From the classroom to outer space

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If you're not sure what science classes can do for you, read Natalie Batalha's recollections of how she began to discover her own strengths once she enrolled in a physics course in college. It made her realize how much she loved science.

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From that point on, her passion and career skyrocketed. Today she's an astronomer on the NASA team assigned to the Kepler mission: searching for Earth-like planets.
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Watch Natalie at work in this video, in which she and other astronomers explain the Kepler mission. Its key scientific instrument is a space telescope. Since it was launched in March 2009, it has allowed researchers to detect hundreds of planets that might be Earth-like.

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At the end of the video, Natalie proudly announces a historical milestone: on January 10, 2010, the Kepler team detected the first rocky planet orbiting a star other than our sun.
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Kepler 10-b, the first rocky planet orbiting a start other than our sun

A vision by artist Dana Berry

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Although it's too hot to support life, the discovery of a rocky planet (as opposed to, say, a gas planet) is extraordinarily significant because a rocky planet might host life. On a rocky planet, the most important requirement for life as we know it, liquid water, can pool and gather the substances that life needs.
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And so the scientists keep on searching for answers to soul-stirring questions. Are we alone? Or are there other Earths out there?

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LINKS AND MORE

* Hear Natalie's thoughts on the historical rocky planet discovery, in this video.

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* See a movie about Natalie's career path.

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* Read a brief description of astronomy.

* Go on a virtual field trip to the Palomar Observatory in California.

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* FAQ for high school students.

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* "The Ultimate Astronomy Career Guide" is an annotated compilation of carefully selected links to excellent career guides, overviews, interviews, day-in-the-lie, articles, and info on specialties.

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* Reference for the details in this post about rocky planets, and a great read: Planet Hunter - Geoff Marcy and the Search for Other Earths by Vicki Oransky Wittenstein.

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Geoff Marcy is one of the Kepler astronomers. He appears in the video about the mission.
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* Listen to podcasts by astronomers about lots of topics such as multiples universes, our explosive sun, black holes, and more. This is offered by the Astronomy Society of the Pacific.

Updated October 8, 2011

Life tip: a weight control trick

It's hard for me to avoid gaining weight, but I manage to do it by being active enough and by not eating (too much) more than I should. In fact, "Stop eating when you're full" is one of the heatlthy-lifestyle tips I give in my science book, The Night Olympic Team. But it's easier said than done!
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To be able to follow my own advice, I use a trick. Before sitting down for dinner, I plan an irresistible fun thing to do afterwards, so I can't... resist doing it--instead of having seconds. It's often a craft activity.
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For example, I just finished making a birdhouse pin. First, I sketched it on scratch paper. Then I made it out of modeling clay (the brand name is Sculpey). This took several sittings. After making sure I liked the birdhouse, I hardened it by baking it in the oven (pencil shown for scale):
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Next, I painted it with acrylic paint:
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Finally, I glued the hardware (available from bead shops, craft supplies shops, or jewelry supplies shops) on the back.
Chirp!

Guess who this girl grew up to be in my book, The Night Olympic Team

Readers of my science book, The Night Olympic Team, ask me for glimpses of the childhood and career path of key players in the book. Here's another one. .


Doesn't she look like she was born to play? .

Her science career started with a bang! At age twelve, she and a friend combined all of the glassware and products from their two chemistry sets, then heated the flasks to make something happen. Multicolor products started racing around. Bubbles overflowed. Then... BOOM! It splattered stinky brown ooze everywhere. Both girls let out a gasp and a giggle. There were no casualties, except for the kitchen, which had to be repainted. The girls got in big trouble for their recklessness. They could have been injured or even killed. .

As a kid growing up in France, she loved to read about biology to learn how living things work. She went to medical school to learn how the numan body can get out of whack and get sick, and how to fix it. skip line . .She signed up to do a research project. She was scared, because everything was new to her, but she did O.K. and she liked working in a lab. By the time she became a doctor, she had published her first scientific article in an international journal. skip line. . She never became the kind of doctor who sees patients. Instead, she did research. Her task was always to make a lab test work. But in truth, "All the science work I've ever done was to satisfy my hunger for play," she says. "I love to play computer sleuthing games, to figure out whodunit in crime novels, and recently I developed a passion for genealogy [that's family tree science], which is detective work into the past." . . WHO IS SHE? . .

* Caroline Hatton (that's me, your blogger), scientist (I help test athletes for prohibited performance-enhancing drugs) and author of The Night Olympic Team? . . * Francoise Lasne [pronounced fran-swahz lahn], scientist, who perfected a test to find prohibited drugs in athletes' samples? . . IF YOU GUESSED FRANCOISE LASNE, YOU WERE RIGHT! . . She's a scientist who catches sports cheaaters nd defends honest athletes who compete drug-free. Read about her work in the book, The Night Olympic Team. She is the current Director of the French national anti-doping laboratory (AFLD Departement des analyses). .
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It's a bird! It's a cat! Test your visual skills

This National Geographic interactive puzzle times how long it takes you to arrange shapes (such as triangles and squares) to cover a picture (such as a cat design).