For us, as for many science lovers, it’s currently our favorite season. Some might even call it the most wonderful time of the year: Shark Week. The Discovery Channel’s annual full-channel takeover, devoted to all things predatory and sleek, is one of the single-most anticipated science events of the year. So we were a little […]
The Museum is always interested in educating its fans, whether that’s within our exhibition halls or online. If your daily social media experience doesn’t include the Houston Museum of Natural Science, you might be missing out on news that can feed your noggin. Photo courtesy of melontao via Instagram For example, this week one visitor […]
We’re hosting late-night this weekend. On Saturday, August 10, the George Observatory will be staying open until the wee ours of 2 a.m. in order to proffer the best possible viewing of the annual Perseid Meteor Shower. Each year in mid-August, a stream of debris ejected by the Swift-Tuttle comet, called the Perseid cloud, becomes […]
Editor’s Note: This blog comes to us courtesy of longtime volunteer John Moffitt. I lead tours through the new HMNS Paleo Hall and spend a lot of time in the Paleozoic. Sometimes this ties in with a class on trilobites. During these tours, I answer a lot of questions like, “What is a trilobite, anyway?” […]
Venus remains in the west at dusk. It outshines everything but the Sun and Moon, so you can begin observing it during deep twilight. As August ends, Venus begins to approach Saturn. Saturn is now shining in the south/southwest at dusk. Although not as bright as Venus, it does outshine the stars around it, so […]
Royalty and cracking codes and castaways, oh my! It might sound like a plot summary of a new hit novel, but it’s actually a few of the highlights that our online followers liked and shared this week. From a fancy dinner with Prince Charles to edible insects to the difference between Dimetrodons and Uma Thurman, […]
The moon’s appearance in the sky follows a 29.5-day cycle. During the cycle, it first appears as a crescent. The lighted portion that you can in the night sky see becomes larger as days pass, growing until you see a full moon. As more days pass, the lighted portion gets smaller again, until no moon […]
When most people think of a port city, they think of beaches and a lot of waterfront property. They think of palm trees and salty sea breezes. But not all port cities are on the coast. In the United States, there are numerous inland ports (ports on fresh waterways) such as those in Milwaukee and […]
“Today we will: build a robotic hand; build a roving chassis for your robotic prototype; program your partner; study gearations; learn robotic parts; visit the Wiess Energy Hall and build a model magic robot.” So began my day as a Roving Robot Xplorations camper, when I was greeted by this extensive, exciting to-do list. All […]
In the time before TV or radio, people had to entertain themselves. Some of the quickest games to start were word games. Either take a theme and pun away, or set up different rules like starting the next word with the letter that ended the previous word. For more formal entertainment, you could create a […]
