Dr. Michael Nowak, Research Scientist
| Jan/26 | Tue | 02:00PM-02:30PM | Marlar Lounge 37-252 |
Enrollment: Unlimited: No advance sign-up
Prereq: attend 2pm talk to take two tours that follow
In the summer of 1999, NASA launched the third of its great observatories--the Chandra X-ray telescope. Like the Hubble Space telescope which preceded it, Chandra is designed to have an unprecedented ability to create images and spectra of astrophysical objects, except working with high energy X-rays instead of optical light. This means that Chandra views some of the universe's most exotic and energetic phenomena: supernovae, neutron stars, black holes, jets traveling at nearly the speed of light emanating from near the center of clusters of galaxies. In this talk, we'll take a tour of the discoveries made by the Chandra X-ray telescope, starting with studies of our own solar system, moving outward to nearby stars, to the center of our own Galaxy where a black hole 40 millions times the mass of our Sun lurks, to distant clusters of Galaxies where the most massive black holes, billions of times the mass of our Sun, reside.
Two tours will follow this talk. See separate listing for each tour and visit the MKI website for complete details.
Tour #1: Operations Control Center, Chandra X-ray Observatory (Dr. Schulz, 2:45 - 3:30pm; Tour departs 37-252 @ 2:30pm). Signup deadline: 12noon Thurs, Jan 21. Email meinbres@mit.edu your first & last name (as it appears on your ID) & the country of your citizenship.
Tour #2: Tour of the X-ray Polarimetry Lab (Drs. Schulz and Marshall, 3:45 - 4:15pm)
Sponsor(s): Kavli Institute for Astrophysics & Space Research
Contact: Debbie Meinbresse, 37-241, 617 253-1456, MEINBRES@MIT.EDU