Made another handy #accessibility guide, this time for your science plots!

Our plots can have lots of messages in them, so try and tell the story of the main message. Here's a guideline/template and some tips on how you can describe your plots that works for me.

Hope folks find this useful!

(I am using one of our pulsar observations to demonstrate how I have used this template in the alt-text for this image)

#Science #Astrodon #ScienceCommunication #SciComm

I come from a business / digital background, so digital accessibility has always been big on my radar. When I started in science a few years back, I was very surprised to see that arXiv - a service that allows scientists to put their pre-prints (papers before peer review) was not accessible.

This meant that all science papers that were open access (away from journal subscriptions) were only available as PDFs - which means people with digital accessibility needs could not access them.

Access to science should be open to everyone (the pandemic showed us how important this is), and whilst there is a need for papers to undergo the formal peer-review process, that does not mean we can't adhere to global digital accessibility standards.

So, I am extremely glad to see that arXiv is now moving toward digital accessibility, with its second accessibility forum in Sept. 2024. They've also been moving to make papers in HTML format (instead of PDFs only) which adheres to these standards.

If you are interested in accessibility and science, you might consider attending this forum. It's free to all and only requires remote participation.

accessibility2024.arxiv.org/in…

#science #accessibility #digital #astrodon #arxiv

Long before #Rosetta & 67P/C-G, there was Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 & its devastating 1994 encounter with Jupiter.

I was privileged to be part of the team that made & released the very first images of Fragment A impacting at ~20:15 UTC on 16 July, 30 years ago last night, as seen from Calar Alto in Spain.

The brightness of the impact plume was a huge surprise & the following week saw intense astronomical, media, & public engagement.

#Astronomy #Astrodon #SpaceScience #PlanetaryProtection

This is a three hour long #photo sequence I took in Jan 2019 during a total lunar #eclipse at ESO's Paranal Observatory in #Chile

As the #Moon moves into the Earth's shadow it becomes red. When sunlight passes through the Earth's atmosphere, blue light is scattered away more efficiently than red light, which passes through almost unimpeded, like at #sunrise or #sunset.

From the Moon, you would see the Earth surrounded by a golden fiery ring.

#astrodon #astronomy #astrophotography

Want to become part of #ESA's science advisory structure?

The ESA Director of Science invites scientists affiliated with institutions in the ESA Member States to express their interest in being a member of the Space Science Advisory Committee (SSAC), Astronomy Working Group (AWG), or the Solar System and Exploration Working Group (SSEWG):

▶️ cosmos.esa.int/web/expression-…

#ESA #astrodon

Phew! Thanks to new data from ESO's Very Large #Telescope, we now know that a white dwarf that was set for a close encounter with our Solar System in 29000 years isn't actually headed our way. Turns out that the intense magnetic field of the #star had biased the previous measurements of the approach speed. You're welcome everyone! 😉

We tell you everything in our latest ESO #blog: eso.org/public/blog/rogue-star…

#astrodon #astronomy #space #scicomm

ESOblog: Rogue star not heading for Solar System collision after all

Rogue star not heading for Solar System collision after all

^www.eso.org

Happy Halloween 🎃

Here are the pumpkins I carved this year: An active red dwarf star and its gas giant planet. I call it an exo-pumpkin.

#pumpkin #JackOLantern #halloween #Astrodon #astronomy

We have a new post in our Blog article series illuminating 🪔the #science background 👩🏻‍🔬 👨🏾‍🔬 of ##ESAEuclid 🛰️ and the techniques we'll employ for high-precision #cosmology: "Measuring the Universe with Baryon Acoustic Oscillations?"

👉 euclid-ec.org/measuring-the-un…

#astrodon #astronomy #DarkEnergy #DarkMatter #space

My company Aperio Software is hiring a Research Software Engineer: aperiosoftware.com/jobs

The work is mostly Python, for a variety of Astronomy and Solar Physics related packages and tools.

We are a small company (3 founders and two other people), work fully remote and based in the UK.

#jobs #fedihire #astrodon

Mars - #HopeMarsMission spotted an elongated cloud around Ascraeus Mons

Full size image: flic.kr/p/2oDddEZ

North Polar Cap ↖️
Timetag: 2021-07-10
Altitude: 33580 km
Raw Data from: sdc.emiratesmarsmission.a
Filters: f635+f546+f437 (f320UV used just to enhance a little bit the cloud around the Ascraeus Mons)

I love also Olympus and Arsia Mons on the Terminator!

#Mars #HopeProbe #Space #Spacetodon #Astrodon #Solarocks #Astronomy
Credit:
UAESA/MBRSC/HopeMarsMission/EXI/AndreaLuck

I just had whatever the opposite of 'future shock' is - I stumbled upon a telescope proposal from 2001 and I wondered if the #latex would compile - of course it did, and the proposal looked exactly as it should have.

In related news, I wrote my thesis in Word 98 and the next version refused to open one of my chapters for no obvious reason.

Plain text and openly documented image formats are definitely the way to future proof your work.... #astrodon #opensource #openscience #TeXLaTeX

Tomorrow is my first day of class this semester at Duke University.

For my first year seminar I am asking the students to build and use an astrolabe. It is a great way to both get a physical understanding of the sky, and to really appreciate the sophistication of early astronomy.

The astrolabe was used for centuries to tell the time, navigate, etc. Now you can make and use one too by following the instructions here:

in-the-sky.org/astrolabe/index…

#astronomy #astrodon #histodons #teaching

We are all stardust.

That oxygen you breath? That comes from dying massive stars, ending their light in a supernova.

The iron in your blood? Some massive stars dying, but mainly white dwarfs, the leftovers of dwarf stars like our own Sun, exploding.

The gold ring on your finger? Mostly merging neutron stars, leftovers from supernovae.

#astrodon #scicomm #astronomy

It was really nice to contribute to this image of the Cone Nebula that ESO just released to mark 60 years of collaboration. It's one of the many things I love about my current job here: working with our amazing visual team to deliver cool images for you to enjoy.

What you see here is a pillar of dust and gas sculpted by the intense radiation of stars further up, outside of the field of view.

More info: eso.org/public/news/eso2215/

#astrodon #astronomy #astrophotography

📷 ESO