measurements are used to discern the chemical composition, densities, and temperatures of the interstellar medium, and the temperature and composition of hot young stars. UV observations can also provide essential information about the evolution of galaxies...

Visible-light Astronomy ... The ESRO convention, the organisations founding document outlines it as an entity exclusively devoted to scientific pursuits. This was the case for most of its lifetime but in the final years before the formation of the European Space Agency (ESA), ESRO began a programme in the field of telecommunications...

Cybernetics ... Aristarchus of Samos (c. 310–250 BC) first put forward the notion that the motions of the celestial bodies could be explained by assuming that the Earth and all the other planets in the Solar System orbited the Sun...

Astronomy ... However, the invention of the telescope was required before astronomy was able to develop into a modern science... Historically, astronomy has included disciplines as diverse as astrometry, celestial navigation, observational astronomy, the making of calendars, and astrology, but professional astronomy is nowadays often considered to be synonymous with astrophysics... During the 20th century, the field of professional astronomy split into observational and theoretical branches...

X-ray Astronomy ... X-ray emission is expected from astronomical objects that contain an extremely hot gas at temperatures from about a million kelvin (K) to hundreds of millions of kelvin (MK). Although X-rays have been observed emanating from the Sun since the 1940s, the discovery in 1962 of the first cosmic X-ray source was a surprise...

Digital Photography ... Until the advent of such technology, photographs were made by exposing light sensitive photographic film, and used chemical photographic processing to develop and stabilize the image. By contrast, digital photographs can be displayed, printed, stored, manipulated, transmitted, and archived using digital and computer techniques, without chemical processing...

Observational Astronomy ... While they are still commonly used in almanacs and astrological publications, their occurrence in published research and texts on astronomy is relatively infrequent, with some exceptions such as the Sun and Earth symbols appearing in astronomical constants, and certain zodiacal signs used to represent the solstices and equinoxes...

Vision For Space Exploration ... It includes imaging, where a picture of some sort is made of the object; photometry, where the amount of light coming from an object is measured, spectroscopy, where the distribution of that light with respect to its wavelength is measured, and polarimetry where the polarisation state of that light is measured. An example of spectroscopy is the study of spectral lines to understand of what kind of matter light is going through...

Astrophysics ... In pursuit of these goals, the Vision called for the space program to complete the International Space Station by 2010; retire the Space Shuttle by 2010; develop a new Crew Exploration Vehicle (later renamed Orion) by 2008, and conduct its first human spaceflight mission by 2014; explore the Moon with robotic spacecraft missions by 2008 and crewed missions by 2020, and use lunar exploration to develop and test new approaches and technologies useful for supporting sustained exploration of Mars and beyond; explore Mars and other destinations with robotic and crewed missions; pursue commercial transportation to support the International Space Station and missions beyond low Earth orbit. Outlining some of the advantages, U. S...

Galileo Galilei ... In Ptolemaic Egypt, the Egyptian tradition merged with Greek astronomy and Babylonian astronomy, with the city of Alexandria in Lower Egypt becoming the centre of scientific activity across the Hellenistic world... His works on astronomy, including the Almagest, became the most influential books in the history of Western astronomy... Following the Muslim conquest of Egypt, the region came to be dominated by Arabic culture and Islamic astronomy...

Theory Of Relativity ... Scope The theory of relativity transformed theoretical physics and astronomy during the 20th century...

Infrared Astronomy ... Infrared astronomy began in the 1830s, a few decades after the discovery of infrared light by William Herschel in 1800... After a number of discoveries were made in the 1950s and 1960s in radio astronomy, astronomers realized the information available outside of the visible wavelength range, and modern infrared astronomy was established... Infrared and optical astronomy are often practiced using the same telescopes, as the same mirrors or lenses are usually effective over a wavelength range that includes both visible and infrared light...

Gamma-ray Astronomy ... In the 10th century, Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi carried out observations on the stars and described their positions, magnitudes and star color, and gave drawings for each constellation, in his Book of Fixed Stars. Ibn Yunus observed more than 10,000 entries for the sun's position for many years using a large astrolabe with a diameter of nearly 1.4 metres...

Forensic Science ... In modern use, the term "forensics" in the place of "forensic science" can be considered correct as the term "forensic" is effectively a synonym for "legal" or "related to courts". However the term is now so closely associated with the scientific field that many dictionaries include the meaning that equates the word "forensics" with "forensic science"...

History Of Astronomy ... Mesopotamia The origins of Western astronomy can be found in Mesopotamia, the "land between the rivers" Tigris and Euphrates, where the ancient kingdoms of Sumer, Assyria, and Babylonia were located... Our knowledge of Sumerian astronomy is indirect, via the earliest Babylonian star catalogues dating from about 1200 BC...

ESRO ... Most astronomical gamma-rays are thought to be produced not from radioactive decay, however, but from the same type of accelerations of electrons, and electron-photon interactions, that produce X-rays in astronomy (but occurring at a higher energy in the production of gamma-rays)...

Radio Astronomy ... Radio astronomy is conducted using large radio antennas referred to as radio telescopes, that are either used singularly, or with multiple linked telescopes utilizing the techniques of radio interferometry and aperture synthesis... The use of interferometry allows radio astronomy to achieve high angular resolution, as the resolving power of an interferometer is set by the distance between its components, rather than the size of its components... Jansky wanted to investigate the radio waves from the Milky Way in further detail, but Bell Labs re-assigned him to another project, so he did no further work in the field of astronomy...

Planetary Science ... Planetary scientists are generally located in the astronomy and physics or earth sciences departments of universities or research centres, though there are several purely planetary science institutes worldwide...

List Of Astronomers ... They may have won major prizes or awards, developed or invented widely used techniques or technologies within astronomy, or are directors of major observatories or heads of space-based telescope projects. List of astronomers The following is a list of notable astronomers...

Science ... Chemistry Acid-base reaction theories · Alchemy Analytical chemistry · Astrochemistry Biochemistry · Crystallography Environmental chemistry · Food science Geochemistry · Green chemistry Inorganic chemistry · Materials science Molecular physics · Nuclear chemistry Organic chemistry · Photochemistry Physical chemistry · Radiochemistry Solid-state chemistry · Stereochemistry Supramolecular chemistry Surface science · Theoretical chemistry Astronomy Astrophysics · Cosmology Galactic astronomy · Planetary geology Planetary science · Stellar astronomy...

Astronomical Symbols ... His contributions to observational astronomy include the telescopic confirmation of the phases of Venus, the discovery of the four largest satellites of Jupiter (named the Galilean moons in his honour), and the observation and analysis of sunspots...

Astrometry ... As a science, astronomy is somewhat hindered in that direct experiments with the properties of the distant universe are not possible... Since that time, observational astronomy has made steady advances with each improvement in telescope technology... A traditional division of observational astronomy is given by the region of the electromagnetic spectrum observed: Optical astronomy is the part of astronomy that uses optical components (mirrors, lenses and solid-state detectors) to observe light from near infrared to near ultraviolet wavelengths...

Further Reading: Space

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Energy ... The total energy contained in an object is identified with its mass, and energy (like mass), cannot be created or destroyed. When matter (ordinary material particles) is changed into energy (such as energy of motion, or into radiation), the mass of the system does not change through the transformation process...

Artificial Intelligence ... The field was founded on the claim that a central property of humans, intelligence—the sapience of Homo sapiens—can be so precisely described that it can be simulated by a machine. This raises philosophical issues about the nature of the mind and the ethics of creating artificial beings, issues which have been addressed by myth, fiction and philosophy since antiquity...

Google ... Google was first incorporated as a privately held company on September 4, 1998, and its initial public offering followed on August 19, 2004. At that time Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Eric Schmidt agreed to work together at Google for 20 years, until the year 2024...

NASA ... Since February 2006, NASA's mission statement has been to "pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery and aeronautics research." On September 14, 2011, NASA announced that it had selected the design of a new Space Launch System that it said would take the agency's astronauts farther into space than ever before and provide the cornerstone for future human space exploration efforts by the U. S. NASA was established by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29, 1958, replacing its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA)... space exploration efforts have since been led by NASA, including the Apollo moon-landing missions, the Skylab space station, and later the Space Shuttle... Currently, NASA is supporting the International Space Station and is overseeing the development of the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle and Commercial Crew vehicles...

Sun ... The Sun's hot corona continuously expands in space creating the solar wind, a stream of charged particles that extends to the heliopause at roughly 100 astronomical units...

Holography ... The holographic recording itself is not a plain image – it consists of an apparently random structure of either varying intensity, density or profile. Overview and history The Hungarian-British physicist Dennis Gabor (Hungarian name: Gábor Dénes), was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1971 for "for his invention and development of the holographic method"...

Warehouse ... These systems are often installed in refrigerated warehouses where temperatures are kept very cold to keep product from spoiling, especially in electronics warehouse where they require specific temperature to avoid damaging the parts, and also where land is expensive, as automated storage systems can use vertical space efficiently...

Optics ... Most optical phenomena can be accounted for using the classical electromagnetic description of light. Complete electromagnetic descriptions of light are, however, often difficult to apply in practice...

Space ... Debates concerning the nature, essence and the mode of existence of space date back to antiquity; namely, to treatises like the Timaeus of Plato, or Socrates in his reflections on what the Greeks called khora (i.e... In Isaac Newton's view, space was absolute - in the sense that it existed permanently and independently of whether there were any matter in the space... Other natural philosophers, notably Gottfried Leibniz, thought instead that space was a collection of relations between objects, given by their distance and direction from one another...

Technology ... The human species' use of technology began with the conversion of natural resources into simple tools. The prehistorical discovery of the ability to control fire increased the available sources of food and the invention of the wheel helped humans in travelling in and controlling their environment...

Grid Computing ... Grid size can vary by a considerable amount. Grids are a form of distributed computing whereby a “super virtual computer” is composed of many networked loosely coupled computers acting together to perform very large tasks...

Website ... A webpage is a document, typically written in plain text interspersed with formatting instructions of Hypertext Markup Language (HTML, XHTML). A webpage may incorporate elements from other websites with suitable markup anchors...

Book ... Books may also refer to works of literature, or a main division of such a work. In library and information science, a book is called a monograph, to distinguish it from serial periodicals such as magazines, journals or newspapers...

Privacy ... The right not to be subjected to unsanctioned invasion of privacy by the government, corporations or individuals is part of many countries' privacy laws, and in some cases, constitutions. Almost all countries have laws which in some way limit privacy; an example of this would be law concerning taxation, which normally require the sharing of information about personal income or earnings...

Transport ... Transport infrastructure consists of the fixed installations necessary for transport, and may be roads, railways, airways, waterways, canals and pipelines, and terminals such as airports, railway stations, bus stations, warehouses, trucking terminals, refueling depots (including fueling docks and fuel stations), and seaports. Terminals may be used both for interchange of passengers and cargo and for maintenance...

Robotics ... The concept and creation of machines that could operate autonomously dates back to classical times, but research into the functionality and potential uses of robots did not grow substantially until the 20th century. Today, robotics is a rapidly growing field, as we continue to research, design, and build new robots that serve various practical purposes, whether domestically, commercially, or militarily...

Future ... In the philosophy of time, presentism is the belief that only the present exists and the future and the past are unreal. Religions consider the future when they address issues such as karma, life after death, and eschatologies that study what the end of time and the end of the world will be...

Public Housing ... Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, definitions of poverty and other criteria for allocation vary within different contexts. Asia Hong Kong In Hong Kong, public housing is one of the major housing policy of the government...

European Space Agency ... ESA's space flight program includes human spaceflight, mainly through the participation in the International Space Station program, the launch and operations of unmanned exploration missions to other planets and the Moon, Earth observation, science, telecommunication as well as maintaining a major spaceport, the Guiana Space Centre at Kourou, French Guiana, and designing launch vehicles... ESA science missions are based at ESTEC in Noordwijk, Netherlands, Earth Observation missions at ESRIN in Frascati, Italy, ESA Mission Control (ESOC) is in Darmstadt, Germany, the European Astronaut Centre (EAC) that trains astronauts for future missions is situated in Cologne, Germany, and the European Space Astronomy Centre is located in Villanueva de la Cañada, Spain... Although the 1950s boom made it possible for Western European countries to invest in research and specifically in space related activities, Western European scientists realised solely national projects would not be able to compete...

Health ... The maintenance and promotion of health is achieved through different combination of physical, mental, and social well-being, together sometimes referred to as the “health triangle”. The WHO's 1986 Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion furthered that health is not just a state, but also "a resource for everyday life, not the objective of living...

Satellite ... Since then, thousands of satellites have been launched into orbit around the Earth; also some satellites, notably space stations, have been launched in parts and assembled in orbit... A few hundred satellites are currently operational, whereas thousands of unused satellites and satellite fragments orbit the Earth as space debris... A few space probes have been placed into orbit around other bodies and become artificial satellites to the Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the Sun...

Database ... The term database is correctly applied to the data and their supporting data structures, and not to the database management system (DBMS). The database data collection with DBMS is called a database system...

DNA ... DNA consists of two long polymers of simple units called nucleotides, with backbones made of sugars and phosphate groups joined by ester bonds. These two strands run in opposite directions to each other and are therefore anti-parallel...