A wide open space (It could be your backyard or a park.) Two Hula-Hoops (Alternatively, you could use two flat rocks or bricks that you can sit on.) A yardstick or meterstick (Use one that has clear ...

Let’s try a demonstration that we all enjoyed in elementary school. Close one eye, hold out your thumb at arm’s length, and align it with an object on the other side of the room. Without moving your ...

Have you ever wondered how astronomers measure the distance to other objects in the universe? How do they make claims that this nebula is 1,500 light years distance or that galaxy is 2.5 million light ...

It isn't easy to measure the distance of stars. We can't travel to them, counting the miles as we go, nor can we simply say that brighter stars are closer and dimmer ones more distant. Instead, we ...

A team of astronomers has used asteroseismology, or the study of stellar oscillations, to accurately measure the distance of stars from the Earth. Their research examined thousands of stars and ...

Astronomers from the U.S. Naval Observatory (USNO), in collaboration with others from the REsearch Consortium On Nearby Stars (RECONS), have determined new distances to a group of faint young stars ...

How do scientists calculate the distance from Earth to a star or galaxy? originally appeared on Quora - the knowledge sharing network where compelling questions are answered by people with unique ...

Try this experiment: extend your thumb at arm’s length and close one eye at a time. Your thumb will seem to ‘jump’ between two positions as you switch the eye that is closed. That jump is known as ...

University of Newcastle provides funding as a member of The Conversation AU. Let’s talk numbers for a moment. The moon is approximately 384,000 kilometres away, and the sun is approximately 150 ...

For most of us, the countless bright spots in the nighttime sky all seem to be stars. But in fact, some of those spots are actually planets, or distant suns, or even entire galaxies located billions ...