May 01 2009 09:01 UTC | Views: 1742 | Comments: 1 Posted by: TonyF in Videos
David Alan Grier, editor of IEEE Annals of History of Computing, host a lecture on the evolution of calculating the return and orbit of Halley's Comet in 1758. How the calculation where preformed by the "human computer" before the modern computer was invented.
Comet Halley was most recently observed in 2003 by three of the Very Large Telescopes at Paranal, Chile, when Halley's magnitude was 28.2. The telescopes observed Halley, at the faintest and furthest any comet has ever been imaged, in order to verify a method for finding very faint Trans-Neptunian objects. Henceforth, astronomers will be able to observe it throughout its orbit.
