New
Jersey
Hubble
Amateurs

General Information

Over the past few years there has been a program at NASA that allowed amateur astronomers to submit projects for the Hubble Space Telescope. Only a few dozen amateurs in all were accepted. However, within that small number were four New Jersey Amateurs (more than any other state) ... George Lewycky, Karl Hricko and Lew Thomas, and Jim Flood. I have included some information about the individuals, the title of their projects, along with the overview abstracts that describe the projects. However, if you are interested in finding more about Amateur Astronomers and the Hubble Space Telescope, you can go to this site. Or, if you want to get information on their specific projects you can go here. This second page will allow you to search the Hubble Space Telescope observing programs and view the abstracts and data sets for them.

George Lewycky George is a computer programmer and a member of AAAP. He researched the atmosphere of Saturn's largest moon Titan. Using Hubble's Goddard High Resolution Spectrograph (HRS/GHRS) he observed Titan's atmosphere in the middle ultraviolet (UV) spectrum in search of formaldehyde. George maintains a Hubble web page where he discusses his work.

Title: Titan's Atmosphere and Evolution Thru Disk Resolved Spectroscopy - Proposal 4790

Abstract : By using disk resolved spectroscopy with HST's HRS, a search for formaldehyde (CH
2O) will be performed on Titan. Formaldehyde is known to serve as an oligomer to Hydrogen Cyanide resulting ultimately in simple precursors, purines and pyrimidines (e.g., adenine, uracils) necessary for DNA.

Karl Hricko &
Lew Thomas
Karl is a science teacher and Lew is a retired engineer. Both are members of AAI. Their research was searching for a bridge connection between a Galaxy and Quasar using the WFPC (Wide Field Planetary Camera)

Title: WFC Observations of NGC4319-Markarian 205: High Resolution Morphology of a Galaxy-Quasar Association Displaying an Anomalous Redshift - Proposal 4750

Abstract: This program involves use of the Wide Field Camera to imagIuGpFn55uf,*54I˥r2CiR[ZX}}˥r2CiR[Zn   9PIy!3 ު|O(Uݘ&@^PWMFSDKVersion11.0.5721.5145WMFSDKNeeded0.0.0.0000 IsVBR)54I,*54I@Rц1HARц1HWindows Media Audio 9.2* 32 kbps, 32 kHz, stereo (A/V) 2-pass CBRaWindows Media Video 9WMV3ܷ Ser@iM[_\D+Pÿa \a} ܷ SeM[_\D+W U[_\D+8@--@WMV3Ly u{F`ɢ&ͼ6&ufbl@f""r-EVũKS ]\  (U9YYYQө-R 5San7 I?l >@yn@iy$؃ER&$6`c̐|/L:u&q][mfWY>@P¬(aj¬!<Յ + F@̓7oN\{Q'S)xܝi^0 w1Df~zjmT,%ޏmi4Džp 1 $%+n֡is1@ۦ@瘼nJ“Ch'Vvc4j|=;zY,4pO Rl <-wLH) Z`"jt:o^mރZm?y2 tplv]4Xx @rBZ@^Zn|^>HA[8$[5-+D4iQ"qC5QTR SGhzM ),¬*,$Y ~/0[3X@r7BMln㤡CFa@n 4:L`# ~ "1Tn7I&B'HFI0jݧGw@4Җa\:;c2!Uzb)z6hc~?bPRǰZ:)m ӁJb šz*jY)$@ ̈́!z@)M7&Ϡ$Y|?Q,d*-&<@D\CT.VC,V`dRQ: d/^f%ٱ]]p;*,<.k;kK N@%V4XBL,5ae, \f l$̏0L.E0(Q#lRP醐Q4H)`2! dzRT_Rk)$0 @`s9(v̒X}נ#ưOJ? ZA7Sf8| L/>[?sg \' D2<(;t-aY jč+[O2|t-HJZbJ^Dx0?wQEnC?o.o@{|Dz4~6yyf3'w[6a܀)8L-fdnCXR N;”) eMӶ3`S24I[7cm: Ld}OWv2Kd)؄r8"ŞK0 y