Fernbank Museum Press Kit
THE STAR GALLERYThe Star Gallery is a unique feature at Fernbank Museum of Natural History. Located at the entrance to the IMAX® Theatre, it gives visitors the opportunity to learn about the stars, constellations and celestial objects that can be seen with the naked eye in Atlanta's nighttime sky. More then six miles of fiber optic wires accurately portray the 542 stars twinkling above.
Each star was carefully plotted on the ceiling, forming an illuminated star chart. The fibers used to create the stars vary in diameter, allowing them to be represented with 22 varying degrees of brightness. The gallery stars range from the brightest star in the sky, Sirius, to some of the faintest visible from Atlanta. The represented gradations in brightness are as sensitive as can be discerned in the real sky.
In addition to the stars, there are three other celestial objects visible in The Star Gallery. Just as these objects appear as fuzzy patches in the real sky, they are also in The Star Gallery. The largest is the Andromeda Galaxy. At a distance of 2.3 million light years from Earth, this galaxy is the most distant object that can be viewed with the naked eye. Visitors can faintly spot M-13 in the constellation of Hercules, which in reality is a densely packed group of stars called a global cluster. The Orion nebula, a gas cloud where young stars form, is also lightly visible in the Star Gallery.
Four slightly red stars appear among those in The Star Gallery. They represent old, bloated red giant stars: Aldebaran in the constellation of Taurus, Betelgeuse in Orion, Antares in Scorpius and Arcturus in Bootes.
Every Wednesday at 3:30 p.m., a Fernbank Science Center astronomer leads Star Talks, a program about constellations, folklore and astronomical events currently visible in the evening sky and shows how to find them using The Star Gallery's ceiling.
- Visitors can find the stars in The Star Gallery using the following guide: " Visitors should stand facing south toward the doors to the IMAX® Theatre to recognize the constellations in the appropriate direction.
- By moving west from the aquarium toward the Great Hall, visitors will pass under stars visible in the early evening in the summer, autumn, winter and spring.
- Ursa Major constellation (The Big Dipper) - easily recognized over the double doors to the Great Hall
- Andromeda constellation - fuzzy constellation near the center of the room
- M-13 - slightly northwest of the room's center
- Orion nebula (M-42) - just below the belt of stars of Orion to the east
- Aldebaran (in the constellation of Taurus and Betelgeuse in Orion) - found among the winter stars on the east side of the room
- Antares in Scorpius and Arcturus in Bootes - located near The World of Shells exhibition
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