Outreach

2024 Total Solar Eclipse

For the 2024 total eclipse, the Department of Physics collaborated with the Department of Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences to host an event on Brown University’s main green for the public. Volunteers from the department of Physics arrived with a collection of solar telescopes for individuals to watch the eclipse through. Among the volunteers were several members of the Observational Cosmology, Gravitational Lensing, and Astrophysics Group including Anthony Englert (PhD Student), Zacharias Escalante (PhD Candidate), Jess Nelson (PhD Student), Jess Washington (Masters Student), and Pei-Jun Huang (Undergraduate Researcher).

    This is a time-lapse of the 2024 Eclipse, taken from Providence RI by PhD Student Anthony Englert. It happened that 4/8 was a great day to be imaging the sun due to the activity scattered around the main disk along with the prominences on its edges. Some high-atmosphere thin clouds were rolling over throughout the event, which is causing the small “jitter” from frame-to-frame along with changes in the illumination of the disk.
 

Among the telescopes brought to the event were three Meade ETX 90mm GoTo telescopes which were fitted with white-light filters, making them safe to point at the sun. Volunteers from the Department of Physics can be seen keeping the telescopes on-target and answering questions individuals have about the event.

To create the time-lapse, Anthony had a camera attached to Brown University’s Coronado SolarMax I Hα Telescope which was recording almost the entire event. A live view from the camera was displayed on a computer for everyone at the event to see.

In addition to the three Meade telescopes, the Department of Physics brought two Hα telescopes. The Coronado was reserved exclusively for imaging, but we setup an additional one for people to view the eclipse through. Pictured here is Pei-Jun helping keep the telescope on target while people watch the eclipse.