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Stars and other heavenly combustibles at the Hayden Planetarium
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Star [stahr]. noun.
L.stella.
1. Cosmos which appear as ‘fixed luminous points’ in the night sky.
2. ‘A heavenly body consisting of five or six points and considered as influencing humankind and events.
3. A combination of hydrogen and helium triggered by anti-matter and bonded by fusion in its core.
4. A celebrated public figure.
5. Grantors of wishes.
The Mayans used them to predict the end of days. Nostradamus charted their iridescent paths to write luminous quatrains. We confer this dazzling title upon the best and brightest of our respective societies. We derive meaning from these points of light without knowing much about them.
I refer to stars, those prismatic combustibles in the sky made of hydrogen and helium which hold our imaginations like Helen of Troy.
As the current subject of a multi-million dollar exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History, "Journey to the Stars" , offers an illuminating glimpse into the lives of stars in our own galaxies and beyond. Narrated by Academy Award-winner, Whoopi Goldberg and projected on the planetarium's demi-dome, viewers are treated to spectacular 3-D renderings of the Sun's corona flashing hotter-than- hot gases during an eclipse which suddenly envelop the entire room. For the mad-physicists in the audience, thundering supernova explosions splay numerous elements including carbon, gold and oxygen into our space , all of which we humans happen to already contain a trace of. Alongside stunning renderings of the Earth taken from satellite footage and generously provided with the support of NASA, images of distant galaxies and planets, red and white dwarfs and those ever elusive black holes are smashed together into a mysterious cosmic soup in perfect chaotic order.
Perhaps the most interesting question the show poses is 'What place do stars occupy in the giant cosmic soup ?' With life on gigantic planets taking precedence in scientific studies and strange anti-gravitational matter flowing around brewing a perfect storm, you'll be surprised to find out just how much stars have contributed to the creation of our solar systems and more importantly, to our own existence.
If anything, after this journey, we can be one step closer to figuring our why we get such a nostalgic feeling when we look up into the night sky and see those bright balls winking at us.
Journey to the Stars is curated and created by the museum's astrophysicists and contains stunning telescopic images mixed with simulations. Show times are Monday - Friday from 10:30 a.m to 4:30 p.m every half hour (Wednesday's show begins at 11:00 a.m) and Saturday - Sunday from 10:30 a.m to 5:00 p.m.
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