Astronomy on Tap: Galaxies!

All photographs were taken by Christophe Marcade.

Tonight we finished off our astronomy events for the year with two great talks by local astronomers at our Astronomy on Tap series.  The theme of the night was galaxies, and the talks did not disappoint.  First off, we had UCLA postdoc Jordan Mirocha talking about his area of research, the formation of the first galaxies in the universe.

Next, we had a delightful talk by Caltech graduate student, Ivanna Escala, discussing the various ways in which galaxies can get ripped apart, starved of their star-forming fuel, or eaten by larger galaxies!

It was a fun night and a great way to finish off the year.  Have a great holiday, everyone.  See you in January!

--Cameron

Lecture & Stargazing: ALMA

Professor Nick Scoville, esteemed professor and principle investigator of the COSMOS survey, gave a lecture tonight on the revolutionary new telescope ALMA.  ALMA is an NSF-funded telescope, operating in the radio part of the electromagnetic spectrum, consisting of 66 individual radio dishes. It was built in the high mountains of the Andes in Northern Chile above 5,000 meters of elevation. 

All photographs were taken by Christophe Marcade.

We got started a little late due to some technical difficulties with the equipment in the lecture hall, but Professor Scoville regaled us with a broad discussion as to how both optical and radio telescopes work.  He showed us photos from his visit to the ALMA site, and taught us how scientists use data from the various telescopes combined as an interferometer to get very high resolution images back of gas and molecular cloud structures where stars are being born.  It was really an excellent talk!

After Professor Scoville's lecture, we hosted an expert Q&A panel answering questions on a variety of topics across astronomy, physics, and planetary science.  Simultaneously, audience members were given the opportunity to spy the heavens with our telescopes set up on Beckman Lawn.

Thanks to everyone who attended, and again I'm sorry about the technical difficulties with the A/V setup.  It won't happen again.

--Cameron