[meteorite-list] UA Team Will Edit Popular Magazine About Meteorites

From: Ron Baalke <baalke_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue Dec 20 12:35:11 2005
Message-ID: <200512201733.jBKHXaK07963_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>

UA TEAM WILL EDIT POPULAR MAGAZINE ABOUT METEORITES
>From Lori Stiles, UA, University Communications, 520-621-1877
Tuesday, December 20, 2005

-- Contact information listed at the end --

A University of Arizona planetary scientist and a former UA Steward
Observatory employee will edit a popular magazine for people interested in
meteorites. The quarterly journal will carry meteorite news for amateurs,
collectors, dealers, educators, researchers -- anyone with a keen interest
in space rocks.

Meteorite magazine was founded in 1995 by a family in Auckland, New
Zealand, but is moving its headquarters to the University of Arkansas in
Fayetteville, Ark. Larry A. Lebofsky of the University of Arizona's Lunar
and Planetary Lab and his wife, Nancy, who was an editor and outreach
educator at Steward Observatory before she retired, are editors.

"Our goal is to keep this as a more popular magazine," said Larry Lebofsky.
"We'd especially like to reach more people in planetariums, and more
teachers and students." He is the education officer for the Division of
Planetary Sciences of the American Astronomical Society.
 
Lebofsky will spend spring semester as a visiting professor at the
University of Arkansas, using part of that time to get the magazine up and
running. The publication is based at the university's Arkansas Center for
Space and Planetary Sciences, directed by Derek Sears.

The 44-page magazine carries general interest articles on meteorites,
information on conferences and gem shows around the world, articles about
hunting for meteorites and meteorite expeditions, and articles about great
new meteorite finds, Lebofsky said. "It's a great forum for everyone in the
meteorite community to exchange information and share their particular
expertise," he said.

Anyone is eligible to submit articles to Meteorite, Lebofsky said. That
includes scientists, non-scientists, people who run museums, people who hunt
for meteorites, people with interesting stories about meteorites, and people
who earn their livelihoods by buying and selling meteorites. Authors come
from all over the world, he added. The next issue includes articles by
meteorite enthusiasts from the United States, Brazil, Germany and Egypt.

For nearly every year for more than a decade, UA Lunar and Planetary
Laboratory professors, graduate students or alumni have been part of the
Antarctic Search for Meteorites (ANSMET) program, intent on collecting
pieces of asteroids, the moon and Mars which have landed as meteorites on
the polar continent. The National Science Foundation funds the important
program.

But in addition, private collectors and dealers lead their own expeditions
to other important meteorite collecting regions, especially in northern
Africa.

Meteorite collection "is an undertaking where people who are non-scientists
can be very important," the University of Arkansas' Sears said. Dealers who
properly authenticate and characterize their finds make valuable
contributions to science.

An annual subscription to Meteorite magazine costs $35. Details are
available online at http://meteoritemag.uark.edu
----------------------------------------------
Contact Information
Larry Lebofsky 520-621-6947 (until Jan. 9, 2006)
479-575-3302 (after Jan. 9, 2006)
lebofsky_at_lpl.arizona.edu meteditr@uark.edu

Nancy Lebofsky meteditr_at_uark.edu

Derek Sears University of Arkansas
479-575-7625 dsears_at_uark.edu

Related Web site
http://meteoritemag.uark.edu
Received on Tue 20 Dec 2005 12:33:34 PM PST