Walter Lewin is back with installments five and six of the eight lectures he’s taping for Japanese TV. The MIT professor known for his entertaining online lectures has come out of retirement to go live. Get there — MIT’s Building 6 — early. Read more
It’s plants and planets this week in Boston. So far, we count four separate sites to observe the Transit of Venus across the sun. At the Museum of Science they’ll have number of telescopes will be set up on the Museum garage roof and you’ll need a reservation.” Every 100 years or so, a pair of these transits occurs, separated by about 8 years. Scientists take advantage of these opportunities to learn more about the solar system. In 1761 and 1769, for instance, hundreds of expeditions—including one with a young James Cook—were sent throughout the world to observe the transit of Venus in an effort to predict the distance between Earth and the Sun. During the coming transit, some astronomers will attempt to learn more about Venus’s atmosphere based on how it appears when it is only halfway across the solar disk. Read more