Sunday, May 27, 2012

Transit of Venus 2012 (TOV)

                           We all know "what is solar eclipse?". Solar eclipse happens when moon passes between earth and sun. Moon will block sun. There are two types of solar eclipses 1) Total and 2) Annular In Total solar eclipse moon will completely cover the sun and sun becomes completely invisible. But in Annular eclipse moon cannot completely cover the sun. so when moon passes we can see an annular ring of sun. 

2004 transit of Venus
                           Transit is also a phenomenon like eclipse the only difference is that moon is replaced by planet Venus. Venus is very much larger than moon but it cannot cover the sun completely. Because Venus is very distant from our earth. So it appears as a very small dot on sun.

                On coming June 6th you can see such a sun with a small "beauty spot" on its face. Last TOV was in 2004 June 8th. But the next one will occur on 2117 December 11. During the orbiting around the sun Venus will cross earth in every 584 days. But TOV's are rare phenomenon. Since there is a difference of 3.39 degree between the plane of orbiting of Venus and earth around sun. So all of you get ready its your last and final chance to observe TOV. On June 6th morning moon will rise with a small dot on his face and it move through the face and become invisible at 9.52am. You can use solar filters to observe the sun. Or you can make a small projection of sun on a screen simply with the help of a ball and mirror arrangement. Its very simple to construct. Take a small plastic ball and fill half of its volume with sand and seal it. Fix a small piece of mirror on the face of it. Ball and mirror arrangement is ready. You can place it anywhere and reflect the sun light to a distant screen now u can see a circular shaped image on the screen even if the mirror is not circular. This circular image is sun.