Latest Fred Lawrence Whipple Stories

Dr. Brian Geoffrey Marsden passed away Thursday, Nov. 18 at the age of 73 following a prolonged illness. He was a Supervisory Astronomer at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory and Director Emeritus of the Minor Planet Center."Brian was one of the most influential comet investigators of the twentieth century," said Charles Alcock, Director of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, "and definitely one of the most colorful!"Dr. Marsden specialized in celestial...

Cambridge, MA -- Smithsonian astronomers watched as the "Impactor" probe from NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft hit Comet Tempel 1 earlier this week. They monitored the impact using the ground-based Submillimeter Array (SMA) in Hawaii and NASA's orbiting Submillimeter Wave Astronomy Satellite (SWAS).Results are still coming in, but so far the scientists report seeing only weak emission from water vapor and a host of other gases that were expected to erupt from the impact site. The most...