On Sunday 8 October 2017, ASTRON & JIVE opened their doors to several hundred visitors during the Weekend of Science.
Published by the editorial team, 9 October 2017
The theme of the day was ‘Looking through radio eyes’. A range of activities enabled visitors to learn about what it means to look through ‘radio eyes’, and what needs to happen before astronomers can use their ‘radio eyes’.
Visitors could follow guided tours, visit the LOFAR control room and attend lectures. Activities for children were also organised, such as building pulsars, constructing a telescope using spaghetti and marshmallows and making their own network of radio telescopes.
Like previous years, CAMRAS opened the Dwingeloo Radio Telescope for the public. In the telescope, visitors were able to listen to a pulsar and learn about the telescope itself. In addition to visiting the telescope, visitors could do experiments like measure their speed with a Doppler test.
Visitors who completed multiple activities received the new ASTRON/JIVE/NOVA ‘Astronomy? That’s how it works!’ Quartet game. This fun game (in Dutch) is for the whole family and teaches about celestial bodies, telescopes, computers, types of radiation, and more.