presents a series of lectures, demonstrations, and films
WHAT PHYSICISTS DO
Physics is what physicists do late at night
SEVENTY-FIFTH SERIES
SPRING 2008
| Mondays at 4:00 p.m. | Darwin 103 | Coffee at 3:30 p.m. |
| FEB 4 | MASSIVE SKY SURVEYS OF THE NEXT DECADE |
| Dr. David Wittman of the University of California, Davis will describe how systematic imaging of the sky to much fainter levels than ever before is expected to reveal everything from 200-meter rocks in Earth-crossing orbits to very distant galaxies. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| FEB 11 | THE TUNGUSKA EVENT 100 YEARS LATER: FINDING NEAR EARTH OBJECTS BEFORE THEY FIND US |
| Dr. Donald K. Yeomans of Caltech’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory will discuss the daily bombardment of Earth by asteroid fragments and the ongoing NASA programs to understand and track Earth’s nearest neighbors. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| FEB 25 | THE EVOLUTION OF GALAXIES IN DIFFERENT ENVIRONMENTS |
| Dr. Jacqueline van Gorkom of Columbia University will show observations and simulations that suggest that the evolution of a galaxy may be seriously affected by its environment. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library and online.] | |
| MAR 3 | DEMARCATION: IS THERE A SHARP LINE BETWEEN SCIENCE AND PSEUDOSCIENCE? |
| Dr. Raymond Hall of California State University, Fresno will discuss the philosophical attempts to define a boundary between the scientific and its pretenders and the application of this distinction in the areas of law, public policy, and education policy. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| MAR 10 | THE ROLE OF ENERGY EFFICIENCY IN CALIFORNIA’S EFFORTS TO CURB GLOBAL WARMING |
| Audrey Chang of the Natural Resources Defense Council will describe California’s policies to spur energy efficiency, and its key role in cutting global warming pollution. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| MAR 17 | STUDIES OF THE TERRESTRIAL UPPER ATMOSPHERE WITH ASTRONOMICAL INSTRUMENTS |
| Dr. Tom Slanger of SRI International will describe how the study of sky spectra collected at major telescopes is leading to new insights into atomic and molecular processes and important upper atmospheric phenomena as diverse as atom recombination and space weather. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| APR 7 | THE WARMING WILL ACCELERATE THE WARMING |
| Dr. Inez Fung of the University of California at Berkeley will describe how climate change will alter the processes that store carbon in the land and the oceans, and hence accelerate climate change itself. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| APR 14 | LIGO: LASERS, OPTICS, AND INTERFEROMETRY IN THE SEARCH FOR GRAVITATIONAL WAVES |
| Dr. Shailendhar Saraf of Sonoma State University will discuss the technological challenges in the detection of gravitational waves with a terrestrial instrument and describe the laser technology and interferometric techniques used in LIGO. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| APR 21 | A PHYSICIST’S PLAYGROUND: FROM DOLPHINS TO TOUCHSCREENS |
| Dr. James Aroyan (’87) of JRJ Simulation & Design will discuss computational modeling applications ranging from marine mammal sound reception to Rayleigh wave scattering and solar cell design. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| APR 28 | FABRICATION AND STUDIES OF MAGNETIC NANOSTRUCTURES |
| Dr. Hongtao Shi of Sonoma State University will discuss the fabrication of macroscopic masks with nanometer-scaled pores by anodization of aluminum. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| MAY 5 | LIGHTING UP THE DARK: GALAXIES AS PROBES OF THE DARK UNIVERSE |
| Dr. Risa Wechsler of Stanford University will describe how the dark matter that pervades our Universe is connected to the galaxies observed with telescopes, and how galaxy surveys can be used to understand the contents of our Universe. [Now available on DVD in the SSU library.] | |
| Next lecture: SEP 8 | |
