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IAP 2012 Activity


MIT Physics Lecture Series:i

Gravitational Lensing is Fantastic!
Dr. Simona Vegetti, Pappalardo Fellow
Wed Feb 1, 01:30-02:30pm, 6-120

No enrollment limit, no advance sign up
Single session event

Light does not always travel in a straight line. The gravitational pull of massive objects as galaxies and galaxy clusters deflect passing light rays and produce a detectable distortion and magnification of the background source. If the alignment between the source and the gravitational lens is good enough, multiple images are formed. The images that are so created, are very beautiful and intriguing, but most importantly they can be used to learn something about the Universe. During this talk, I will present some of the most interesting astrophysical applications of gravitational lensing and show that lensing is a very powerful tool to study galaxy formation but also to constrain the properties of dark matter and dark energy.
Contact: Denise Wahkor, 4-315, 253-4855, denisew@mit.edu
Sponsor: Physics
Latest update: 09-Dec-2011


MIT  
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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Last update: 7 Sept. 2011