Total solar eclipse and more space and astronomy news

It's that time of the week again, time for the space and astronomy stories from last week's Overnight News Digest: Science Saturday (Obama re-elected edition) on Daily Kos. Tonight's top story is the total solar eclipse that was visible from Australia.

NASA Television on YouTube: ScienceCasts: Total Eclipse of the Sun

Scientists and sky watchers are converging on the northeast coast of Australia, near the Great Barrier Reef, for a total eclipse of the sun.

Even without the Arizona schools, one of the universities I used came through. To my surprise, it was one of the smallest.

University of North Dakota: Astrophysicist Tim Young, computer scientist Ron Marsh team up again to deliver Solar event video
November 6, 2012

Once again, the University of North Dakota's popular team of scientists is taking its show on the global road to astronomical adventure.

UND professors Timothy Young, Physics and Astrophysics, and Ronald Marsh, chair, Computer Science, will travel with their team to Cairns, Australia, to share a live webcast of a total solar eclipse. In addition to the video webcast, the UND team will acquire and post high-resolution digital photographs of the corona.

The eclipse begins at 2 p.m. U.S. Central Standard Time, Tuesday, Nov. 13. The webcast can be viewed at http://www.sems.und.edu or on Facebook. The live webcast is also available on mobile devices.

More space and astronomy stories over the jump.

NASA Television on YouTube: Suni Set to Return on This Week @NASA

International Space Station Commander, Suni Williams is beginning to prepare for her upcoming return home. The NASA astronaut and two of her Expedition 33 colleagues, Aki Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Russian cosmonaut, Yuri Malenchenko, are scheduled to make their way back to Earth with a parachute-assisted landing by their Soyuz capsule in rural Kazakhstan on November 19, local time. Also, Curiosity Roves On; Fire-Fighting in Space; Stump for STEM; Enterprising Student; HQ Honors; Happy Birthday

DarkSyde on Daily Kos has more general space news in This week in science: All aboard!, while LeftOfYou goes into detail about the Red Planet in On Mars: Investigating Planetary Flatulence.

Finally, here's a fun video about space and science education.

NASA Television on YouTube: ScienceCasts: NASA's Cure for a Common Phobia

NASA has an unusual candidate for the astronaut corps--a rubber chicken. Seriously. Beloved by schoolchildren around the country, Camilla the rubber chicken has been training in fighter jets, flying to the edge of space, and visiting classrooms around the country as she prepares to go where no chicken has gone before.

In the previous installment, I lamented losing a couple of sources.

I'm going to miss using stories from the University of Arizona and Arizona State University in future Overnight News Digests. I'll wean myself away this week, as I'll use stories from public research universities in the competitive states that came through either for Obama or for Democratic U.S. Senate candidates. Sorry to write that Arizona wasn't one of them.

This week's report wasn't as rich as last week's, but it wasn't bad. I'll adjust.