LECTURES & TALKS

Original air date: Aug. 9 at 7 p.m. PT (10 p.m. ET, 0200 UTC) The Spitzer Space Telescope is one of NASA’s Great Observatories, designed to observe the universe in infrared light. Launched in 2003 with an expected lifetime of five years, Spitzer has succeeded beyond our wildest expectations. This talk will cover engineering feats and technical challenges, as well as recent science highlights. These include science Spitzer was not designed to do, such as the discovery and characterization of seven rocky, potentially habitable planets in the nearby TRAPPIST-1 system. Speaker: Sean Carey, Manager of the Spitzer Science Center, Caltech/IPAC

Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust: The Fate of Stars Like the Sun Greg Sloan of the Space Telescope Science Institute Our Sun, though seemingly eternal, is about halfway through its roughly 10-billion-year lifespan. What will happen when the Sun dies? Not only will the answer be important to whoever inhabits Earth in a few billion years, it is important to astronomers today. Quiet stars like the Sun are many times more numerous than large stars and play a major role in how galaxies develop. Importantly, how these stars die determines when life can first form in the galaxy. Host: Dr. Frank Summers Recorded live on Tuesday, August 7 at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A. More information: http://hubble.stsci.edu/about_us/public_talks/

What is the potential of Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR/AR) technology in Space? Could VR technology plays a role in our ambition to reach the stars. Could we use this new tool to explore and understand our solar system? Will it help to harvest the almost infinite amount of energy and material available in space? Together with VR/AR specialists, Space entrepreneurs, as well as scientific institutions like the SETI Institute, we will discuss the role of VR/AR, emphasizing how this new technology can be used by scientists, engineers, and educators to build, share and describe future innovative space projects as well as share with the public the excitement of exploring our universe. Timoni West is a director of XR Research in Unity Labs, managing a team of cross-disciplinary artists and engineers. Her group explores how humans can create and live in worlds in virtual & augmented reality. She will describe how the VR/AR tools are now available to everybody giving the opportunity to talented artists and engineers to build their own applications for space exploration. Amaresh Kollipara is an Emmy-nominated VR producer and space industry executive with a multidisciplinary background. He recently led a project called Mission:ISS at Facebook's VR company Oculus. This project was conducted in collaboration with NASA and is a true-to-life simulation of the International Space Station in VR. Amaresh will also discuss new VR use cases being developed by NASA, ESA, and other agencies. He’ll discuss how several agencies and companies are using VR and AR technologies to visualize large amounts of data and communicate space themes with the general public. Franck Marchis, a senior planetary astronomer at the SETI Institute and Chief Scientific Officer at Unistellar. Franck is also a scientific advisor for VR2Planets, a company which specialized in creating accurate environments from space-based and drone/rover data to help scientists explore and understand planets and other bodies in our solar system. A multi-user demo which immerses the users on the surface of Mars made from the Curiosity rover data combined with the space-satellite data will be featured at the event. Franck will discuss his thoughts on the potential of VR for scientific investigations at large. J.R Skok is a planetary scientist with the SETI Institute. His research is focused on exploring the deep history of Mars and the Earth and the active exploration for astrobiology. He is the scientific advisor for AstroReality, a company that developed topographically precise planetary models that are paired with AR technology for education and science outreach. J.R. will demonstrate the power of combining the limitless potential of AR with tangible handheld artifacts to understand Space like never before.

http://www.fordastronomyclub.com Astronomy For Everyone is a TV series of monthly TV shows developed by members of the Ford Amateur Astronomy Club (FAAC) targeted to beginner and intermediate audiences as well as all amateur astronomers and sky observers. Please click SHOW MORE. The Ford Amateur Astronomy Club (FAAC) meets monthly in Dearborn, Michigan, provides public outreach sessions, holds night-time observing sessions (Star Parties) in and around South Eastern Michigan, has established observing locations with State and Local park authorities, we share mentoring and more. To see an overview of all of the Astronomy For Everyone programs, please visit: http://www.fordastronomyclub.com/AFE/AFE.html You are welcome to explore our website at: http://www.fordastronomyclub.com This episode covers Eclipse & Syzygy

NASA's Global Rain and Snow Observations for Science and Society presented by Gail Skofronick-Jackson . Originally presented at the Fall AGU 2017 conference on Thursday, December 14, 2017 at 10:30 a.m.

A Tale of Three Continents: Record Carbon Dioxide Growth During the 2015 El Niño presented by Kevin Bowman. Originally presented at the Fall AGU 2017 conference on Thursday, December 14, 2017 at 7:00 p.m.

Pawan Gupta presents "Making Sense of NASA Air Quality Data, Powered by Citizen Scientists". Originally presented at the Fall AGU 2017 conference on Wednesday, December 13, 2017 at 1:20 p.m.

presented by Dr. Calen Henderson (Caltech/IPAC-NExSci) at the 2018 Sagan Summer Workshop

A single gamma ray carries millions of times the energy of a single photon of visible light. This means that gamma rays are produced only in the most convulsive environments in the universe – pulsars spinning inside huge magnetic fields, stars in binary systems devouring their partners, and black holes at the centers of galaxies swallowing gas clouds more massive than our sun. The Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope was launched on June 11, 2008, to measure these extreme astronomical events. In this lecture, SLAC scientist Eric Charles describes how we observe astronomical gamma rays and why we must go to space to see them. Then he discusses how 10 years of observations from the Fermi Telescope have changed our understanding of the most violent objects in the universe. About the Speaker: Eric Charles grew up in New Mexico. He received his PhD in high-energy particle physics from the University of Wisconsin in 2002. After three years as a postdoctoral fellow at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, he moved to SLAC in 2005 to help with the construction and testing of the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, and stayed on as a member of the Fermi instrument team. He’s been working to improve the performance of the telescope and actively studying the data it gathers on the gamma-ray sky. His hobbies include metal-working and pyrotechnics.

John Kirk (Heidelberg) Pulsar Winds Abstract: Pulsar Winds and the nebulae which they energize (PWN) are among the most enigmatic objects in astrophysics. They consist of a relativistic, magnetized, electron-positron plasma that forms a compact cloud surrounding young pulsars. Their nonthermal synchrotron and inverse-Compton emission is detected from the radio band to very high energy (TeV) gamma-rays, where they are the dominant galactic source population. The radio-to-infrared spectra of PWN are flat, indicating a remarkably efficient particle acceleration mechanism, able to transfer most of the system energy into a tiny fraction of particles. Despite decades of research, the mechanism responsible for accelerating these particles has remained elusive, and poses one of the greatest challenges in particle acceleration theory. In this talk I will give an introduction to the physics of pulsar winds, and describe recent work on the acceleration mechanisms thought to be at work. These include not only variants of the well-known first-order Fermi mechanism, but also "inductive acceleration", which may explain the mysterious gamma-ray flares from the Crab Nebula, discovered in 2011 by the Agile and Fermi satellites.

Dr. Steve Running discusses his work at NASA using satellites to keep tabs on Earth’s ecological systems. Jessi from Animal Wonders drops by to introduce Hank and Steve to Bindi the Bearded Dragon. Hosted by: Hank Green Head to https://scishowfinds.com/ for hand selected artifacts of the universe! ---------- Support SciShow by becoming a patron on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scishow ---------- Dooblydoo thanks go to the following Patreon supporters: Lazarus G, Sam Lutfi, Nicholas Smith, D.A. Noe, سلطان الخليفي, Piya Shedden, KatieMarie Magnone, Scott Satovsky Jr, Charles Southerland, Patrick D. Ashmore, Tim Curwick, charles george, Kevin Bealer, Chris Peters ---------- Looking for SciShow elsewhere on the internet? Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/scishow Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/scishow Tumblr: http://scishow.tumblr.com Instagram: http://instagram.com/thescishow ---------- Images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ogallala_saturated_thickness_1997-sattk97-v2.svg

Perimeter Institute Director Neil Turok explores a universe of ideas and shares his optimism about the positive power of human ingenuity. A renowned cosmologist and advocate for international research and education, Turok delivered "We Are Innovators" to audiences across Canada as part of the Innovation150 collaboration during Canada's sesquicentennial year. More about Innovation150: https://youtu.be/ZQfr98okwXs www.perimeterinstitute.ca www.insidetheperimeter.ca twitter.com/perimeter facebook.com/pioutreach

Presented by Dr. Tracy Gregg (SUNY Buffalo) for the LPI 50th Anniversary Science Symposium held on March 17, 2018, in Houston, Texas.

Parallel Session 1 Human and Robotic Exploration Hardware Overview Talk: Human Efficiency Improvements in Lunar and Martian Field Exploration

Presenter: Gen. John E. Hyten, Commander of USSTRATCOM What does it take to protect space and our world from threats? Gen. John E. Hyten, Commander of the U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), believes it takes imagination and innovation. In this year’s John H. Glenn Lecture in Space History, General Hyten will address the most pressing challenges USSTRATCOM faces as it stands ready to respond to threats anywhere, anytime across the globe, including space. With more than 35 years of experience as an Air Force officer and a leader in the Department of Defense, General Hyten leads a unique joint military and civilian team. Together they work to deter conflict in space and maintain space as "a sea of peace." The John H. Glenn Lecture is made possible by the generous support of Boeing.

Original air date: Wednesday, June 13 at 10:30 a.m. PT (1:30 p.m. ET, 1730 UTC) NASA's media teleconference discussed a massive Martian dust storm affecting operations of the agency’s Opportunity rover and what scientists can learn from the various missions studying this unprecedented event. The storm is one of the most intense ever observed on the Red Planet. As of June 10, it covered more than 15.8 million square miles (41 million square kilometers) -- about the area of North America and Russia combined. It has blocked out so much sunlight, it has effectively turned day into night for Opportunity, which is located near the center of the storm, inside Mars' Perseverance Valley. Participants in the teleconference included: · John Callas, Opportunity project manager, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California · Rich Zurek, Mars Program Office chief scientist, JPL · Jim Watzin, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters, Washington · Dave Lavery, program executive at NASA Headquarters for the Opportunity and Curiosity rovers The public can send questions on social media by using #askNASA. For information about all of NASA's Mars missions, visit https://mars.nasa.gov

A conversation with New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern and astrobiologist David Grinspoon about their new book, Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto. Stern and Grinspoon will share the up-close, inside story of one of the greatest space exploration projects of our time and explore the sheer human ingenuity it took to design, build, and fly this unparalleled mission.

HD1080p Reinout van Weeren (CfA) Hosted: Charles Alcock (CfA) LOFAR is the world’s largest and most sensitive low-frequency radio telescope. It is currently carrying out a monumental survey of the entire northern sky. In this talk I will discuss how we use LOFAR to unravel the physics of particle acceleration and cosmic rays in galaxy clusters, the largest gravitationally bound objects in our Universe.

James Burk's talk on MarsVR at the National Space Society's International Space Development Conference on May 25, 2018 in Los Angeles. James presented on the MarsVR project with only 6 days left on our Kickstarter campaign, and discussed future plans as well as how all of the space groups can work together on projects like this.

Watch Slava G. Turyshev (Physicist, JPL) and Louis Friedman (Co-Founder and Executive Director Emeritus, The Planetary Society) discuss a mission to the SGL focal region that could provide us with direct, multi-pixel, high-resolution images and spectroscopy of a potentially habitable Earth-like exoplanet. The speakers address some aspects of mission design and spacecraft requirements, as well as capabilities needed to fly this mission in the next two decades. This lecture took place at the workshop "Technology Requirements to Operate at and Utilize the Solar Gravity Lens for Exoplanet Imaging" at the Keck Institute for Space Studies on May 16, 2018.

Original air date: Tuesday, May 17 at 7 p.m. PT (10 p.m. ET, 0200 UTC) Juno is a solar-powered spacecraft which has been orbiting Jupiter since July 4, 2016. For a few hours every 53 days, Juno passes within a few thousand kilometers of the giant planet and collects a wealth of new information about Jupiter. Learn more about some of Juno’s current science results on the planet's origins, interior structure, deep atmosphere, and magnetosphere, and discuss the science expected from Juno in the coming years. Speaker: Dr. Steve Levin – Juno Project Scientist and lead co-investigator for Juno’s MicroWave Radiometer instrument

Tony Case, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Solar Probe Cup Instrument Scientist, and Kelly Korreck, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Science Operations Lead for SWEAP Instrument Suite aboard Parker Solar Probe In July 2018, NASA will launch a satellite 60 years in the making. The hottest mission under the Sun will visit - the Sun! It is an extreme mission - the fastest human-made object that will travel closest to the Sun at the hottest operating temperatures in history. Learn what went into building this satellite with Dr. Kelly Korreck, who will describe the strange Sun behavior that this mission aims to explain, and Dr. Tony Case, who will discuss the bravest instrument on board that peeks around the spacecraft's protective sun shade: the Solar Probe Cup. Original music by Mark C. Petersen, Loch Ness Productions. Used with permission. Animations used under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

HD 1080p Alan Rogers Haystack / MIT Host: Shep Doeleman Abstract: A deeper than expected absorption with flattened bottom has been observed using the Experiment to Detect the Global EoR signature (EDGES) instruments located at the Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory in Western Australia. I will describe the instrument and its calibration and how the performance has been improved over a period of about 12 years leading to detection of the 21_cm absorption at 78 MHz. Absorption of the CMB is expected when the hydrogen spin temperature drops from the CMB temperature to the kinetic temperature as the result of Wouthuysen–Field coupling of the Lyman-Alpha radiation from the early stars. I will discuss the need and prospects for confirmation by other instruments, the future plans of EDGES, list mechanisms which might explain the greater depth and flattened profile and allow time for discussion of these mechanisms.

The key to understand our origins is in the interiors and atmospheres of the giant planets. Jupiter is the biggest planet in our system and the most influential one: its large mass shaped the architecture of the solar system and due to its fast formation it contains valuable information of the solar system formation history. In orbit since July 2016, the first orbits of the Juno mission have led to a remarkable improvement of the planet gravity data, changing our knowledge of the planetary interior and leading to a much better comprehension of the giant planet and its role in the solar system. In this seminar, I will present the new Juno results, the models we use to understand Jupiter's interior and its differential rotation, and the main challenges and questions that remained to be solved. Credit: CFA Follow Us: Facebook: https://goo.gl/QapZAe Twitter: https://goo.gl/RoQSmJ

Dr. Alan Stern and Dr. David Grinspoon will give the inside story of one of the greatest space exploration projects of our time, the New Horizons mission to Pluto. Mission leader Dr. Alan Stern and noted scientist and author Dr. David Grinspoon will be signing copies of their book, "Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto", at the event. Subscribe now for more All Space Considered clips: https://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=griffithobservatory All Space Considered is Griffith Observatory’s live science program that is free and open to the public, held the first Friday of every month. Watch All Space Considered videos: https://www.youtube.com/griffithobservatory Learn more about All Space Considered on our official site: http://griffithobservatory.org/asc/all_space.html Follow All Space Considered on Twitter: https://twitter.com/allspacecnsdrd -Disclaimer- WE DO NOT OWN THE RIGHTS TO THE, VIDEOS, MUSICAL MATERIAL OR PICTURES PRESENT THAT WERE NOT CREATED DIRECTLY BY GRIFFITH OBSERVATORY OR ITS AFFILIATES, ALL CREDIT FOR THIS MATERIAL GOES TO THE ORIGINAL ARTISTS, CREATORS AND COMPOSERS. Fair Use: "Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."

Presented by Dr. Daniel P. Schrag The increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide due to burning coal, oil and gas represents an unprecedented experiment on the planet Earth. Dr. Schrag will discuss how the history of Earth and its neighboring planets provide hints of how that experiment might unfold. Learn more about the Kavli Fulldome Lecture Series at the Adler Planetarium: https://rebrand.ly/adlera30ad

Celebrating 45 years since Apollo 17, this panel features Harrison Schmitt (first geologist on the Moon), Gerry Griffin (Apollo 17 Flight Director), and James Head III (Apollo 17 backroom scientist). The panel is moderated by Carle Pieters (Brown University).

The Search for Life: Near & Far Presented by Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Gravitational Wave Astronomy Andrew Fruchter, Space Telescope Science Institute The 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded for the observation of gravitational waves. This new field transforms our ability to study the universe. For the first time, we can directly observe the mergers of binaries composed of the densest macroscopic objects in the universe—black holes and neutron stars. The results are revolutionary. We have discovered stellar mass black holes far larger than any previously known, and have seen them merge to form even larger black holes. We have seen evidence that neutron star mergers are a major source of the heavy elements in the universe. Dr. Fruchter will provide an introduction to the technology and physics behind the detection of gravitational waves as well as discuss the exciting new results. Host: Dr. Frank Summers Recorded live on Tuesday, May 1 at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.A. More information: http://hubble.stsci.edu/about_us/public_talks/

What does it take for a planet to be hospitable for life? In this April 18, 2018 MAVEN Outreach Webinar, MAVEN Co-Investigator Dr. Dave Brain of the University of Colorado Boulder's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) discusses the role a global magnetic field may play in the evolution of a planet’s atmosphere and in planetary habitability. https://lasp.colorado.edu/home/maven http://lasp.colorado.edu/home/maven/education-outreach/public-outreach/maven-outreach-webinars/

Join NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientists and engineers and get a sneak peek of the upcoming InSight Mars mission, the first to focus on examining the deep interior of Mars. Launching in May 2018, this lander will be the very first interplanetary launch from the West Coast. The Exploratorium will host the InSight Roadshow with a half-scale model of the lander and an array of instruments. InSight (Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) is a NASA Discovery Program mission that will place a single lander on Mars. InSight is more than a Mars mission; it’s a terrestrial planet explorer that will address one of the most fundamental questions of planetary and solar system science: what are the processes that shaped the rocky planets of the inner solar system, including Earth, more than four billion years ago? By using sophisticated geophysical instruments, InSight will delve deep beneath the surface of Mars, detecting the fingerprints of the processes of terrestrial planet formation, as well as measuring the planet's “vital signs”: its "pulse" (seismology), "temperature" (heat flow probe), and "reflexes" (precision tracking).

Iron: Primordial Cofactor for Biochemistry Presented by Dr. Marcus Bray Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Phosphorylation in Urea-Rich Eutectic Solvents Presented by Dr. Bradley Burcar Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Genetics Underlying de novo Origins of Multicellularity in Response to Predation Presented by Dr. Kimberly Chen Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Quantitative, Compositional Analysis of Trace Amino Acids in Europa Analogues Presented by Dr. Zachary Duca Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Glycosylation of Model Proto-RNA Nucleobases Presented by Dr. David Fialho Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

The Embedded Scientist Program Presented by Dr. Andrea Krafft Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

GTRI Space Strategic Initiative: MicroNimbus CubeSat Presented by Dr. Nelson Lourenco Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Exo-Evo? An Organismal Approach to Evolutionary Dynamics Presented by Dr. Pedro Marquez-Zacarias Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

A Possible Path to Prebiotic Peptides Presented by Dr. Aaron McKee Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Chemical Selection of Plausible Protopolypeptides Presented by Dr. Martin Solano Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

New Pathways for Old Metals Presented by Dr. Nadia Szeinbaum Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Iron Sulfide Minerals in Prebiotic Redox Chemistry Presented by Dr. Olga Taran Exploring Life Origins and the Universe: A Networking Event March 30th, 2018 The Georgia Tech Astrobiology Colloquium is a new early career event for the Georgia Tech astrobiology community and consisted of presentations and talks by students (both graduate and undergraduate) and post-doctoral fellows working in astrobiology, space science, and engineering across the Georgia Tech campus and greater Atlanta. There are also plenary lectures given by distinguished members of the global astrobiology community. Plenary Speakers: Dr. Ada Yonath Dr. Niles Lehman Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman Organizing Committee: Moran Frenkel-Pinter Kennda Lynch George Zaharescu Faculty Advisors: Martha Grover Glenn Lightsey Jennifer Glass

Planetary scientist Dr. Susan Lederer of the Astromaterials Research and Exploration Science (ARES) Division at the NASA’s Johnson Space Center discusses the discovery of the TRAPPIST-1 extrasolar system. Lederer also discusses the potential habitability of the seven planets orbiting the parent star. This was the fifth and final presentation in the Lunar and Planetary Institute’s 2017–2018 Cosmic Exploration Speaker Series, “Diving into Ocean Worlds.”

To uncover the mysteries of the universe, astronomers are becoming greedy, making more observations than they can possibly analyze manually. Large photometric surveys from space telescopes like Kepler and the future TESS are no exception and today modern astronomers use artificial Intelligence (AI) algorithms to help them reveal the existence of exoplanets hidden in many years of observations of hundreds of thousands of stars. For this SETI Talk, we invited two researchers involved in the Kepler mission and AI to discuss the potential of neural networks to transform astronomy. Jeff Smith, Data scientist at the SETI Institute, has developed data processing and planet detection algorithms for Kepler since 2010 and is now involved in developing the pipeline for the future TESS mission. Chris Shallue, a senior software engineer at Google AI has used a neural network to analyze archival data from the Kepler Space Telescope to reveal the existence of two unknown exoplanets, named Kepler-90i and Kepler-80g. After presenting their recent work, we will discuss the impact of this new mode of scientific discovery, where artificial intelligence can assist humans in mapping out parts of the galaxy that have not yet been fully revealed. Chris Shallue is a Senior Research Software Engineer on the Google AI team in Mountain View, California. His research is currently focused on machine learning techniques for identifying planets in data collected by the NASA Kepler space telescope. He also works on image captioning, natural language modeling and machine learning theory. Chris was previously a member of the Google Display Ads team where he worked on ad selection and personalization for GMail and Google Maps. Prior to joining Google, Chris was teaching, studying and researching mathematics. Dr. Jeffrey Smith began his academic passion in the field of High Energy Accelerator Physics. His Ph.D. thesis was on the design of the International Linear Collider (ILC), a 22 mile-long electron-positron accelerator that will complement the discoveries being made at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. After Cornell, Jeff joined the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University to continue his work on the ILC and also to develop upgrade hardware for the LHC. After a successful career looking into the tiniest of inner-spaces Jeff decided to look up to the stars. Dr. Smith, now at the SETI Institute, develops data processing and planet detection algorithms for the Kepler and TESS Missions. Eking out planet signals in the Kepler data has proven to be a challenging and rewarding endeavor but looking toward the future, Dr. Smith is involved with developing new methods for use with the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), a new NASA planet finding mission to find Earth’s nearest cousins in a our galactic back yard.

Feb. 28, 2018 Dr. Ashwin Vasavada, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory For five years, Curiosity has explored Gale Crater, one of the most intriguing locations on Mars. In this richly illustrated talk, the Project Scientist discussed what the rover is capable of and the many things it has discovered on the red planet.

Once a month, SAGANet (www.saganet.org) hosts a program called "Ask an Astrobiologist", where the public is invited to interact with a high-profile astrobiologist, who replies to twitter, facebook, and chat questions live on video. Each session lasts about an hour. Hosted by Dr. Sanjoy Som (Blue Marble Space Institute of Science) Featured Guest: Dr. Shawn Domagal-Goldman (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center) Directed by Mike Toillion (NASA Astrobiology Program) Music by Sam Doshier (NASA Astrobiology Institute)

The search for extrasolar planets has uncovered a dizzying array of planetary systems. As part of that quest, researchers have found new planet types—lava worlds and super-Earths—as well as planets orbiting more than one star.

Take a tour of some of the strangest stellar phenomena in the universe during this talk featuring Emily Levesque. From the biggest, brightest, and most volatile stars to the explosive fireworks of core-collapse supernovae and the fascinating physics of gravitational waves, “weird” stars serve as a common thread for exploring our universe’s history, evolution, and extremes. Levesque will discuss the history of stellar astronomy, present-day observing techniques and exciting new discoveries, and explore some of the most puzzling and bizarre objects being studied by astronomers today.

HD 1080P Host: Sean Andrews Yamila Miguel Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur Abstract: The key to understand our origins is in the interiors and atmospheres of the giant planets. Jupiter is the biggest planet in our system and the most influential one: its large mass shaped the architecture of the solar system and due to its fast formation it contains valuable information of the solar system formation history. In orbit since July 2016, the first orbits of the Juno mission have led to a remarkable improvement of the planet gravity data, changing our knowledge of the planetary interior and leading to a much better comprehension of the giant planet and its role in the solar system. In this seminar, I will present the new Juno results, the models we use to understand Jupiter's interior and its differential rotation, and the main challenges and questions that remained to be solved.