Astronomy and Space

The expansive boundaries of space have always inspired awe and incredulity in people's mind. Over the ages humans have tried to unfold its seemingly unfathomable mysteries. Astronomy is the branch of science devoted to the study of space, its evolution and all celestial bodies that lies beyond the Earth's atmosphere. It has been instrumental in breaching the frontiers of our knowledge when it comes to space.

From the early days of civilization people used to wonder about the night sky, the stars, and the change of the day into night but reality always eluded them as they did not have the telescope at their disposal. It was after the invention of the telescope that many truths about the universe and the space were discovered. There are different types of subjects that fall in the zone of astronomy including the likes of astrometry, making of calendars, observational astronomy, celestial navigation etc. It was only in the 20th century that such divisional studies were truly applied and this has resulted in a grand success with numerous amazing and exciting truths being discovered. The two branches of astronomy (observational and theoretical) deal with different matters. Observational astronomy is all about using the formulas and definitions of physics and through it acquisition and analysis of the objects and movements of the space. The other branch includes the use of computers and then the explanation of the same objects theoretically. It is not that these two fields are completely different from each other; in fact they are considered complimentary to each other. The truths and movements described theoretically are justified by the confirmation of the observational studies.

Just like the endless space, our queries and curiousness about the space is equally unending. Though it seems like a blue umbrella, the truth behind this is absolutely fascinating. The sky and space holds such fascination that for centuries no one has been able to answer all of the questions that we ask. Here we can name a lot of scientists and astronomers who has just donated their whole life in finding solutions to these questions. A few astronomers whom we can name in this respect are Galileo Galilei, Claudius Ptolemy, Johannes Kepler, Edmund Halley etc.

Galileo Galilei was one of the prominent scientists to have contributed certain absolutely valuable materials like the 'calculating compass' for solving the mathematics problems. It was he who invented the first telescope like that of the modern day glasses and this was a very successful invention. He even invented the second telescope and this was twenty times more powerful than the previous one. The list of his discoveries in space is extremely long with that of the moon, stars in the Milky Way, and the four largest satellites of Jupiter coming under his belt. The presence of Venus was supposedly discovered by him only.

Next we have an astronomer who has made a remarkable contribution to science by discovering the Halley's Comet. This was discovered by Edmund Halley and therefore is named after him. He was the first person to have predicted the existence of the comets and their accurate movement around the Sun on the orbit. This fact has even been proved by Halley's Comet when it returned in 1758, as predicted by him.

We also have Nicholas Copernicus who established the fact that the Ssn rests almost in the center of the universe and the Earth moves around it by completing one whole circle in one year.

We can conclude by saying that the examples above are just the indicators of what a fascinating world lies beyond us and how astronomy is helping us understand it.