“The Splendors of the Universe with Visual Astronomy” – Speaker: Dr. Paul Knauth
The talk surveys astronomical marvels that can actually be seen with the human eye and discuss how today’s colorful digital images inadvertently distort our human understanding and appreciation of the cosmos.
“My work with the Rovers on Mars” Speaker: Dr. Tanya Harrison
Dr. Harrison works on commercial-academic space partnerships and Martian geomorphology research at Arizona State University. She has been deeply involved with all of the Rovers that we have on Mars. Dr. Harrison wrote an article in the July 2017 Astronomy magazine about water on Mars. Her talk is primarily about water – past and present – on Mars.
“CCD Photometry from Inside the Light Dome” Speaker – Retired engineer Tom Polakis
Tom is a Contributing Editor for Astronomy Magazine. He has written many stories about the hobby and the profession. Tom has actively pursued photometry with his CCD imaging Equipment in Tempe. During that time, he has determined rotation periods of asteroids, measured brightness and colors of eclipsing binary and pulsating variable stars and created light curves of exoplanets.
“Space Physiology” Speaker – Michelle Turner
Our speaker was Michelle Turner, a world traveled expert in the field of human locomotion. Ms. Turner spoke on space physiology based on the Theory of Opposition to Gravity and Locomotion, a paper she presented at the International Conference of Movement and Cognition at the University of Oxford in July 2017. The theory has implications for humans in long term space flight such as in NASA’s upcoming Mars mission.
“Are We Alone in the Universe” Speaker – Dr. Laird Close
Dr. Laird Close is an award winning Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at The University of Arizona. Dr. Close is the principal scientist of the 6.5m Magellan Adaptive Optics extrasolar planet imager, located in the high Atacama Desert of Chile. He has developed a course available in the “The Great Courses” series entitled “Are We Alone in the Universe” and this will be the theme of his presentation.