“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.

“An Immigrant’s Journey to the Cosmos” Speaker – Dr. Misconi

Some of Dr. Misconi’s Interests: The Zodiacal light, Interplanetary dust dynamics, Comets and Asteroids colliding with the Earth, Conversations with Buz Aldrin and others, Space science in Florida, Global warming views.

 “Probe of Earth-Trojan Asteroid – Bennu” Speaker – Carl Hergenrother

Carl Hergenrother has discovered multiple asteroids and minor planets and is on the OSIRIS-Rex asteroid investigation team .
The mission, launched in 2016, will study asteroid 101955 Bennu by scooping up and returning it’s pristine material* back to earth for important scientific study. (*remanents that built the earth) Coincidentally asteroid Bennu also occupies a dangereous near-earth orbit! If successful, OSIRIS-REx will be the first US spacecraft to return samples from an asteroid.