50 years of Human Spaceflight

Source SPACE.com: All about our solar system, outer space and exploration

Quick facts about Pluto

Pluto is a dwarf planet. It has many differences compared to the planets of our solar system. This infographic can help you learn those facts in an easy way.

Also try this online quiz on Pluto after you finish reading this.


Source SPACE.com: All about our solar system, outer space and exploration

Now try the Pluto Quiz

7 Ways to Organize a Better Astronomy Picture Quiz

Using pictures in a quiz competition can add colour and excitement to your astronomy quiz. On the other hand poorly planned picture quizzes can become a nightmare to the organizers. These simple steps will guide you to  plan and execute a better picture quiz.

What is this Messier object?

1. Build a Large Image Bank

Piling up a decent collection of photos and pictures is the place to start your astronomy picture quiz. This is hardly a difficult talk given that astronomy is full of breathtaking images. Before you embark on your hunt for pictures, have a clear idea about the content and format of the quiz. It is a waste of time to collect pictures of space exploration for a quiz on the history of astronomy. 

There are plenty of online resources that can be used to build up your image bank. Here are a few,

• http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/archivepix.html
• http://hubblesite.org/gallery/album/

2. Organize Your Image Collection

What are the objects in this picture?

Once you have a large collection of pictures, it is useful to keep things in order by categorizing and labeling them. You can even combine this with image collection to save time. Put pictures in different folders for easy identification. Remember to name the pictures correctly. For instance, if a Messier object also has a given name, include that in the file name. Always double check, since there can be mislabeling of photos. It can save you from an embarrassment on the quiz day. 

3. Select Good Pictures and Modify

Shortlist a few good photos before you start making questions. If you plan to project the images on a screen, then select ones with a higher resolution and size. Smaller images can be a better choice if they are being printed on a question paper.

You will have to customize the pictures to suit your questions. If you want to point to only one aspect of the picture, an arrow can be inserted. Don't be afraid to crop pictures to suit your quiz. Try to bring some harmony into the pictures by converting them to equal or similar size and format.

4. Formulate Good Questions

What type of a galaxy is this?

It is easy to run away with the idea of asking 'what is this object?' type of questions. While there is nothing wrong in asking competitors to identify objects, try to bring in some subject matter. Frame your questions in a way so to discourage mere guessing. Also it is a more scientific approach to astronomy quizzes. Use the picture as a starting point for your question. This method also gives you the chance to make different questions for the same picture.

5. Decide on Presentation

You must have already decided on a format for the quiz. Make changes fit the pictures into your format. If you are projecting the pictures, then prepared a PowerPoint presentation. Always leave a blank or question number slide between pictures, to avoid accidental display of the next question. You can choose to type the question on the slide or to ask it when the picture is displayed.

If you are printing them on a question paper, try to have pictures with good contrast, so they don't appear hazy on the print.

6. Do a Test Run

What is a Quasar?

Whatever the format, test your quiz prior to the competition. If you can get the opinion of independent observers, their feedback will be very useful. Check for all factual and spelling errors. Make sure that the equipment is working fine. Always have a backup copy on a CD/flash-drive.

Print your paper and check for clarity of the pictures. Can someone do it within the allocated time frame? Can the questions be understood clearly?

7. Remember to Collect Feedback

One thing that can help you improve your quizzes is the feedback you get from the competitors. When you spend a lot of time preparing quizzes, it is difficult to assess the difficulty and clarity of the questions. If you have added new features or changed the format, then it is important to check whether it had worked. No one can tell you better about the quiz than the participants.

It takes time an energy to build a good astronomy quiz. If you are interested, read more about making questions for astronomy quizzes

Who discovered Neptune?

Most discoveries are straightforward. We can clearly say who discovered it and when. But there are exceptions, where it is not sure who discovered it first. And the discovery of Neptune is one of them.

Following the discovery of Uranus, astronomers realized that Uranus had been plotted in star charts almost a century before it had been discovered by William Herschel. But when these data was analysed it was evident that something was tugging Uranus while it orbited around the sun.

Berlin Observatory

One astronomer who use the data to calculate the position of this unseen planet was English astronomer John C Adams. He calculated the orbit and position of this planet by October 1845. But his calculations and predictions were not taken seriously.

French astronomer Urbain Jean Leverrier also made calculations of his own and predicted the position of the eighth planet, almost an year later in September 1846. Based on his predictions, Johann Galle of Berlin Observatory discovered Neptune on the same day. The position was only 2° away from John C Adams's predicted position.

So the credit of discovering Neptune goes to three astronomers, John C Adams, Urbain Jean Leverrier and Johann Galle.

But to make things more complicated, Galileo's notes have recorded Neptune close to Jupiter on two occasions. But during that period Nepture had begun its retrograde motion, so it would have been difficult to detect any noticeable movement against the background stars. Although Galileo was the first person to observe Neptune, he failed to identify it as a planet.

To test your knowledge on discovery and other aspects of Neptune, take the Neptune Quiz 

Or learn more about the planet with Neptune (True Books)

Download Astronomy Quiz for Free!

AstronomyQuiz.info website has made pdf versions of their quizzes to be downloaded. The quizzes are arranged according to topics, indicating the number of questions and level of difficulty.
This will enable you to practice the quizzes offline and use it as a quick reference. These quizzes can be used to practice for astronomy quiz competitions, to aid teaching/ learning astronomy. All the quizzes can be downloaded free of charge and no need to log in or disclose your personal information.
You can now download pdf versions of your favourite astronomy quizzes at www.astronomyquiz.info/downloads.html

A Quick Guide to Asteroid Groups

Two centuries ago, Sicilian monk Guiseppe Piazzi discovered the first asteroid. It was named Ceres after the Roman goddess of harvest. Soon many more joined this group of asteroids, which lie between the orbits  of Mars and Jupiter. Collectively these asteroids are known as the asteroid belt.

Not all asteroids in the solar system lie in the asteroid belt. Some are clustered together and have different orbits. It is easy to confuse these groups. Following is a concise guide to the different groups.

Amor objects:  Asteroids that cross the orbit of Mars but does not reach Earth’s orbit

Apollo objects: Apollo  objects cross the Earth’s orbit, thus Apollo-Amor objects have the potential to collide with an inner planet. Apollo objects are not the same as Near Earth Objects (NEOs). NEOs include asteroids, comets, meteroids which are in orbits closer to the Earth.

Trojan asteroids: Two groups of asteroids share the orbit with Jupiter 60°ahead and behind the planet. These points are the Langrangian points where the gravities of Sun and Jupiter combine to trap smaller objects into orbit.

Hirayama families: Japanese astronomer Kiyotsugu Hirayama discovered that some asteroids share similar orbits with same eccentricity and inclination. This suggested that they originated from a single body, which fragmented into smaller asteroids. Modern observations have confirmed this theory since asteroids of one family have similar spectroscopic characteristics.

Now try the Asteroid quiz at www.astronomyquiz.info/asteroid-quiz.html

Questions on Mercury's Orbit and Rotation

relationship between mercury's orbit and rotation

Mercury’s orbit and rotation is different from other planets that it’s an interesting topic for questions. Whether you make or participate in a quiz, it pays to have a clear view of facts.

• Orbital period = 88 Earth days.
• Rotation period = 58 Earth days
• Mercury siderial day = 115 Earth days
• Mercury solar day = 176 Earth days (two Mercury years)
• It completes three rotations about its axis for every two orbits.  (mercury rotation=2/3 orbital period)

For many years astronomers believed that the the roation period and orbital period was equal due to tidal locking with the sun. The reason for this was, whenever it was easier to observe the planet, it showed the same side. Radio telescopes have detected higher temperatures on the darkside, suggesting that the planet rotates slowly. This has been supported by data from Mariner 10

For more facts visit Quick Reviews at www.astronomyquiz.info/mercury-quick-review.html

To test your knowledge on Mercury visit www.astronomyquiz.info/mercury-quiz.html

Difficulties in using the magnitude scale in Observational Astronomy

Q: Why is it difficult to understand the magnitude scale system?

Stars drawn to magnitude in a star chart

A: It works backwards with brighter objects having smaller and negative values. Also each magnitude difference gives a brightness difference of 2.5. For instance, a star with a magnitude of 4 is 2.5 times brighter than a star with magnitude 5. And when there is a difference of 5 magnitudes, the brightness difference is about  100 times (2.5 X 2.5 X 2.5 X 2.5 X 2.5 = 97.7)

There is advantage of using the system. It compresses the scale so a wide range of brightnesses can be represented by a close range of numbers.

In a quiz, you can be asked of the magnitude values of well known objects. Though planets’ magnitudes change depending on the position and distance,  it’s useful to remember their average values.

Sun                        -26.7

Moon                    -12.6 (full moon)

Venus                   -4.7 (brightest)

Mars                      -2.9 (Brightest)

Jupiter                  -2.8

Mercury               -1.9 (Brightest)

Saturn                   0.7

Uranus                 5.5

Sirius                     -1.4

Canopus              -0.7

Polaris                   1.9

New layout for the Astronomy Quiz Website

I have made some serious changes to my website www.astronomyquiz.info so it's easier to navigate. It now includes questions in three difficulty levels, beginner, intermediate and advanced. This was included to cover varying range of knowledge in our users. The website provides online mcq based quizzes on astronomy. You don't need to log on or make an account to use it. Everything in the website is provided absolutely free!

Screen shot of the new layout

Hope that many people will enjoy the quizzes and share the joy of learning astronomy.

I would be grad to hear from you regarding improvements which I can consider in future.