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Welcome to Houston Astronomical Society

Fostering the science and art of astronomy through programs that serve our membership and the community. Founded in 1955, Houston Astronomical Society is an active community of enthusiastic amateur and professional astronomers with over 70 years of history in the Houston area. Through education and outreach, our programs promote science literacy and astronomy awareness. We meet via Zoom the first Friday of each month for the General Membership Meeting and the first Thursday of the month for the Novice Meeting. Membership has a variety of benefits, including access to a secure dark site west of Houston, special interest groups that focus on particular areas of astronomy, an active community outreach program, and much more. Joining is simple.

Notice of election to fill vacant Treasurer seat at July meeting

Our esteemed treasurer, Bonnie Neuren, has offered to resign in order to focus more on family and other issues she is presently dealing with.  Her years of service to the club are greatly appreciated 

HAS member Marc Chouinard has offered to fill the role of Treasurer, pending an election by the Membership.  Marc has been active in the club for several years and has been helping out with observatory training, and has a background in finance.  I believe he is more than qualified to perform these duties. Our bylaws require at least 15 days notice of said election, so we will conduct the election to fill this vacancy for the remainder of this term at our July 11 General meeting.  We will also take nominations from the floor.  This post will serve as formal notification to the Membership.

Stephen Jones

President – Houston Astronomical Society

What members are saying... 2025 06 09

These members are saying or imaging...

  • 5/24/2025
    • Craig Lamison - Had the Seestar beavering away, even during twilight, and it captured this picture of the Sombrero. The sky conditions were not the best.
  • 5/21/2025
    • Stephen Jones - Smart Telescope SIG object for the month: NGC 5128 - the Centaurus A galaxy... find yourself a nice southern horizon for this one.
  • 5/21/2025
    • Mike Nelson - NGC 3718 in Ursa Major from last night, no extra processing other than native to the scopes. Unistellar eVScope 2 (87 minutes), Dwarf 3 (97 minutes), Vespera 1 (60 minutes). In this comparison, the Dwarf looks pretty good to me, as does the Unistellar as usual.

      NGC 3718, 52 mly away, exhibits a warped, S-shape, possibly a result of gravitational interaction with NGC 3729 (150,000 ly away from NGC 3718) which is also clearly visible. The Hickson Compact Group 56, UGC 6527, can be seen south of one of NGC 3718's spiral arms, and is 8x further away (~400 mly).

  • 5/21/2025

    • Ward Booth - Some of my Celestron Origin images from TSP. Haven't done any processing or cropping on most of them yet.

  • 6/8/2025

    • Cat’s Eye galaxy. I am surprised that I got any details at all! Under 90 mins and in the middle of a horrible night last night - LP, clouds rolling in, moon, etc. C8 edge at f/10 l-pro filter. Let's see if I can add more subs, but the prospects are not great .

  • 6/7/2025

    • Mike Hooper and Kenric Kattner - NGC3572 Southern Tadpoles. Data by Kenric Kattner from Obstech Chile with CDK20 and Moravian C5 Pro. LRGB total of 31 hours. Processing in Pixinsight by me. BlurX, gradient correction, SPCC, NoiseX, StarX, GHS for nebula, Arcsinh for stars, curves with mask, CreateHDR, Dark Structure Enhance and Dynamic Crop. I wasn't going to crop but a star in the bottom left made me do it.

  • 6/6/2025

    • Gary Ray - IC 443, the Jellyfish Nebula. Shot this last March, but just got around to processing it. Is a supernova remnant 5000 light years away in Gemini. Imaged from my backyard in Sugar Land with an Askar FRA400 with an ASI2600MC Pro and an Optolong L-Ultimate filter. 40 x 360s subs (4 hrs integration). Flats, darks and bias frames applied.

Night of the Dobs

The Houston Astronomical Society is hosting The Night of the Dobs at the club dark site on Saturday, June 28 for members and their families/guests. We have a 30" and four 25" Dobs that will be running for all club members to come enjoy. Come see your favorite objects through huge telescopes! This star party is not just for Dobs though. We will have the C14 in the club observatory up and running. One person has volunteered to bring their night vision system if they are able to make it. Please bring your own system to observe with or photograph with and share as you like. No RSVP required, but please complete your annual dark site training ahead of time. Please join us!

Clearest skies,

Walt Cooney
Field Trip and Observing Committee Chair

AP Target of the Month - June 2025

The June 2025 target of the month for the Astrophotography Special Interest Group (AP SIG) is the Triffid Nebula (M20), located in the constellation Sagittarius. This striking object features a blue reflection nebula alongside vivid emission from Hydrogen-alpha, Hydrogen-beta, and Sulfur II, all interwoven with dramatic lanes of dark nebulosity. It's a rewarding subject for both one-shot color (OSC) and narrowband imaging—bright enough to yield quick results, yet complex enough to challenge and refine the skills of even the most seasoned astrophotographers.

 

HAS Main Meeting - June 6th 2025 7:00pm - "Unlocking the Chemistry of the Heavens"

“Unlocking the Chemistry of the Heavens”

In memoriam Prof. Harold Linnartz

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By: Danna Qasim

Senior Research Scientist, Planetary Science Research Staff at Southwest

In this talk, Dr. Qasim will discuss her career path, starting at age 16 when she decided to become an astrochemist, and the research projects she engaged in that lead me to her passion for bridging interstellar chemistry to the chemistry in our Solar System. These included experimentally testing the role of the mineral schreibersite on meteorites in biochemical reactions which may have been critical to life,  the challenges of forming interstellar methane ice analogs in the laboratory and experimental investigations on the role of interstellar inheritance in the detection of amines and amino acids in meteorites. Dr. Qasim will also give brief overview of her current research in the Nebular Origins of the Universe Research Laboratory (NOUR Laboratory), and reflect on the current funding climate for (space) science. Dr. Qasims talk will be dedicated her late PhD supervisor, Prof. Harold Linnartz, whose belief in her scientific potential often exceeded her own.

Speaker: Dr. Danna Qasim is a laboratory astrophysicist and astronomer. Her long-term goal is bridging interstellar/protoplanetary disk chemistry to the chemistry in our Solar System. She received her Bachelor of Science in Chemistry and minor in astronomy at Northern Arizona University (2012), and her Master of Science in Chemical Sciences at Kennesaw State University under the supervision of Prof. Heather Abbott-Lyon, where she experimentally investigated early Earth phosphorylation reactions by meteoritic minerals (2016). She received her PhD in Astronomy at Leiden University under the supervision of Profs. Harold Linnartz and Ewine van Dishoeck (2020). Notably, she developed a method to experimentally investigate carbon atom chemistry occurring in dark interstellar clouds, which resulted in two international dissertation awards.

After her PhD, she did her postdoctoral at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, where she worked in the Cosmic Ice and Astrobiology Analytical Laboratories to bridge interstellar chemistry to the chemistry found in meteorites. In 2022, she joined SwRI’s Planetary Science Research Staff, where she is currently leading a JWST Cycle 3 Program on interstellar sulfur chemistry, a NASA New Frontiers Data Analysis Program on analyzing Juno data of Ganymede and is head of the newly formed Nebular Origins of the Universe Research Laboratory (NOUR Laboratory; NOUR =نور = light).    ___________________________________________________________________________________

To see the video, click Unlocking the Chemistry of the Heavens.