The Lake County Astronomical Society

Antimatter vs Fusion Deceleration Concepts for Exoplanet Exploration
2026-02-20 19:00 - 21:30 (America/Chicago) | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
The February 20th meeting of the LCAS will feature a presentation by Dr. Gerald Jackson. Dr. Jackson retired from Fermilab is now President of Hbar Technologies a firm developing markets for antimatter with capabilities in scientific research and engineering development. His talk will be about the possibilities of using antimatter in interstellar travel.

This meeting will be at Volo Bog State Natural Area and held via Zoom.

LCAS Monthly Meeting - Space: The Year in Review
2025-11-21 19:00 - 21:30 | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
Larry Boyle, with the Chicago Society for Space Studies Speakers Bureau will give a presentation titled, ‘Space: The Year in Review’. Mr Boyle who has presented to LCAS many times in the past has made this talk pretty much a yearly event. This is sure to be a very educational and informative talk.
The presentation will start at 7:00 PM (open to the Public Business meeting starts about 8:30 PM.). Afterwards LCAS members will show guests the night sky through powerful telescopes (weather permitting). Please join us.

AUTCL - Deerfield
2025-10-29 19:30 - 20:30 | Deerfield Public Library, 920 Waukegan Road, Deerfield, IL, United States
**10/28/25 UPDATE Due to forecasted cloudy skies the Deerfield Astronomy Under the City Lights event will be moved to Wednesday, October 29th**
Astronomy Under the City Lights is a free to all-ages event presented by the Lake County Astronomical Society in cooperation with local libraries. LCAS volunteers will bring sophisticated telescopes to allow the public to view the Moon and other objects in the sky.
Visitors are welcome to view at any time during the scheduled hours, and stay as long as they want. No registration is required. Groups are welcome.
In the event of bad weather we have a back up date of October 29th.

LCAS Monthly Meeting - The Cosmos in the Lab: Exploring the Dark Matter Mass Scale with Direct Detection
2025-10-17 19:00 - 21:00 | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
While the astrophysical and cosmological evidence supporting the existence of a gravitationally-active dark matter is overwhelming, no signals unambiguously attributable to it have yet been observed in laboratory experiments. The prevailing hypothesis is that the dark matter is comprised of a new fundamental particle not found in the Standard Model of Particle Physics. In that framework, the possible mass of the dark matter particle ranges over 50 orders of magnitude, posing a challenging and exciting landscape for detection. In this talk, Dr. Dylan J Temples of Fermilab will briefly review the evidence supporting dark matter and the properties which a fundamental particle must satisfy to be dark matter. From there, he will discuss the signatures of dark matter models across the range of allowed masses and the detector technologies used to investigate them. Finally, He will provide some outlook on dark matter searches in the future from the viewpoint of an experimentalist.
Zoom Meeting Link Meeting Link

AUTCL - Lake Zurich
2025-09-30 19:30 - 21:00 | Ela Area Public Library, 275 Mohawk Tr, Lake Zurich, IL, United States
Astronomy Under the City Lights is a free to all-ages event presented by the Lake County Astronomical Society in cooperation with local libraries. LCAS volunteers will bring sophisticated telescopes to allow the public to view the Moon and other objects in the sky.
Visitors are welcome to view at any time during the scheduled hours, and stay as long as they want. No registration is required. Groups are welcome.
In the event of bad weather we have a back up date of October 2nd.

LCAS Monthly Meeting - Update from American Astronomical Society Meeting
2025-09-19 19:00 - 21:30 | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
Amateur Astronomers Attend an Astronomical Conference: A Report on AAS 244
Our Speaker for the September 19th of the Lake County Astronomical Society is Dale Dellutri who has had a life-long fascination with science and technology. He will share his experience in attending the latest convention of the American Astronomical Society. He has worked with computer hardware and software since the late 1960’s, and has managed technical employees and projects in various fields including programming, data center construction, legal, tax, and futures and equity trading. He has written programs in many computer languages. He is now retired. Mr. Dellutri has an MBA and a MS in Information Science from the University of Chicago, and a BS in Engineering Science from the Illinois Institute of Technology. He is an amateur astronomer, specializing in computational astronomy, and manages the Skokie Valley Astronomers website. As an amateur astronomer, he has given a number of astronomy-themed presentations over the years to local astronomy clubs.
The presentation will be followed by an LCAS business meeting starting about 8:30PM. Weather permitting, LCAS Members will show Attendees the Night Sky through powerful telescopes.

Topic: LCAS Monthly Meeting

AUTCL - Arlington Heights
2025-08-28 18:30 - 19:30 | Arlington Heights Memorial Library, 500 N Dunton Ave, Arlington Heights, IL, 60004, United States
Astronomy Under the City Lights is a free to all-ages event presented by the Lake County Astronomical Society in cooperation with local libraries. LCAS volunteers will bring sophisticated telescopes to allow the public to view the Moon and other objects in the sky.
Visitors are welcome to view at any time during the scheduled hours, and stay as long as they want. No registration is required. Groups are welcome.
In the event of bad weather we have a back up date of September 2nd (7-8pm).

AUTCL - Grayslake
2025-07-31 20:00 - 21:00 | Grayslake Area Public Library, 100 Library Ln,, Grayslake, IL, 60030, United States
Astronomy Under the City Lights is a free to all-ages event presented by the Lake County Astronomical Society in cooperation with local libraries. This month we are at the Grayslake Area Public Library for the August AUTCL event. LCAS volunteers will bring sophisticated telescopes to allow the public to view the Moon and other objects in the sky. Visitors are welcome to view at any time during the scheduled hours, and stay as long as they want. No registration is required. Groups are welcome.

In the event of bad weather we have a back up date of Tuesday, August 5, 2025 from 8:00to 9:00 pm

Grayslake Area Public Library, 100 Library Ln, Grayslake, IL 60030

Remote Sensing of Planetary Surfaces
2025-07-18 19:00 - 21:30 | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
The July 18th meeting of the Lake County Astronomical Society will feature a presentation by Jackie Cooney who is a professor at Harper College. This will be the first time that Jackie will present to LCAS and this is sure to be an interesting, informative and educational event. The meeting will be in person at the Volo Bog.
Afterwards, weather permitting, Members of LCAS will show views of the Skies through their powerful telescopes.

AUTCL - Cary
2025-06-30 19:30 - 20:30 | Cary Area Public Library, 1606 Three Oaks Rd, Cary, IL, 60013, United States
Astronomy Under the City Lights is a free to all-ages event presented by the Lake County Astronomical Society in cooperation with local libraries. This month we are at the Cary Area Public Library for the July AUTCL event. LCAS volunteers will bring sophisticated telescopes to allow the public to view the Moon and other objects in the sky. Visitors are welcome to view at any time during the scheduled hours, and stay as long as they want. No registration is required. Groups are welcome.

In the event of bad weather we have a back up date of Wednesday, July 2, 2025 from 7:30 to 8:30 pm

Cary Area Public Library 1606 Three Oaks Rd, Cary, IL 60013

Impact Cratering
2025-06-20 19:00 - 21:30 | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
The Speaker for the June 20th meeting of the Lake County Astronomical Society is Jim Hopkins, retired Professor of Astronomy at Joliet Junior College with a Masters Degree from Eastern Illinois University. Jim was also a teacher at Naperville High School and at the College of DuPage. He has given over 100 presentations on Astronomy over the years in the Chicagoland area. The talk will cover the nature of impactors, the creation of craters, the nature of the evidence that supports the impact theory, and mass extinctions related to cratering.

Afterwards, weather permitting, Members of LCAS will show the night sky to guests through their powerful telescopes.

Astronomy Day - 2025
2025-05-03 11:00 - 16:00 | Ela Area Public Library, 275 Mohawk Tr, Lake Zurich, IL, United States
The Lake County Astronomical Society will be hosting our annual Astronomy Day event on Saturday, May 3rd!
This year the event is being held at Ela Public Library in Lake Zurich from 11am to 4pm.
The event is free and open to the public! We will have displays set up, astronomy related activities for kids, and raffle prizes! We hope to see you there!
Weather permitting we will have solar observing outside!
We want to thank our sponsors for Astronomy Day 2025:
ELA AREA PUBLIC LIBRARY (www.eapl.org)
Ela Area Public Library offers a wide range of services to the community for children and adults.

The Europa Clipper Mission
2025-04-18 19:00 - 21:30 | Volo Bog, 28478 W.Brandenburg Road, Ingleside, IL, United States
The Europa Clipper is NASA’s largest-ever planetary spacecraft & it is on its way to the Jupiter system. Arriving in April 2030, the goal of this mission is to study Europa, one of the Galilean moons & one of our solar system’s most interesting ocean worlds. The main goal will be to characterize whether this moon might host conditions that are suitable for life. Michelle Nichols from the Adler Planetarium will give an overview of this exciting mission and what scientists are hoping to learn from it.
The presentation will be followed by an LCAS business meeting starting about 8:30PM. Weather permitting, LCAS Members will show Attendees the Night Sky through powerful telescopes.

Moon over McHenry
2025-04-10 19:30 - 20:30 | McHenry Public Library, 809 N Front St, McHenry, IL, United States
Astronomy Under the City Lights is a free to all-ages event presented by the Lake County Astronomical Society in cooperation with local libraries. LCAS volunteers will bring sophisticated telescopes to allow the public to view the Moon and other objects in the sky. Visitors are welcome to view at any time during the scheduled hours, and stay as long as they want. No registration is required. Groups are welcome.
