Venus Transits Past, Present & Future

What’s the science behind the recent Venus Transit? In this talk by Dr. Jay Pasachoff of Williams College presents brand new images and movies from the recent transit gathered in multiple wavelenghts and from many locations. This talk, which includes a detailed history of transit science, was delivered two days after the June 5, 2012, Venus Transit on the Big Island of Hawai’i.

The W. M. Keck Observatory operates two 10-meter optical/infrared telescopes on the summit of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaii. The twin telescopes feature a suite of advanced instruments including imagers, multi-object spectrographs, high-resolution spectrographs, integral-field spectroscopy and a world-leading laser guide star adaptive optics system which cancels out much of the interference caused by Earth’s turbulent atmosphere. The Observatory is a private 501(c) 3 non-profit organization and a scientific partnership of the California Institute of Technology, the University of California and NASA.