Events archive

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Past Event · Public Lecture

The Violent Universe

In this talk, Eduardo do Couto e Silva will explain that while the night sky appears calm, it is in fact populated by colossal explosions and cosmic conflagrations.

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Presented by Sean Brennan. The Stardust mission returned from a 6-year voyage in January of 2006. During the mission it swept through the tail of comet Wild 2 (pronounced Vilt), collecting the microscopic particles streaming from it.

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Past Event · Public lecture

Whispers of the Big Bang

Presented by Sarah Church. The faint radio signal that fills our universe is the echo of the beginning of the universe. This signal, called the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation, was first detected by accident in 1964 but has since been...

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Past Event · Public lecture

Space: The Hunt for Hidden Dimensions

Presented by JoAnne Hewett. Extra dimensions of space may be present in our universe. Their discovery would dramatically change our view of the cosmos and would prompt many questions. How do they hide? What is their shape? How many are...

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Past Event · Public Lectures

Arsenic: The Silent Killer

Andrea Foster uses x-rays to determine the forms of potentially toxic elements in environmentally-important matrices such as water, sediments, plants, and microorganisms. In this free public lecture, Foster will discuss her research on arsenic, which is called the silent killer...
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Past Event · Public Lectures

Archimedes: Accelerator Reveals Ancient Text

Archimedes (287-212 BC), who is famous for shouting 'Eureka' (I found it) is considered one of the most brilliant thinkers of all times. The 10th-century parchment document known as the “Archimedes Palimpsest” is the unique source for two of the...
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Past Event · Public Lectures

Neutrinos Get Under Your Skin

The enigmatic neutrinos are among the most abundant of the tiny particles that make up our universe. They are a billion times more abundant than the particles of which the earth and we humans are made. Thus, to understand the...
Neutrinos Get Under Your Skin
Past Event · Public Lectures

LCLS: Ultrafast Science

Everyone knows that lasers can be bright. From Goldfinger to Star Wars, intense lasers carry a "death ray" reputation in popular culture. But what is intense light, anyway?

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According to Smith, protein crystallography allows scientists to design drugs in a much more efficient way than the standard methods traditionally used by large drug companies, which can cost close to a billion dollars and take 10 to 15 years...
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When we explore Nature at distances much smaller than the size of an atom, we find new and mysterious physical principles. At such small sizes, particles are governed by "quantum theory". Quantum theory tells us that some aspects of particle...
stillframe from public lecture Profiling the invisible