Past Colloquia
Transcending the Limits of Astrostatistics with Machine Learning Methods
Virtual Colloquium
Yuan-Sen Ting, Australian National University
April 11, 2023
9:00 am - 10:00am
Astronomy has undergone a profound transformation in recent years, as the acquisition of ever-growing amounts of data through increasingly powerful instruments has opened up a wealth of new avenues of exploration. However, this boon is not without its own set of challenges, as astronomical observations…
The Emergence of Galactic Structure in the Era of JWST
Cody Hall
Erica June Nelson, University of Colorado
April 05, 2023
3:00pm - 4:00pm
The launch and commissioning of the James Webb SpaceTelescope is ushering in a new era in our understanding of our cosmicorigins. Galaxies are a fundamental building block of the universe,yet how they formed has remained enigmatic owing to our inability toobserve them at early cosmic…
Astro Colloquium: Witnessing the Universe with ACT
Cody Hall
Suzanne Staggs
March 29, 2023
3:00pm - 4:00pm
The Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) made measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) for fifteen years, with a series of three cameras. ACT was designed to complement Planck, the latest and most sensitive CMB satellite. To compete with the powerful data set provided from a …
DADDAA Faculty Search: “Atomic Gas in Nearby Galaxies as a Cosmological Probe”
AB88
Dr. Kristine Spekkens
March 28, 2023
2:00pm - 3:30pm
The atomic gas (HI) content of nearby galaxies provides important insight into how they form and evolve within the standard cosmology. In this talk, I will highlight some of my group’s recent progress towards building statistical samples of HI detections for nearby galaxies to use…
Astro Colloquium: The formation of galaxies and supermassive black holes. Early results from JWST.
Cody Hall
Prof. Tommaso Treu, UCLA
March 22, 2023
3:00pm - 4:00pm
In just a few months, JWST has revolutionized our understanding of the universe. Its unprecedented sensitivity and angular resolution have given us a new view of the cosmos, enabling new discoveries in many areas of astronomy. I will describe first results from my GLASS-JWST Early…
DADDAA: Faculty Search: Probing Planet Formation with the Most Extreme Cases
Zoom Group Viewing in AB88
Dr. Fei Dai, Caltech
March 21, 2023
4:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Thousands of exoplanets have been discovered in the past ~30 years. Kepler has shown us close-in sub-Neptune exoplanets (<1AU, <4R_earth) are extremely common in our Galaxy but somehow absent in our solar system. The James Webb Space Telescope is poised to characterize some of these…
Astro Colloquium: Fast flares and furious transients: exploring the deep, high-speed sky
Cody Hall
Nick Law
March 15, 2023
3:00pm - 4:00pm
Current sky-survey telescopes’ limited fields of view hinder the rapid detection of rare fast events, including superflares capable of rendering exoplanets uninhabitable, fast stellar dips from Oort-cloud occultations, and electromagnetic counterparts to gravitational waves. I will discuss the impacts of stellar superflares on planet habitability…
DADDAA Faculty Search: “From Blips to Bits: FRB cosmology, Radio Cameras, and Astroinformatics”
UC179
Dr. Liam Connor
March 09, 2023
2:00pm - 3:30pm
Modern radio telescopes have seen tremendous gains in sensitivity, field of view, and frequency bandwidth, thanks largely to advances in signal processing. This has allowed us to uncover entirely new source classes, such as fast radio bursts (FRBs). Beyond the mystery of their origin, FRBs…
Closing the Loop in Early Universe Cosmology?
Cody Hall
Prof. Chris Smeenk, UWO
March 01, 2023
3:00pm - 4:00pm
Contemporary cosmology pursues several ambitious aims, including uncovering new aspects of fundamental physics based on their role in the very early universe. In pursuing these aims, cosmologists have revisited basic questions about what constitutes an acceptable scientific theory, what explanatory demands a theory should meet,…
Astrophysical Lessons from LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA’s Black Holes
Cody Hall
Prof. Maya Fishbach
February 15, 2023
3:00pm - 4:00pm
The LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration has observed over 70 gravitational-wave sources to date, including mergers between black holes, neutron stars, and mixed neutron star—black holes. Focusing on the black hole mergers, I will describe some recent lessons into how, when, and where black holes are made. These…