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Period: 476 to 550
Aryabhata
Aryabhatta was born in 476BC Bihar,India and died in 550BC. He is famous for writing books on maths and astronamy and some of those books are still around today. Aryabhatta's books have very advanced knowlede in them. It states that the planets move in certain paths. Aryabhatta also correctly explained the causes of luna and solar eclipses and this dis-improved on the popular Indian belief that a demon,Rahu, caused the eclipses. -
Period: Feb 19, 1473 to May 24, 1543
Copernicus
Copernicus was born in 1473 Torun,Poland and died in 1543. Copernicus was famous because he beleived that the sun was the centre of the solar system and the Earth revolved around it when everyone else thought that the sun revolved around the Earth. -
Period: Feb 15, 1564 to
Galileo
Galelio was born in 1564 Pisa,Italy and died in 1642. Galileo was the first astronomer to use science to find out what the Earth is made of. Galelio was a famous inventor because he improved on the telescope, water thermometer and a compound microscope. He used the telescope one night and found out that the Milky way is made out of millions of stars. -
Halley's Comet
Comets are left over from the formtion of planets and stars billions of years ago and contains gas, ice, rocks and dust. Halley's Comet was named after the astrononer Edmund Halley. Halley's Comet appears every 75-76 years. The last time it was seen was in 1986 and is estimated to come back in 2061. Halley's Comet is about 15km by 8km in size. -
CSIRO
CSIRO stands for the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. The CSIRO was founded in 1926.The CSIRO is a big lab. One of the things the CSIRO has done is develop a satellite that moniters the environment. It has also made a radio telescope which is the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder. It is a telescope that can capture radio images over a large area of sky. -
First Animal in Space
The first animal to go to space were fruit flies on the 20th February 1947. -
Laika
Laika was a dog. Lakia was famous because she orbited around the Earth although in 2002 it was said that she died from over heating hours after the launch. -
NASA
NASA stands for National Aeronautics and Space Administration. NASA was founded on the 29th July 1958 by the then U.S President Dwight Eisenhower. One of the things NASA is doing is exploring the solar system using robots to collect samples and data from the surface of other planets. -
Yuri Gagarin
Yuri Gagarin was born in 1934 Klushino, Russia and died in 1968. Yuri Gagarin became famous because he was both the first person to enter space and the first person to orbit around the Earth. -
Mars
On the 20th June 1976, the Viking probe began preparing to send its lander down on the 4th of July. On July 20th the Viking 1 lander became the first spacecraft to land on mars. -
Space Shuttles
The first space shuttle mission was on the 12th April 1981 and the last space shuttle mission was on the 8th July 2011. The Space Shuttle Challenger was different to all the other space shuttles because of its disaster when it fell apart 73 seconds into its take-off causing all the crew to die. There have been 6 space shuttles built. A space shuttle is different to a spacecraft because it can be reused and can carry more crew. -
Hubble Telescope
The Hubble Telescope is a large telescope in space. It was sent up in 1990. The Hubble telescope takes pictures of planets,stars and galexies. It has seen galexies that are billions of light years away. The Hubble telescope was named after Edwin Hubble, a famous astronomer. -
Pluto
In Augest 24 2006, Pluto was declared no longer a planet. Pluto itself didnt change but the meaning of 'planet' did. Besides being round and orbiting the Sun, a palnet's gravity must clear the objects around it but Pluto does not do this. -
American Space Missions
The Mercury program ran from 1959-1963 and its purpose was to put a human in orbit around the Earth. The Apollo program ran from 1961-1972 and its purpose was to land humans on the moon and to bring them back safely. The Space Shuttle program ran from 1981-2011 and its purpose was to take large parts into space to make the International Space Satation.
