Related papers: Build your own analemma
The observation that the shadows of objects change during the course of the day and also for a fixed time during a year led curious minds to realize that the Sun could be used as a timekeeper. However, the daily motion of the Sun has some…
I describe how to obtain a rather good experimental determination of the eccentricity of the Earth orbit, as well as the obliquity of the Earth rotation axis, by measuring, over the course of a year, the elevation of the Sun as a function…
We proposed an analytical model for the calculus of illumination time of the Earth for any time of year and any latitude, this model assumes the obliquity of the ecliptic as constant, the light beams as parallels, the Earth as spherical,…
The figure of the Sun reflects its inner structure and dynamics, influencing also the perihelion precession of close orbiting bodies, like Mercury. To study the solar figure from ground, the deformation on the solar image induced by the…
Second part of a didactic sequence of activities on some topics of Astronomy, related mainly with the real shape of the Earth, the gravitational interactions between our planet and other celestial bodies, and the resulting movement of the…
We express the position of the Sun in the sky as a function of time and the observer's geographic coordinates. Our method is based on applying rotation matrices to vectors describing points on the celestial sphere. We also derive direct…
I present a novel macroscopic wave geometric effect of the sunbeam occurring when the sunbeam directional (shadow by a bar) angle c velocity is observed on the earth surface and a sunbeam global positioning device with a needle at the…
Atmospheric refraction is responsible for the bending of light-rays in the atmosphere. It is a result of the continuous decrease in the refractive index of the air as a function of altitude. A well-known consequence of this phenomenon is…
The Earth's albedo is a fundamental climate parameter for understanding the radiation budget of the atmosphere. It has been traditionally measured from space platforms, but also from the ground for sixteen years from Big Bear Solar…
The variation in the figure axis in the Earth owing to the geophysical causes directly reflects the physical state of the Earth and therefore, it is important for understanding the Earth. Of the variations in the figure axis arising from…
It is customary to employ a semi-spherical scale model to describe the apparent path of the Sun across the sky, whether it be its diurnal motion or its variation throughout the year. A flat surface and three bent semi-rigid wires…
In this monograph (written in 1973-1974) the author uses the theory of mechanics of the inertless mass to investigate the structure of heavenly bodies of the solar system. The structure of the Sun and planets is the sole reason of the…
It will be shown that the rotation of the Earth in the Earth-Moon system can be detected by comparing the deflection of a Foucault pendulum at noon on the one hand and at midnight on the other hand. More precisely, on 21 June the midnight…
The obliquity of a terrestrial planet is an important clue about its formation and critical to its climate. Previous studies using simulated photometry of Earth show that continuous observations over most of a planet's orbit can be inverted…
Derivation of the following formulae for solar position as seen from orbiting planet based on a simplified model: sunrise direction formula, solar declination formula, sunrise equation, daylight duration formula, solar altitude formula,…
Helioseismology, the study of global solar oscillations, has proved to be an extremely powerful tool for the investigation of the internal structure and dynamics of the Sun. Studies of time changes in frequency observations of solar…
The kinematics of the Solar zenith passage on the Earth was shown as a simple harmonic motion. This analytical model used the uniform circular motion to describe the Earth's rotation relative to its axis and relative to the Sun, also this…
The polar motion data is analyzed to obtain accurate position of the figure axis referred to the Earth-fixed frame. The variation of the figure axis should be the basic object to which the geophysical events are linked. By the method of…
The objective reality of the Earth's motion about the Sun was finally proven observationally by Bradley (1727) when he correctly explained the ~20'' annual, elliptical motions of stars as being due to aberration of starlight caused by the…
With only five photographs of the Sun at different dates we show that the mass of Sun can be calculated by using a telescope, a camera, and the Kepler's third law. With these photographs we are able to calculate the distance between Sun and…