Keck Lecture – Comet ISON

Astronomy Talk: The Wonder of Comet ISON, A Relic From the Beginning of the Solar System

Thursday October 24, 2013
07:00 pm – 08:00 pm

Comet C/2012 S1 ISON
An image of comet C/2012 S1 ISON acquired by the Hubble Space Telescope on October 9th, 2013, credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team
Kahilu Theatre

Dr. Carey Lisse, head of NASA’s Comet ISON Observation Campaign, will present a timely talk on how and when comets were formed, and where they come from. Also a Senior Research Scientist with Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Lisse will relate how comets may have helped start life on the Earth, and also how they may have ended it for millions of creatures at least 4 times in the past. He’ll also give a bit of the history of comet observing by mankind, and explain how Comet 2012 S1 (ISON) fits into this picture of comets as relics from the beginning of our solar system.

Contact at the Kahilu this Sunday

Date: Sunday, March 17
Showtime: 7:00 pm, Free and Open to the Public
Location: Kahilu Theatre

Join us for a wonderful screening of this classic film hosted by Artist Jon Lomberg who will share about how he and Carl Sagan collaborated for 25 years on projects including COSMOS, the Voyager Golden Record, and the film Conact, in production at the time of Sagan’s death in 1996. Lomberg is also developer of the Big Island’s Galaxy Garden.

Beer and wine available for sale at event. Not just any beer either, but Big Island Brewhaus brews!

Contact
Contact starring Jodie Foster and Matthew McConaughey

Keck Lecture at Kahilu May 10

Dr. Brian Siana
How Stars Destroyed Most of the Atoms in the Universe

Kahilu Theater
Thursday, May 10th
7:00pm

The first galaxies had an extraordinary impact on the young universe. Their ultraviolet light destroyed nearly all of the atoms in the cosmos. This process, called reionization, had severe consequences for galaxies trying to form thereafter. Unfortunately, we have no idea how it happened. In galaxies today ultraviolet light cannot escape, so the first galaxies must have been very different from those we see today. Dr. Siana will describe the quest to detect these first galaxies and their impact on the early universe.

There is no charge for admission to any events in the Makana series.

Presented by W.M. Keck Observatory. This event will also be streamed live on the Keck Observatory website.

A Premiere

Tomorrow night will see the premiere of my latest work. Over the last few months I have been assembling a video on Keck titled Keck in Motion. The nice part is that the first public screening will see the video on a big screen indeed… The showing will be at the Kahilu Theater. It will be run as a introduction piece before the Keck lecture

The video has seen the usual creative cycles during production… Enthusiasm followed by disillusionment, in alternating phases. Despite some doubts along the way, I have to admit the final version is not all that bad. Everyone who has seen it uniformly gives great reviews, but as the author, I see all the flaws and things I could improve. Whatever reservations I might have, the time has come to simply say… It is done. I have turned over copies to Larry and Mariko, ready for projection on a big screen tomorrow night.

The video has been seen a couple private showings to a selected audience. In particular it has been seen by the guys on the summit crew, many of whom appear in the video. Some bits of the video have been seen here before, particularly the three lasers sequence. Some of the material was stuff I had accumulated across the years, many pieces were custom shot to complete the project. Somehow it works into a very nice narrative and a complete story in three minutes, thirty-six seconds.

Look to see the video posted here after the premiere. Peeking at my Vimeo account will not help, I have not uploaded it yet. I suspect it will get spread around a little, used for Keck PR. It does show what a special place Keck is. Better yet, it highlights the hard work it takes to keep Keck on-sky every night. Because of that, this video is dedicated to the guys of the summit crew.

Lasers 3 over Mauna Kea from Andrew Cooper on Vimeo.

Reminder – Keck Lecture Tomorrow

Tom Soifer
Seeing the Invisible Universe

Kahilu Theater
Thursday, February 9
7:00pm

Astronomy is enjoying a golden age and the W M Keck Observatory is a world leader in cosmic exploration. With generous support from Rob and Terry Ryan, Keck Observatory invites you to take a journey beyond this world to the frontiers of discovery. Your guides are Keck’s astronomers. They will bring you a rich and varied Universe and an evening filled with beauty, drama, mystery and surprise.

Tom Soifer is professor of physics at the California Institute of Technology and the Director of the Spitzer Science Center. He is also the Chair of the Division of Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy at Caltech and a member of the Board of Directors of the W. M. Keck Observatory. The Spitzer Space Telescope is NASA’s latest Great Observatory, designed to explore the infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. Spitzer was launched in August of 2003. In his talk, Soifer will describe some of the most exciting results from the Spitzer mission, among its many discoveries have been measuring the thermal emission and spectra from hot Jupiters orbiting other stars, finding “Fullerene (buckyball)” molecules in space, observing prebiotic molecules in galaxies seen less than 3 billion years after the big bang, and measuring the masses of the most distant and youngest galaxies known.

There is no charge for admission to any events in the Makana series.

Presented by W.M. Keck Observatory.

Keck Lecture at Kahilu February 9th

Tom Soifer
Seeing the Invisible Universe

Kahilu Theater
Thursday, February 9
7:00pm

Astronomy is enjoying a golden age and the W M Keck Observatory is a world leader in cosmic exploration. With generous support from Rob and Terry Ryan, Keck Observatory invites you to take a journey beyond this world to the frontiers of discovery. Your guides are Keck’s astronomers. They will bring you a rich and varied Universe and an evening filled with beauty, drama, mystery and surprise.

Tom Soifer is professor of physics at the California Institute of Technology and the Director of the Spitzer Science Center. He is also the Chair of the Division of Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy at Caltech and a member of the Board of Directors of the W. M. Keck Observatory. The Spitzer Space Telescope is NASA’s latest Great Observatory, designed to explore the infrared portion of the electromagnetic spectrum. Spitzer was launched in August of 2003. In his talk, Soifer will describe some of the most exciting results from the Spitzer mission, among its many discoveries have been measuring the thermal emission and spectra from hot Jupiters orbiting other stars, finding “Fullerene (buckyball)” molecules in space, observing prebiotic molecules in galaxies seen less than 3 billion years after the big bang, and measuring the masses of the most distant and youngest galaxies known.

There is no charge for admission to any events in the Makana series.

Presented by W.M. Keck Observatory.