Patrick Browne of NUI Galway will be giving a public lecture on Monday, August 14 on Celestial Mechanics. You can book tickets for this lecture at www.astronomy.ie/lecture0608 If you cannot get to Dublin for the lecture, you can purchase a full DVD for the same price as a ticket. Simply log onto www.astronomy.ie/lectureDVD.html Patrick will show how basic mathematics (school level calculus and algebra) is combined with the work of Sir Isaac Newton to provide us with the basic laws that have been used for centuries to determine planetary motion and predict stellar events (such as transits, close approaches of planets, etc...). In particular, the talk will demonstrate the following. 1. How some of Kepler's Laws are derived (e.g. Keplers Third Law: A Line joining a planet and its star sweeps out equal areas during any equal intervals of time) 2. That the planets do indeed orbit in a plane (i.e. that the motions of the solar systems are essentially a two-dimensional problem) 3. That the planets' orbits follow elliptic paths Venue: Henry Grattan Building, Dublin City University, Glasnevin, Dublin 9 Date of Lecture: Monday August 14 Time: 8:00pm Admission: €5 (€3 children/students) To book places call (01) 847 0777 or visit www.astronomy.ie ALL ARE WELCOME! P.S. Get details on the Perseid Meteor Shower this weekend and Star-B-Q on August 26 at www.astronomy.ie