Related papers: Maria Reiche's Line to Archaeoastronomy
The most famous geoglyphs of Peru are the "Nazca Lines". Considered as one of the mysteries of the ancient world, they have been included among the UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Located in a large region between the towns of Nazca and Palpa,…
The mysterious lines in the desert of Nazca in southern Peru received many attempts at an explanation. We discuss the possibility that their origin is based on solar eclipses which could have evoked some kind of "reaction" by the…
It seems that the Nazca Lines, ancient geoglyphs of a Peruvian dry pampa, had some astronomical orientations. Here we discuss a geoglyph representing a frigatebird and its orientation towards the setting of Fomalhaut, using freely available…
We analyze the geometrical structure of the astonishing Nasca geoglyphs in terms of their fractal dimension with the idea of dating these manifestations of human cultural engagements in relation to one another. Our findings suggest that the…
The paper proposes an ancient landscape design as an example of graphic design for an age and place where no written documents existed. It is created by a network of earthworks, which constitute the remains of an extensive ancient…
There has been a long standing debate about the existence of maya constellations, but there are several sources of evidences that favour this hypothesis: mural paintings, stelae and codex. In this work, we have recovered and compiled…
Radionuclides with half-lives ranging from some years to billions of years presumably synthesized outside of the solar system are now recorded in `live' or `fossil' form in various types of materials, like meteorites or the galactic cosmic…
The Gaia mission will have a profound impact on our understanding of the structure and dynamics of the Milky Way. Gaia is providing an exhaustive census of stellar parallaxes, proper motions, positions, colors and radial velocities, but…
I present an overview of the science goals and achievements of ongoing spectroscopic surveys of individual stars in the nearby Universe. I include a brief discussion of the development of the field of Galactic Archaeology - using the fossil…
The Caral civilization developed on the north-central coast of Peru and had an occupation period between 2870 and 1970 years BC. The first studies carried out in the field of archaeoastronomy showed evidence of possible astronomical…
During the voyages that led him to discover the new continent bearing his name, Amerigo Vespucci made interesting astronomical observations of the southern sky. In the past, his data have been interpreted with criteria that do not follow…
Nuclear gamma-ray lines constitute the most genuine diagnostic tool of nuclear astrophysics, since they allow for an unambiguous identification of isotopic species. Continuous improvement in instrumentation led to the discovery of several…
The Gaia mission has revolutionized our view of the Milky Way and its satellite citizens. The field of Galactic Archaeology has been piecing together the formation and evolution of the Galaxy for decades, and we have made great strides,…
Cultural astronomy is an interdisciplinary area of research that studies how perceptions and concepts related to the sky are part of the worldview of a culture. One of its branches, archaeoastronomy, focuses on the material remains of past…
A general overview of the understanding of our Galaxy is presented following the lines of its main structures: halo, disc, bulge/bar. This review is emphasising some "Time Domain Astronomy" contributions. On the one hand the distance and…
Russell (1948) famously described eclipses as the "royal road" to stellar astrophysics. From photometric and spectroscopic observations it is possible to measure the masses and radii (to 1% or better!), and thus surface gravities and mean…
HI observations in the 21cm line have been a principal tool for investigating the large-scale structure of the Milky Way. This review considers what was learned in the first decade after the discovery of the 21cm line, and how that…
The Astrophysics of microquasars - galactic miniatures of the far distant quasars - has become one of the most active fields of modern Astronomy in recent years. Here I review the astronomical methods used for the investigation of these…
Margherita Hack observed with the Galileo telescope at the Asiago Astrophysical Observatory from September 1951 to March 1954. Using the spectroscopic facilities of the observatory, Margherita contributed to the stellar study of novae,…
Astrobiology or exobiology is a relatively new area of science that investigates the possibilities of finding life in other places in the universe. This not only includes the exploration of planets near or distant to Earth, but also the…