Emma Gray
Editor
In March, the William M. Staerkel Planetarium, located in the M-wing of Parkland, will begin showing “Spring Prairie Skies” just before spring break along with a number of other shows as it closes down some shows from February.
In March, the show “Out There! The Quest for Extrasolar Worlds” will begin showing. It is a new show for the planetarium from the European Southern Observatory that covers the exploration of other planets in the universe and the question of if there is a possibility of life on another planet.
“It’s tough to do a show like that because [information] changes so often,” said David Leake, director of the planetarium at Parkland. “They’re always making a [planetary] discovery here and there…but it’s really [about] how we find these planets going around other stars.”
According to Leake, scientists discover new planets by watching stars blink out during an eclipse of the star by the planet and through watching how large planets make a star wobble.
In March, the show “In My Backyard” will also begin playing. This is a children’s show which uses “storytelling, poetry, and songs” to engage kids with what they can see in the night sky according to the planetarium brochure.
On Friday, March 2, the planetarium will hold a World of Science lecture with Zeynep Madak-Erdogan, an assistant professor at the University of Illinois, titled “Big Data, Precision Medicine and Cancer Research.” Her research has been on breast cancer according to Leake.
Leake says this is a change from what was originally planned for this lecture date. Originally the lecture was supposed to be on gene profiling and was to be given by Sarah Spinella from the University of Illinois. Due to illness, however, Spinella is unable to give the talk. This change has been updated on the planetarium’s website, but the printed brochures have not been updated.
On March 30, there will be a second World of Science lecture titled “Chasing Tornadoes!” by meteorologist Andrew Pritchard. Usually there is only one World of Science talk per month, but Leake said this speaker was very eager to do another talk.
“[Pritchard] called me up and just begged to do a talk and he’s been here before,” Leake said. “He’s a tornado chaser and the video he came in with last year was amazing. I’ve never seen video like that. So he says he’s got some new stuff.”
One of the shows that will be closing at the end of February is “Skywatchers of Africa,” an older show produced by the Adler Planetarium in Chicago. Though the show is older, Leake says that the information in it has not become outdated so the planetarium still likes to show it for Black History Month occasionally.
“Skywatchers of Africa” is a shorter show that briefly gives the audience an overview of what different cultures in Africa named various stars and constellations and how they used the stars to plan different aspects of their lives.
One of the stories the show tells is about how the Egyptians built their pyramids so the pharaohs had a view of the north star, which was believed to be an eternal star because it is visible all night, all year-round. The other stars were thought to die in the west and be reborn each day. The Egyptians built their homes on the east bank where the stars rose, as this was the living bank, and built the pyramids on the west bank where the stars died.
The show also told of how various cultures would use stone markers to mark where a star would rise in the sky. Where the star rose would stay constant throughout the year, but where the sun and moon rose would change with the season. People used which star the sun was rising with as a way of telling what season it was and when it was time to plant their crops.
On April 6, there will be a World of Science lecture on plate tectonics by Lijun Liu, an associate professor at the University of Illinois.
On April 6 and April 7, “Pink Floyd’s The Wall” will be played with an accompanying light show.
In the summer, the planetarium plans to bring back some old shows before closing for a few weeks to update their software system.
For more information on shows at the planetarium, visit parkland.edu/planetarium or go to the planetarium in the M-wing to pick up a brochure.
