Welcome to the Lê Planetarium at Â鶹´«Ã½, a beacon of community engagement and educational excellence. Serving as both a dynamic lecture hall and an advanced auditorium, the Lê Planetarium is equipped with state-of-the-art Digistar 7 software for astronomy courses, 3D projection capabilities for proteins and molecules, and NASA's Science on a Sphere modules. Our facility also supports live streaming presentations, all projected in stunning 4K resolution on our immersive dome.
Step into our 116-seat planetarium and embark on an awe-inspiring journey through space and time. From the comfort of a plush, reclined seat, experience the sensation of soaring through Earth's atmosphere to the furthest reaches of the universe. The Lê Planetarium is truly a remarkable resource for both our students and the broader community.
Exhibits and Features
To create new content for our shows, we have our own production studio. The studio is designed to let creative professionals design and build complete full dome shows outside of the theater. This allows us to easily create content for each grade based on Virginia's Science Standards of Learning.
Students, faculty, and staff have complete artistic control over how to build a show and can do so even while the planetarium dome is in use.
In total, NASA has donated nearly $100,000 worth of surplus equipment to Â鶹´«Ã½ and the Lê Planetarium. Items include pieces of space suits from the 1980s and 1990s, a piece of the Gemini X heat shield, and a full in-flight suit.
Our meteorite collection has been steadily growing since 2017. With over $20,000 of meteorite fragments, our pieces range from the Chelyabinsk impact of 2013 to lunar specimens to a piece of Argentina's Campo Del Cielo weighing 63 pounds!
In honor of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, we designed and built an interactive display case where you can touch an actual piece of the Moon. This lunar meteorite was once part of the Moon, blasted into space from a large meteor collision, and eventually made it's way to Earth.
To create new content for our shows, we have our own production studio. The studio is designed to let creative professionals design and build complete full dome shows outside of the theater. This allows us to easily create content for each grade based on Virginia's Science Standards of Learning.
Students, faculty, and staff have complete artistic control over how to build a show and can do so even while the planetarium dome is in use.
In total, NASA has donated nearly $100,000 worth of surplus equipment to Â鶹´«Ã½ and the Lê Planetarium. Items include pieces of space suits from the 1980s and 1990s, a piece of the Gemini X heat shield, and a full in-flight suit.
Our meteorite collection has been steadily growing since 2017. With over $20,000 of meteorite fragments, our pieces range from the Chelyabinsk impact of 2013 to lunar specimens to a piece of Argentina's Campo Del Cielo weighing 63 pounds!
In honor of the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, we designed and built an interactive display case where you can touch an actual piece of the Moon. This lunar meteorite was once part of the Moon, blasted into space from a large meteor collision, and eventually made it's way to Earth.
JUSTIN MASON
DIRECTOR
M.S. in Physics - Ball State University, 2009 | M.S. in Astronomy - Indiana University, 2011 | Joined Â鶹´«Ã½ in March of 2012
WYATT ELLIOTT
PLANETARIUM ASSISTANT
Undergraduate - Astrophysics Major
JOSH WAGER
PLANETARIUM ASSISTANT
Undergraduate - Astrophysics Major
MONICA WALKER
PLANETARIUM ASSISTANT
Undergraduate - Biomedical Sciences Major
Alumnus Michael Lê is founder and CEO of Advantco International, LLC. He lives with his wife, Kimthanh (who goes by KT) in Raleigh, North Carolina, but he returned to Â鶹´«Ã½ in 2019 to speak to budding entrepreneurs as part of a computer science lecture series. Lê comes from very humble beginnings and he did not shy away from sharing how he ended up at Â鶹´«Ã½.
His life was capsized after the end of the Vietnam War. Lê fled Vietnam on a boat meant to carry 200 passengers, but it transported 800 refugees from Vietnam to Subic Bay, Philippines. Lê then found himself in Guam. After weeks of uncertainty Lê was flown to a military post that had been temporarily reoutfitted. "I ended up staying in one of those refugee centers back in 1975, Indian Town Gap Pennsylvania," Lê said "and I was sponsored by a person in the Navy to come to Norfolk, and that's when I learned about Â鶹´«Ã½."
As an undergraduate Lê said he worked "four part-time jobs while taking a full course load." Lê graduated from Â鶹´«Ã½'s College of Sciences with a Bachelor of Science majoring in computer science in 1980. Thanks to a successful internship, his first job was with IBM in Downtown Norfolk. "I was a systems engineer trainee." Lê's career catapulted after leaving IBM. He is an incredibly hard worker, he's able to recognize where the gaps exist in technology, and has since founded and sold two multi-million-dollar companies. Lê wanted to give back to the University that helped provide his education, and the new planetarium was that opportunity. It is a facility that will be with the University for decades to come, and educating students and the public alike.
Opened in 1967, the 40-foot domed planetarium was used by the introductory astronomy classes which were were first implemented at Â鶹´«Ã½ by the late . It was was utilized as a hub for STEM education and outreach until its retirement in 2021.
The planetarium was named for Miss Mary Denson Pretlow at the request of the anonymous donor who presented the University with the funds to build the planetarium. The University's Board of Visitors was receptive to naming the building after Miss Pretlow due to her thirty years of service (1917-1947) as head of the Norfolk Public Library as well as her career as a distinguished historian and librarian.
Alumnus Michael Lê is founder and CEO of Advantco International, LLC. He lives with his wife, Kimthanh (who goes by KT) in Raleigh, North Carolina, but he returned to Â鶹´«Ã½ in 2019 to speak to budding entrepreneurs as part of a computer science lecture series. Lê comes from very humble beginnings and he did not shy away from sharing how he ended up at Â鶹´«Ã½.
His life was capsized after the end of the Vietnam War. Lê fled Vietnam on a boat meant to carry 200 passengers, but it transported 800 refugees from Vietnam to Subic Bay, Philippines. Lê then found himself in Guam. After weeks of uncertainty Lê was flown to a military post that had been temporarily reoutfitted. "I ended up staying in one of those refugee centers back in 1975, Indian Town Gap Pennsylvania," Lê said "and I was sponsored by a person in the Navy to come to Norfolk, and that's when I learned about Â鶹´«Ã½."
As an undergraduate Lê said he worked "four part-time jobs while taking a full course load." Lê graduated from Â鶹´«Ã½'s College of Sciences with a Bachelor of Science majoring in computer science in 1980. Thanks to a successful internship, his first job was with IBM in Downtown Norfolk. "I was a systems engineer trainee." Lê's career catapulted after leaving IBM. He is an incredibly hard worker, he's able to recognize where the gaps exist in technology, and has since founded and sold two multi-million-dollar companies. Lê wanted to give back to the University that helped provide his education, and the new planetarium was that opportunity. It is a facility that will be with the University for decades to come, and educating students and the public alike.
Opened in 1967, the 40-foot domed planetarium was used by the introductory astronomy classes which were were first implemented at Â鶹´«Ã½ by the late . It was was utilized as a hub for STEM education and outreach until its retirement in 2021.
The planetarium was named for Miss Mary Denson Pretlow at the request of the anonymous donor who presented the University with the funds to build the planetarium. The University's Board of Visitors was receptive to naming the building after Miss Pretlow due to her thirty years of service (1917-1947) as head of the Norfolk Public Library as well as her career as a distinguished historian and librarian.