<http://www.astronomy.ie/auroracruise.php> Aurora Cruise Evening Classes <http://www.astronomy.ie/class/class1011.php> <http://astronomy.ie/sub/index.html> Membership <http://astronomy.ie/shop/CPC/index.html> Shop 1. The Births and Deaths of Stars For billions of years the Sun provided energy to Earth, bathing it in a constant glow of light and warmth creating the ideal conditions for life - and ultimately humans - to thrive. Day in, day out, it has hung in the skies over the heads of humanity for millions of years as something we take for granted. In a couple of billion years, our Sun will have no more hydrogen 'fuel' left, and will have to use helium in its vast nuclear furnace in its core. When this happens, the star will begin to grow larger and larger. As it grows, turning into a red giant, it will devour Mercury and Venus, and possibly even destroy Earth, vaporising the three planets into a gas in a matter of moments. When the Sun completely runs out of fuel, the outer layers of the red giant will blow off, creating a huge nebula that we often admire in images from the Hubble Space Telescope. Bigger stars experience much more violent deaths, and explode as a supernova - an enormous catastrophe that releases so much energy that a single explosion can be brighter than an entire galaxy. Some of them even turn into those mysterious objects known as black holes - dead stars with a gravity field so strong that not even light can escape. Astronomy Ireland's Public Lecture on November 14th, Dr Gareth Murphy - one of Ireland's top astrophysicists - will explore the births, lives, and deaths of stars, including our own Sun, to the general public in Trinity College Dublin. Tickets for the lecture are only €7 (€5 members rate), and can be ordered online at www.astronomy.ie or by calling (01) 890 11 11. The lecture takes place in Trinity College Dublin <http://www.tcd.ie/Maps/map.php> , on Monday, November 14th at 8pm. There will be a social reception afterwards in The Lombard Inn with complimentary food. BOOK TICKETS <http://astronomy.ie/lecture201111.php> ORDER DVD <http://www.astronomy.ie/lectureDVD.php> 2. Solar Activity and Astronomy Ireland Sun Shows The Sun is currently dotted with relatively small sunspots - cooler regions on the surface of the star - but a massive group of spots several times bigger than Earth is emerging from the side of the Sun. This group contains the biggest sunspots seen on the Sun for many years. Sunspots are created from localised magnetic fields on the Sun, and can often cause solar flares. This current group of sunspots has already unleashed vast flares into space, which were detected on Earth. As the Sun rotates, the sunspots will eventually face Earth. If a huge solar flare occurs at this point, it could have damaging consequences for our satellites, and will cause spectacular aurorae (Northern and Southern Lights). It is possible to see sunspots from Earth, but only with specialised equipment to protect our eyes. SPECIAL SUN SHOWS Tomorrow (Saturday, November 5th) Astronomy Ireland will run a special Sun Watch at its premises at Airside Enterprise Centre in Swords, Co Dublin to give the general public a chance to see these devastating sunspots with their own eyes. Using specialised telescopes, Astronomy Ireland will also be able to show some of the solar flares that blast away from the sunspots. The Sun Watch is a free event and will begin at 1pm at Unit A8, Airside Enterprise Centre, Swords, Co Dublin (visit www.astronomy.ie/map for directions). More details can be found at www.astronomy.ie or by calling (01) 890 11 11. 3. Astronomy Ireland Astro-Expo Astronomy Ireland's annual Astro-Expo will take place this year on Saturday, November 19th. The Astro-Expo is the biggest Astronomy and Space exhibition on this island and is hosted by Astronomy Ireland every year. Throughout the years the Expo has comprised of rockets, meteorites, imaging displays (including impressive astro-photography stands), telescope demonstrations, information on astronomy degree courses and a full compliment of lectures and activities. This year's event is no exception, and is set to be a fantastic day out. This year’s headline speaker is Dr. Cormac O'Raifeartaigh, Waterford Institute of Technology, who will give a talk entitled ‘Faster Than Light - Was Einstein Wrong? In September 2011, a group of scientists announced that they had observed subatomic particles travelling at speeds greater than the speed of light in vacuum. The finding has been met with great scepticism as it appears to be in conflict with Einstein’s theory of relativity. This lecture will describe the experiment and explain the grounds for scepticism. We are still finalising some details of the Astro-Expo, please keep checking our website <http://www.astronomy.ie/astroexpo11.php> for more information. <http://www.astronomy.ie/> Astronomy Ireland The world's most popular Astronomy Club <http://www.astronomy.ie/> www.astronomy.ie ( subscribe / unsubscribe <http://lists.redbrick.dcu.ie/mailman/listinfo/astronomy> )