Steinn Sigurðsson
Professor of Astrophysics at Pennsylvania State University. Science Editor at Astrophysical Journal. Icelandic. Herder of Cats.
catdynamics
Posts by this author
July 22, 2013
This is a public service announcement:
the EU is running a FameLab like Science Slam
EURAXESS Researcher in Motion Science Slam, sponsored by the European Commission.
"If you are a researcher currently based in North America (US and Canada), enter the competition by posting a video featuring…
July 18, 2013
Ok, straight from cosmology to cybersecurity: the Aspen Institute is running an "Aspen Security Forum" with several days of events.
Tonight General Keith Alexander, head of the NSA is doing a forum with NBC's Pete Williams.
I got a ticket and got here early, as the heavens opened up and the…
July 18, 2013
Simon White Director of Max Planck Institut für Astrophysik giving today's Physics Colloquium at ACP on the Planck Results
Likely to be interesting, hence the semi-liveblog.
Starts with description of the collaboration and historical perspective; Penzias and Wilson, COBE and WMAP
Cute ESA video…
July 17, 2013
Playing catch-up here:
Science is Hard - Chad's take
Waiting for the Revolution - David Gross's take
Why Open Access Makes No Sense - I think Robin Osborne is actually saying something other than social network reactions thought he was saying, but I am not saying he is right.
The End of Kepler -…
July 3, 2013
I am at a meeting at an undisclosed location, and concurrently the weak lensing folk are having a workshop on future surveys, so I am slumming at their sessions in my copious spare time.
This morning Tony Tyson is leading a discussion on the technical aspects of the surveys, with LSST as the…
June 20, 2013
Earlier this month I got an invitation to the White House.
It was rather cryptic, asking me to attend an Event, today, followed by a reception in the Indian Treaty Room
Regrettably, I had to decline, I was in Europe, and would only just be getting back. The logistics of getting to DC in time were…
May 24, 2013
Over the next 10 years, what research done on bodies within our Solar System (measurements and theory) will be most important for informing our search for life beyond the Earth?
This is the current topic posed as the Single Question on the Future of Astrobiology at the ongoing NASA Astrobiology…
May 20, 2013
The final session in the online discussion of the NASA Astrobiology Roadmap is today from 4-5 pm eastern.
Go to Astrobiology Future to sign in to the live web chat. Questions and comments will be taken both from call-ins and from written questions.
The online discussion will be moderated by Dr…
May 20, 2013
Astrobiology Future
The NASA online discussion session on the Astrobiology Roadmap continues this week.
This morning there was a web chat on "Early Evolution of Life and the Biosphere", which is being followed up by an ongoing online discussion on the questions posed and soliciting ideas for…
May 15, 2013
I come to praise Kepler, not to bury it...
Kepler!
The Kepler Mission is one of the little NASA spacecraft that so frequently comes along, exceeds all expectations and changes our perspective of the universe.
There is a good Quick History of the transit method and Kepler Mission concept on the…
May 10, 2013
The future of Astrobiology research within NASA is being set now.
Next week there are further opportunities for community input.The online discussion for Solar System Exploration wraps up today!
If you are an active researcher, a student planning on getting into astrobiology, or an interested…
May 9, 2013
What are Origami Nanosat Telescopes? How about Kinetic Inductance Detectors?
More importantly, what should we do with them?
NASA's Astrophysics is doing a Roadmap exercise, with the stated intent to look at science goals, technology and capabilities up to 30 years out!
White papers were solicited a…
May 8, 2013
It is critically important that the community participate in the current ongoing discussion for the NASA roadmaps. Particularly if you are an early career researcher. This is your opportunity to make the case for what you think is interesting and important.
NASA Astrobiology
NASA is going…
May 4, 2013
They were amateurish videos, often black and white, sometimes just a disembodied hand writing simple equations on a blackboard as a quirky voice from off screen gave well practiced short lectures highlighting the essential learning elements.
The pedagogy was revolutionary, university level material…
May 3, 2013
Just read a series of interesting articles on inquiry based science:
Inquiry Science rocks: Or does it - David Klahr tries to test the efficacy of discovery learning (APS News 12. 2012).
Direct Instruction rocks: Or does it - Richard Hake takes issue with Klahr's inferences.
To be contrasted with:…
May 3, 2013
Knock. Knock.
Hello?
Is this thing still working?
Anyone there?
Ok, it is end of semester and I am out of excuses.
Time to clear out some backlog of stuff to read.
Am I Wrong? - Bruce Alberts, Editor in Chief of Science, worries about the future.
He is rarely wrong.
Time Crystals - interesting…
April 13, 2013
"I came with all my books, lived in dorms, followed directions.
I worked, I studied hard, met lots of folks who had connections.
I crammed, they gave me grades, and may I say not in a fair way.
But more, much more than this, I did it their way."
Many years ago, I heard this, I Did It Their Way, on…
March 31, 2013
The department of Astronomy & Astrophysics is proud to announce a special colloquium by a distinguished visitor:
TITLE: Emission Lines Accompanying Gamma-Ray Flares from the Tidal Disruption of Dyson Spheres by Binary Intermediate-Mass Black Holes at z ~ 10.
Special Lunch Talk, Monday, April 1…
March 21, 2013
this is not a Planck post...
Visalization of the Gödel Universe
WMAP-9
Who Wrote Shakespeare's Plays? - Astrophysicist lets you pick the priors and decide...
Harvard did WHAT?
"Detection of Carbon Monoxide and Water Absorption Lines in an Exoplanet Atmosphere" - Konopacky et al Science (sub) -…
March 18, 2013
Answers on a single sheet double spaced 12 pt font, by monday, please, including figures.
The NASA Advisory Council, subcommittee on Astrophysics, has started a Roadmap Exercise.
The roadmap exercise was called for at the February 2013 meeting.
The roadmap is intended to:
Articulate NASA’s…
March 12, 2013
Planets, planets everywhere
and on some there will be drops to drink.
An interesting confluence of research occurred over the last few months, leading to:
"A revised estimate of the occurrence rate of terrestrial planets in the habitable zones around Kepler M-dwarfs" by Ravi kumar Kopparapu PSU (…
March 11, 2013
Inspired by Tim Hamilton's facebook post I played a bit with my old bit of silfurberg this weekend
In particular, I was curious to test whether there was some plausibility to birefringent calcite being the "sunstone" of the Saga's.
This evening, about an hour before sunset, we had nice thick rain…
March 11, 2013
There were a number of interesting results reported today, the start of what promises to be an interesting week:
IR spectra of HR 8799 planets - Scharf at SciAm blogs reports on the Oppenheimer et al paper using the P1640 at the Palomar telescope.
Their interpretation of the rather low signal-to-…
March 11, 2013
I think we should take some pie over, in person.
Discovery of a Binary Brown Dwarf at 2 Parsecs from the Sun - Kevin Luhman, ApJLetters in press.
That is just over 6 light years away, making it the third closest system from the Sun, and the closest known substellar system, only the α Cen triple…
March 10, 2013
When I was about 9 years old, my grandmother gave me a piece of Iceland Spar, it had belonged to my grandfather and she felt I ought to have it.
Iceland Spar
This is the piece, my kids have it now, somewhere along the way it broke into three pieces while in storage.
She showed me the…
March 9, 2013
My quasi-periodic dump of interestingee thingees off the intertoobz
"The Most Precise Extra-Galactic Black-Hole Mass Measurement" A. Gould (ApJ submitted) aka the most talked about paper in astronomy this week...
How to kill your audience - apparently fake Wolverine claws are essential...
Time to…
March 8, 2013
The Dark Matter Crisis Continues
Pavel and Marcel give the back story of what happened at scilog and the social media mud flinging over MOND and other alternate conjectures for modified gravity.
Also on the fb "Astronomers" group
"The Dark Matter Crisis" will have a guest blog entry tomorrow on the…
February 27, 2013
Sequestration begins on Friday, and this time for real... it is, ironically, Hubble Space Telescope Proposal Deadline Day, but then everyday is a Proposal Day.
I'm guessing that this year the "Hubble Constant" will decrease.
The Agencies are now revealing their plans to deal with sequester.
As you…