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COBE Educational Resources
Students, educators and others interested in NASA's Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) mission or in cosmology can find background information here. Access to the COBE data, documentation, and technical information is available from the COBE Data Products Page.
Just for fun...
The COBE satellite was launched aboard a Delta rocket from the Vandenberg Air Force Base at Pt. Arguello, California on November 18, 1989. If you missed the launch, you can see the movie:
COBE launch movie (1MB- mpeg) COBE launch movie (1MB- mov)
How would the Earth appear if you were aboard the COBE satellite right now? Thanks to the Fourmilab in Switzerland, you can see the Earth from COBE (while keeping your feet on the ground). Note that the terminator (the imaginary line separating the sunlit side of Earth from the dark, or night, side) is in view (zoom out to see this more clearly). This is because, by design, COBE was placed in a "Sun-synchronous" orbit, as illustrated here. By pointing the COBE instruments directly away from the Earth and using a protective "Sun-Earth shield," neither sunlight nor light reflected from or emitted by the Earth enters the instruments, giving them the best possible view (from Earth orbit) of the remnant heat from the Big Bang.
Perspectives on Cosmology
The following documents are listed in order of increasing technical content, ranging from a popular account of cosmology to a full-fledged tutorial.
- Introduction to Cosmology - sponsored by NASA's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) mission
- Glossary of terms - also sponsored by NASA's WMAP mission
- Cosmology tutorial by COBE Science Team member Ned Wright of UCLA
Instructional Materials
- COBE Image Gallery (pdf)
- COBE Images
- 3D (VRML) models
- model of the interplanetary dust cloud
- model of the Milky Way Galaxy
- Multiwavelength Milky Way - includes a COBE DIRBE infrared map of our Galaxy
- NASA SpaceLink - searchable index of educational resources, for educators
Related Links
- Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Educational Resources
- Astronomy Educational Resources - sponsored by the SSDOO.
- Imagine the Universe - a service of the High-Energy Astrophysics Learning Center
- Amazing Space - a set of web-based activities primarily designed for classroom use, but made available for all to enjoy.
- Favorite Science Sites for students and teachers
