Astronomy on Tap: Vera Rubin, Dark Matter, and the Slow Speed of Light

We kicked off the New Year properly with the first Astronomy on Tap of 2017!  From the beginning, there was a very large crowd, and quite attentive to the wonder filled night to come. We started things off with a timely talk on “The Discovery of Dark Matter: Vera Rubin’s missing Nobel Prize” by Dr. Johanna Teske, a postdoc at the Carnegie Institute.  Johanna discussed the life of Dr. Vera Rubin, an astronomer who was instrumental in the discovery of dark matter, and yet was over looked for the Nobel prize. Her talk also focused on what dark matter actually is, and how it is important to understanding our universe.

 At the end of her talk, Johanna was bombarded with an endless number of questions ranging from dark matter to exoplanets.

Dr. Adric Riedel, who is a postdoc at Caltech, presented the second talk of the evening. Adric’s talk was titled “The Speed of Light is Slow” and he most certainly made sure that we left there fully experiencing the reasons why. Adric presented the audience with illustrations and movies showing the audience just how slow the speed of light actually compared to the vastness of space, with video and images of Star Wars scenes interspersed throughout the talk.

Here is a brief movie taken of Adric's talk demonstrating just how slow the speed of light is:

After the talks, we moved to the astronomy-themed pub quiz.  The quiz this time was relatively difficult, but a large chunk of the audience participated and we handed out prizes in the form of a NASA hat and Hubble Telescope booklet. All in all, the night was a great success with a massive turnout. Here’s to the next one!

--Rahul

Lecture & Stargazing: The Universe in X-ray Eyes

We started off the year back in Cahill, the astronomy and astrophysics department, after spending the last four months holding our events in Baxter Lecture Hall.  Cahill is a bit smaller, but more accessible and adjacent to the athletic fields for telescope observing. 

Tonight we were joined by Dr. Fiona Harrison, the Division Head of Physics, Math, and Astronomy here at Caltech, who is also the principle investigator of the NuSTAR x-ray telescope.  Dr. Harrison gave a riveting talk describing what sorts of astrophysical phenomena we can view in the universe when we look in the x-ray part of the electromagnetic spectrum.  She also took us through the process by which you build and launch a space telescope into space, and what happens to it over time.  A unique talk from someone at the top of her field, we were glad to have her share her stories and lessons.

The weather was somewhat cooperative, so we had some telescope observing despite not having full access to the athletic fields due to construction.  In addition to observing, we offered a panel Q&A on a variety of astrophysical topics.  We addressed a plethora of questions on topics related to cosmology, the evolution of stars, the x-ray universe, and how we became scientists.  Thanks for coming, everyone!

--Cameron