March 2: Grumpy Bert

On Saturday night, graduate student Munier Salem and Director of Outreach Summer Ash helped kick off the opening of a spectacular photography exhibit at Grumpy Bert in Brooklyn. The exhibition entitled "The Universe in Color" runs through the end of the month and features 22 large format images of the Universe taken by astrophotographer (and physician) Robert Gendler.

Munier opened the evening with an informal talk on light and how astronomers make use of the entire electromagnetic spectrum in order to learn as much as possible about the Universe. Then the 40+ audience members asked some very astute questions ranging from the expansion of the Universe to extraterrestrial life. The event culminated in a lively reception which allowed everyone to examine Gendler's amazing works up close and personal.

Additional photos from the event can be found here.

February 15: My Life as a Higgs Boson

Friday, February 15th, Gladys Velez Caicedo had the very difficult task of explaining what exactly the Higgs Boson is and how its existence is necessitated by the Standard Model of Physics. The Standard Model explains all the particles we know, such as protons, neutrons, and electrons, along with their interactions. Gladys is a second year undergraduate at Barnard College studying Astrophysics and Literature and is a researcher at Nevis Laboratories working with the Very Energetic Radiation Imaging Telescope Array System (VERITAS) and the Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) aboard the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. If you missed the talk or if you just want to immerse yourself in some hard-core physics, you can view the slides from Gladys's talk here.

Over 175 people came out for the event, and we were lucky to have the roof available for star-gazing for an hour after the lecture despite the encroaching cloud cover. The 3D wall was manned by Bryan Terrazas.

After the lecture, I led a small discussion in which we talked about the recent meteorite impact in Russia, along with the near-Earth asteroid that came within 17,200 miles of us, closer than orbiting equatorial geosynchronous satellites! In comparison, the moon is between 220,000 to 250,000 miles away. The discussion was slightly free-form due to the recent nature of the event, and it included us watching some internet videos from Russia. The discussion also focused on efforts humans are undertaking to detect future near-Earth asteroids and possible collisions. Thanks to all who came and participated in this Friday’s outreach program!

Meteor and asteroid videos:
Russia Meteorite Compilation
Another Meteorite Video
Asteroid 2012 DA14 Close Approach
Asteroid Discoveries

--Emir Karamehmetoglu (undergraduate student)

February 1: Saving Hubble

On Friday, February 1st, we kicked off our spring Public Lecture & Stargazing series with not a lecture, but a film. Saving Hubble is a documentary that chronicles NASA's decision to cancel the Hubble Space Telescope in 2004 and the subsequent public outcry. Filmmaker David Gaynes interviewed people far and wide on their thoughts about the pioneering space telescope that became a household name, from scientists and engineers who worked on Hubble to amateur astronomers, cabdrivers, and kids who are self-proclaimed "Hubble Huggers." After the screening, Summer Ash led Q&A with David and Ph.D. candidate, Christine Simpson.

If you missed the film, you can see a clip of it here and find out about upcoming screenings here.

The event attracted a sizable audiences of over 200 people who got to see some great sights from the rooftop telescopes after the film, thanks to the clouds that decided to clear out. Graduate students Jeff Andrews, Lauren Corlies, Ximena Fernandez, and David Hendel had telescopes trained on Jupiter and the Orion Nebula, both wonderful offerings of the winter sky. We also had the 3D wall up and running.

Join us on Feb. 15th for our next event: My Life as a Higgs Boson.

 --Summer Ash (Director of Outreach)

November 30: Galactic Neighborhoods

On November 30th, about 100 people joined us to hear Columbia Astronomy Professor Jacqueline van Gorkom talk about how galaxies are influenced by their surroundings. Professor van Gorkom is a radio astronomer and does extensive research on galaxies. She showed us how strikingly different galaxies look in dense clusters of galaxies compared with fields. She explained that when a galaxy enters a galaxy cluster filled with hot intra-cluster gas, the cold gas inside the galaxy gets stripped out of it and thus star formation is quenched, which changes the color of the galaxy from blue to red. The audience raised a lot of interesting questions about galaxies and gravity.

After the talk, some people went to see the 3D movies on the 13th floor shown by Columbia undergraduate student Gladys Velez-Caicedo. Unfortunately, the sky was not clear on Friday, but Columbia Astronomy graduate students Adrian Price-Whelan and Jenna Lemonias gave a telescope tour to a group of people on the roof of Pupin. In the lecture hall, graduate student Yuan Li presented a slide show on spiral galaxies and Dr. Jana Grcevich talked about the Big Bang and the expansion of the universe.

Join us on December 14th for the last event of this semester: a panel discussion on Life, the Universe, and Everything!

--Yuan

November 16: Living with the Stars

Dr. Helena Uthas's talk was of a different strain than most of our previous outreach events. She shared her experiences of the three years she spent as a support astronomer on the beautiful and isolated Spanish island of La Palma, off the coast of western Africa. It is one of the prime spots for astronomy in the world today, having the best “seeing” available on our little blue planet (seeing is how much the atmosphere perturbs the images of stars as seen through a telescope).

In this personal narrative, Dr. Uthas walked the audience of ~180 people through her time at the Swedish Solar Telescope (SST) and the Nordic Optical Telescope (NOT) and the life of an astronomer in such a remote location. We were shocked and impressed by the difficult loneliness that such a job requires, yet there also was a sense of lusting for the introspection afforded being in one of the most beautiful and untouched natural vistas in the world. After this captivating mix of science, nature, and self, the majority of the audience went up for observing. We had almost 200 people on the roof throughout the event, and our telescopes were pointed at the extremely bright Jupiter, along with the Pleiades star cluster and the Andromeda galaxy. Several people stayed in the lecture hall for a slideshow on galaxies. The evening wrapped up around 9 pm leaving attendees having played astronomer over the skyline of New York City and vicariously experiencing the life of an observational astronomer through Dr. Uthas.

 --Emir

October 19: The Universe is My Lab

On October 19th, graduate student, Or Graur from the American Museum of Natural History, addressed a question always asked of astronomers - "What exactly do you do?"  Or walked an audience of 70 people through the process taken to publish his most recent work on supernovae - from forming the hypothesis to testing it with telescopes and equipment to finally creating the scientific plot of merit.  It was a great inside look at how we practice astronomy today.

Unfortunately, the weather was less than stellar and roof observing was not possible.  However, our 3D movie wall provided entertainment after the talk.

--Lauren

October 5: X-ray Spectacular!

On October 5th, over 175 people came to Doug Thornhill's talk on the newly launched X-ray telescope NuSTAR. NuSTAR was assembled at the Nevis Laboratories of Columbia University and Doug worked with the NuSTAR team for almost four years as an undergraduate student at Columbia since the beginning of the project. He provided a clear and thorough explanation on how x-ray telescopes work, with a physical demonstration on how light is detected by the telescope. Doug then showed how NuSTAR was built and discussed the scientific goals of the telescope including the survey of super-massive black holes, supernovae remnants and compact objects, as well as the study of the energy transport of our sun.

After the talk, some people stayed in the lecture hall to enjoy the movie "High Energy Vision: The Chandra X-ray Observatory," which is another NASA X-ray telescope launched more than a decade ago. 

As it was a fairly clear night, many people headed up to the roof to view the night sky through the telescopes. Additionally, Columbia undergrad, Bryan Terrazas, showed 3D movies on the 13th floor. 

Join us for our next event on October 19th, when we will hear from Or Graur on how astronomers use the universe as their laboratory.

--Yuan