What do we know about the universe? This is the question that prompts “The second star on the right …”, the 2021 edition of the Month of Science, the review of scientific culture promoted by the Historical Libraries and Archives of the Municipality of Modena and which, from November 5 to 27, proposes to children and adults a wonderful journey between astronomy and astrophysics. In the year of Dante’s festivities, the wonders of “seeing the stars” offer an itinerary consisting of books, games, experiments and notes from the smallest to the infinite as well as encounters with heroes, rotating in attendance, respecting safety rules in the fight against Covid, and the Internet, all for free.
The program opens Friday, November 5, 6:30 p.m., at the Crocetta Library, with an “astronomical journey among the mysteries of the universe” led by Andrea Simati, Director of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Bologna and author of the popular text “L’dark universe” by Rita Fiorisi, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Bologna. University of Bologna. The meeting will attempt to provide answers to many intriguing things about the universe, starting with: How big is the universe? From what is it made? We where are we? What are the stars? And how far are they?
Saturday, November 6, the appointment, this time only online on Facebook and Twitter (@bibliotechemodena), with “Lady Comets” Amalia Ercole Fenzi: the first woman in Italy to graduate in aeronautical engineering in 1962, was a professor of orbit mechanics at Politecnico di Milano and worked With NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) directing the Rosetta mission from 2004 to 2014. With her, her youngest of five children, Elvina, and herself a research professor in nuclear engineering, with whom she wrote her autobiographical book Beyond the Farthest Stars. Two generations of astronomers in the family The meeting will be moderated by physicist and journalist Gianluca Dutti.
“The second star on the right…” follows the events open to all on Friday 12 November with the astrobiology meeting “Is there life in the universe?” ; Thursday, November 18, in the speaking room of the Palazzo dei Musei, astronomy historian Fabrizio Bonoli will deepen the topic of astronomy in Dante’s time, while astrophysicists Ilaria Arrosio and Gianluca Dutti will attempt on Thursday November 25 to answer the question “What stars need?” . The last two events designed for everyone, Friday 26 and Saturday 27 November, will take place in the open laboratory: on both days young and old will be able to participate in “Four Steps in Space”, interactive labs and non-stop presentations from physics, earth sciences, chemistry and biology, coordinated by Rossella Brunetti from UniMoRe, while on Saturday the 27th at 6.30pm, well-known astrophysicist Luca Perry will explain “Star Wars science.”
The electronic labs of Maura Sandri, a researcher at the National Institute of Astrophysics, are designed for children: Wednesday, November 10 We’ll talk about Mars with a “perseverance umbrella”; On Wednesday 17th we will test the weights in the different planets of the solar system and on Wednesday 24th November with “Finding Ghosts” we will discover the colors of light by building a spectrometer. The two “Digitarium” workshops, on Saturday 13 November, and the “Cosmo Experience”, on Saturday 20 November, are also for children, to try yourself as astronauts for a day. Friday 19 November will be entirely devoted to our satellite with readings and explorations “Look at the Moon!”.
The “Month of Science” also includes guided visits to special places in the history of Modena and its scientific publication: the Geophysical Observatory, which was born in 1826 as an astronomical observatory, and has since been located in the eastern tower of the Doge’s Palace (November 27); F. Martino Planetarium, opened in 1990, where the view of the planetarium can be manually touched (November 6 and 26); AstroTorre in Ferrari Park, where the passion for astronomy meets the Astrofili GB Amici (14, 15, 20 and 21). The full program is available at www.comune.modena.it/biblioteche.
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