@kellylepo.bsky.social
Astronomer | Science communicator | Adult Lisa Simpson Freelance writer and editor. Former Education and Outreach Scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute (@stsci.edu) supporting JWST. Also on Mastodon: @KellyLepo@scicomm.xyz
40 years ago, the Giotto mission was writing history:
🛰️ ESA's first deep space mission
☄️ first cometary close flyby
⏰ and later on, first reactivation of a spacecraft
The success of Giotto inspired our Rosetta mission and together laid the foundation for our Comet Interceptor mission. 🔭 🧪 1/3
Did I think that most people would get the references to an almost 10 year old movie (I, Tonya) or an almost 20-year-old movie (Blades of Glory)? No. Did I care? Also no.
They asked me to do a video themed on the Winter Olympics. It turns out that there are not a lot of movies that involve winter sports, so it was either figure skating or Cool Runnings.
Intro video I made for last night's @aot-baltimore.bsky.social :
I, Tonya, but the Figure Skaters are Astronomers
www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm3k...
The Space Telescope Science Institute has announced the selection of 254 James Webb Space Telescope Cycle 5 General Observer programs: https://news.stsci.edu/4bneuDE 🔭 🧪 #NASAWebb
The @axisprobe.bsky.social team learned that the phase A concept study report of AXIS (the Advanced X-ray Imaging Satellite) will not be reviewed because the lost personnel at NASA Goddard and government shutdown impacted our schedule and budget. 🔭 Here is the PI's e-mail with the explanation.
If you ever want to read a paper for free and can't find it otherwise, email the lead author and politely ask for a copy. You will not be bothering the person. You will in fact make their whole entire day. I have had scientists get so excited I asked they sent me everything they ever published.
Wowowow - our @science.esa.int Hubble's picture of the month for March is the Cat's Eye Nebula, from combined images of #Hubble and #Euclid. Euclid's wide field and low surface brightness sensitivity brings out an external shell. Incredible image. esahubble.org/images/potm2... 🔭
🌕➡️🔴 Lunar eclipse alert!
Depending on where you are (mostly: Central/Eastern Asia, Oceania, most of North/Central America), you may be able to see a TOTAL LUNAR ECLIPSE ("blood moon") overnight!
You can find information about timing and viewing locations here: www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/luna...
Join us next Thursday, March 12th, at Guilford Hall Brewery for an exciting evening of space knowledge!
Doors open at 7:00 pm, talks start at 7:30 pm. The event is FREE and open to the public!
Follow-up comment on how bad it is on the ground at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. 🔭
That's such good news. Congratulations!
Webb Mission Operations Center: 😏
The star has spikes because of the shape of Hubble's primary mirror and the shape of the support struts that hold up it's secondary mirror. More on that in this thread.
This is a bit of a late reply, but I haven't been checking in on the bot in a few days.
The bright thing to the left is a foreground star in the Milky Way. That's generally how bright stars appear in Hubble images. Pulling it up in a catalog, the star is about 2,500 light years away.
One of the last things I worked on at STScI is finally out.
Learn what JWST has taught us about how stars form, and get excited about what we will learn in the future. We're just getting started!
Narrated by yours truly. 🔭🧪
Good piece from @astrolaura.com about grifting that is "buying" stars or star names.
Don't do it.
Go chat with your friendly astronomer pals - they have many names for the stars they study, and if you ask about a certain star they study, maybe you can come up with a name they'll use!
Save $40!
"Every person is a human being, whose personal development is more important than our short-term scientific accomplishments" - and more bangers in this from David Hogg (spoiler: it's about AI!) arxiv.org/abs/2602.10181 🔭
While not a real-time image feed from the telescopes (the images are from existing surveys), you can see what Hubble or Webb are observing right now. Pretty neat! 🔭🧪
#NASAWebb has set a new cosmic distance record: MoM-z14, the furthest galaxy ever confirmed (for now). In this image we see the galaxy as it appeared only 280 million years after the universe began in the big bang: https://news.stsci.edu/49Uanyg
Exactly. I'm originally from Erie, PA and they are absolutely equipped to handle lake effect snow. Syracuse has worse lake effect, so they will be fine.
It's hard to shake that mentality now that I live in Maryland, where everything shuts down if there is an inch of snow on the ground.
My latest video for @aot-baltimore.bsky.social: Heated Rivalry Astronomy on Tap
In a world where there are no out gay observatories, NASA Astrophysics and NASA Earth Science begin a romance. Can they keep their love a secret?
www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLa8...
Some info on how #Artemis II might impact #JWST operations, from our @jwstobserver.bsky.social site. 🔭https://www.stsci.edu/contents/news/jwst/2026/artemis-ii's-possible-impact-on-jwst-science-operations.html
This is more of a management position than an outreach one. The office of public outreach is in a challenging budget situation and just laid off a bunch of staff (including me). They interface with NASA, who also lost a bunch of staff.
So whoever takes this on will have their work cut out for them.
I was on my way to the airport going home after a study abroad in Madrid. I had $12 in my bank account, no money for a taxi, one trip left on my 10 trip metro pass.
A stranger saw how exhausted I was and helped me with my bags through two metro line transfers even though it was out of his way.
True.
And also your average kid knows more science than your average adult (because adults have mostly forgotten what they learned in science class).
Working in astronomy outreach, you quickly learn that the average person knows way less than you think.
It's fine! You can live your whole life without knowing if the Sun is a star. I know because it is my job, most people don't have to.
But asking questions is the first step to learning more.
xkcd.com/2762/
Few individuals have had such a colossal & deleterious impact on the cultural psyche as the recently-departed Erich von Däniken. While he was not alone in fusing aliens into our conception of the distant human past, he was perhaps the most successful & the most harmful in doing so.
