Asteroid collision shows how much amateur astronomers have to offer

Asteroid collision shows how much amateur astronomers have to offer

Asteroid collision shows how much amateur astronomers have to offer

The DART impact ejected vast amounts of dust and debris from the surface of the asteroid Dimorphos. The trail of dust is more than 10,000 kilometres long.Credit: CTIO/NOIRLab/SOAR/NSF/AURA/T. Kareta (Lowell Observatory), M. Knight (US Naval Academy)

When NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft slammed into an asteroid on purpose last September, many telescopes were trained on this one-of-a-kind celestial event. Some were operated by teams of amateur astronomers — skilled skywatchers for whom astronomy is not their full-time day job (or, more accurately, night job). Three such teams on France’s Réunion island in the Indian Ocean, plus one in Nairobi, managed to watch the impact in real time.

These skywatchers are among the authors of a study in Nature that describes how the asteroid, named Dimorphos, became temporarily brighter and redder as the spacecraft hit it1. One of five papers about the impact published in Nature

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10 Good TV Shows That Got Science Completely Wrong

10 Good TV Shows That Got Science Completely Wrong

Science is detailed, so it’s not surprising that many TV shows get it totally wrong. After all, screenwriters only have storytelling skills, not all the information about chemistry, physics, and biology. A show’s budget is also a major factor, and it would cost a lot more if it was a requirement to hire a scientist as a consultant.


RELATED: 10 Best TV Shows That Are Surprisingly Short

Ordinarily, it’s easy to ignore science errors or simply not spot them at all if the story is good enough. That’s the category that many entries on this list fall on. However, there are times when the inaccuracies are too glaring, causing viewers to slightly lose interest.

10 Breaking Bad (2008 – 2014)

“4 Days Out”

10 Good TV Shows That Got Science Completely Wrong

Breaking Bad‘s blending of actual Chemistry procedures with criminal activities is one of the key reasons it’s regarded as one of the best-written TV shows ever.

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