Science-- there's something for everyone

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Just for fun: Transit of Venus


On June 6th, there was a transit of Venus across the face of the sun. While a spectacular sight in any case, this event was also of historic and scientific interest. In particular, the difference between the observations made at opposite ends of the Earth (Svalbard, Norway and Canberra, Australia) were used to confirm distances in the solar system. The following video demonstrates this example of 'parallax'. 




No comments:

Post a Comment