OXFORD, Miss. – How astronomy revolutionized the way we see the universe is the focus for a monthly public science forum organized by the University of Mississippi Department of Physics and Astronomy.
The next meeting of the Oxford Science Cafe is set for 6 p.m. April 17 at Lusa Pastry Cafe, 1120 North Lamar Ave. in Oxford. Amber Stuver, a postdoctoral student from California Institute of Technology, will discuss “Multi-messenger Astronomy: Expanding Astronomy’s Senses.” Admission is free.
“Light has been the primary tool for doing astronomy since ancient times,” Stuver said. “Only recently have other ways of looking at the universe become available, notably neutrinos and gravitational waves. Observing the universe with different media is a growing field of astronomy called multi-messenger astronomy.”
Stuver’s 30-minute presentation will also describe how multi-messenger astronomy will expand our “senses” to observe the universe in fundamentally new ways. Multi-messenger astronomy examples used will be from the experience of the LIGO gravitational wave observatories. The lecture will be followed by a question-and-answer session.
Stuver is a physicist specializing in data analysis and signal processing with a special interest in physics education. She is a Caltech post-doc working at the LIGO Livingston Observatory near Baton Rouge, La.
This is the last science cafe for the 2011-2012 academic year. The forums will resume this fall.
For more information about Oxford Science Cafes, go to http://www.phy.olemiss.edu/oxfordsciencecafe. For more information about the Department of Physics and Astronomy, go to http://www.olemiss.edu/depts/physics_and_astronomy/ or call 662-915-5311.