The Ryerson Astronomical Society's quintessential purpose is to encourage all humanity to behold the celestial luminaries in hushed awe.
Upcoming Events
Next Meeting: For Spring quarter, we are meeting every Monday night, 8PM, in Ryerson 358. We usually have a short talk by a member of the club, or occasionally a member of the faculty. Titles of talks are announced via our email list, usually on the Saturday preceding the talk. See our schedule of talks for Spring 2008.
Ryerson Wednesdays: Public observing hours in Fall and Winter are 7:30-9:30 PM and 8:30–10:30 PM in Spring. Viewings are cancelled if the sky is cloudy. Take the main Ryerson stairs all the way to the roof.
Calendar:There is a google calendar with the full calendar of events.
Note: If the door to Ryerson is locked, you can enter through the south door of Eckhart. Go to the second floor and cross over to Ryerson from there. If you have trouble, you can call +1-773-702-7625 (or 2-7625 from any campus phone) which rings in the office and the dome. A map of where Ryerson Physical Laboratory is on campus is here.
A little introduction about ourselves...
Its beginnings lost in the misty shrouds of history, the observatory has existed since 1900 and the RAS as a student organization at the University of Chicago since 1952 (when our logbooks began). We operate a 107 year-old 6.25-inch Petitdidier refractor, along with a modern 10-inch (250mm) f/6 Newtonian, both mounted on a hundred and ten year old Warner & Swasey mount. The mount is painted the same color (blue) as the great Yerkes 40 inch refractor mount. Carl Sagan was a member a long, long time ago. We're prone to holding meetings every week and giving some sort of lecture on topics usually only remotely related to astronomy. More history here.
RAS information
- Sign up for our mailing list
- Sign up for our summer-time mailing list
- RAS Logbook: 1952-1964 John Crocker typed in the entire contents of the logbook. Also available is a RTF version Warning: 150KB!
- Guide to reading the RAS logbook
- Membership information
- How to contact us
- RAS constitution
- Schedules of talks: 2004-2005, 2005-2006, 2006-2007
Budget Request Items
The RAS has a tradition of requesting funding from Annual Allocations for ambitious projects. Here are items we've requested in recent years:
Wopat
Student Astronomy Talks, no PhDs allowed.
(weekly talks run by the Astro grad students)
RAS Statement on Year 2000 Quad Floodlights
Photos
Comet Holmes
October 29th, 2007
Comet Holmes through the six-inch refractor.
Comet Holmes at Ryerson Observatory. 36x5s exposures, 0.25m f/6.
2003 UB313 animation
2005 August 8-9
RAS member Steven Lucy took these two images of 2003 UB313 at the University of Chicago's Yerkes Observatory, using the 41" reflector.
Yerkes Observatory Aurora
May 15th, 2005
Click for many more
images of the aurora.
Aurora of November 8th, 2004
CCD
Images (Including supernovae 1998aq!)
RAS Photo Albums
- Messier 51 - Interacting Galaxy Pair
- RAS Observatory and members
- The Solar System
- Eclipses
- Comet Hale-Bopp
- Comet Hyakutake Images
- Yerkes Trip Images
- Madison, WI trip Images
Famous Members Corner
Look into our old logbooks for an entry about activities in the RAS office. Here's another entry by this member regarding Chicago temperatures. Following his example, this shaky phrase still appears in modern logbooks, especially in the month of January.
Other space and astronomy sources
- University Of Chicago Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics
- International Dark Sky Association
- Space and Astronomy News:
- Sky Online by Sky Publications, home of Sky and Telescope.
- SpaceRef
- Astronomy magazine
- Jet Propulsion Laboratory
- Space Telescope Science Institute and the Hubble Space Telescope
- The Digitized Sky Survey GIF and FITS images of any coordinates.
- Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy, a guide to popular and media misconceptions about astronomy
- Advocacy organizations:
- SEDS: Students for the Exploration and Development of Space
- The Mars Society
- National Space Society
- The Planetary Society
Contact:
Joe Cottral, RAS President: jcottral@uchicago.edu.
Dean W.
Armstrong
/ (773) 702-3147 / (773) 931-9400 cell /dean+ras@uchicago.edu
Acknowledgements: Thanks to the University of Chicago Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics for providing us a place on their web server and technical support.