Sunday, June 14, 2009

Teenage girl discovers supernova

I love stories like this about amateurs contributing scientific discoveries. Maybe someday I'll have to write a book on it.
This case is more unusual than most: a 14-year-old amateur astronomer with a small telescope pointed "real" astronomers to a rare type of supernova. Alex Filippenko of the University of California said of the find by Caroline Moore, "Coincidentally, the youngest person to ever discover a supernova found one of the most peculiar and interesting supernovae ever. This shows that no matter what your age, anyone can make a significant contribution to our understanding of the universe."

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