ICIMSS - student course

Physics
Course in Information Retrieval

COSMOS
The multimedia data base
** The multimedia data base COSMOS contains:

over 500 of the most beautiful photographs of the sky,
videos and animations,
interactive maps of the sky,
singularities of the Universe,
practical advises how to observe the sky.

All information is divided into three parts;

WORTH TO KNOW - gives information about such methods of the sky observing, which will enable you to see the most interesting spatial bodies and to know about cosmic technologies, astronautics and developments of the astronomical knowledge.

CATALOGUE OF PHOTOGRAPHS - contains over 500 of the carefully selected, most beautiful photographs of spatial bodies taken among others by the Hubble Cosmic Telescope, space probes and optical and radio- telescopes located on the Earths surface.

MAPS OF THE SKY - you can plan the observation of the most interesting spatial bodies in the real night sky.

Thanks to the clear interface you can easily move through all pages of the publication. Further subjects you select from the menu located on each screen; clicking the "up" arrow will take you forward one level in the menu structure, clicking the "to a side" arrow will show you parallel topics. All windows (also hypertexts) you will close by clicking on the screen behind them or clicking the "close" icon. Videos are marked by the "Film reel" icon, after opening a specific video, click the right button to start it.

WORTH TO KNOW
divided into 8 main subjects containing more important information:

Night sky contains videos about the Comets, Planets, Meteors and Artificial satellites.
Face to face with the Cosmos contains the following presentations: Spring sky, Summer sky, Autumn sky, Winter sky, How far are the stars and Stars in the space.
To see as much as possible describes the methods of observing the night sky with the use of binoculars and telescopes.
Sky within our grasp gives information about: how to find the most interesting stars and constellations in the night sky, how the observational instruments work and where the biggest telescopes are located. Select one from the following topics: Binoculars, Is it worth having a telescope, Lens telescopes, The Earths eyes, Cosmic telescopes, Overhearing the Universe, Buying a telescope.
Wandering stars gives information about planets orbiting the Sun and building the Solar System. You can select from the following: Solar System, Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune.
Singularities of the Universe contains photographs of the seven most beautiful spatial bodies. These are: Solar eclipse, Eruption of the Loki volcano on IO, Saturn rings, Stellar trough, Eta Carinae - the death of the star, Gravitational lens, To the Universes ends.
Time machine contains the history of astronomical and cosmic researches, profiles of scientists and principles ruling over the Universe. You can select from the following: The Gods Universe, Crystal spheres, Cosmos - a machine, Unreasonable cosmic principles.
How to use the maps of the sky helps to find the specific objects in the sky. You can use the Atlas of the sky consisting of maps presenting the celestial sphere. Besides - four selected constellations are presented on the observational foils, which help you to find these constellations in the sky. Cover the real sky with the foil to find without any problems your constellations.

CATALOGUE OF THE PHOTOGRAPHS
You will find here the photographs of the most remote galaxies located at a distance of over 10 billion light years; proplanetary disks around the new born stars; galaxies, which cores are black holes; remains after explosion of supernova; volcanic eruption on the Jupiter moon - IO.

The photographs in the catalogue were grouped in the following sections: Solar System, Astronomical instruments, Stars and groups of stars, Nebulas and galaxies. Each catalogue section has the necessary comments. All photographs are described in details. The great attractions are the three-dimensional photographs of the Mars surface taken by the Pathfinder probe in 1997. You will see them three-dimensionally when wearing special glasses.

MAPS OF THE SKY
Interactive maps of the sky are the separate part of the program. Eight of them present the sky along the celestial equator, the others - the polar zones. When you click on the "Option" icon you will get the map graticule with the Galaxy equator RG and ecliptic plane (E), names and boundaries of the constellations, the lightest stars and also the lightest spatial bodies, which you can often see with a naked eye or with the use of a small telescope. These objects are interactive - select with the mouse pointer the symbol of the object of your choice to see its photography and information about its location and luminosity. The section containing MAPS will help you to find all objects, you have seen in the program, in the real sky. Additional help are the observational foils, enclosed to the publication.

Page elaborated by Teresa Modrzejewska

March 1999

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