Spotlight
Upcoming Public Talk in Spanish
On December 7, Astrocharlas presents another public talk in Spanish (there is no English translation). Dr. Jorge Barrera-Ballesteros, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México will speak. You can see details HERE. It's not in-person, but only on youtube at 6pm Dec 7, at THIS LINK.
Recent Science Press Releases
Here are links to three recent science news articles from the Dept. of Astronomy/Steward Observatory: Hot Jupiters, protocluster of galaxies at redshift 2, "special deliveries" podcast.
1) NASA Sagan Fellow Megan Mansfield led a study of the chemical makeup of Hot Jupiters. A coauthor is David Sing, who got a BS from UArizona Astronomy in 2000.
2) Associate Professor Brenda Frye was part of a team discovering members of a protocluster of galaxies at redshift 2. Two press releases can be seen HERE and HERE. Former Steward postdoc Hervé Dole is also a coauthor.
3) Ass't Professor Erika Hamden was ob a poscast about "special deliveries", "when it absolutely has to be there...", LINK. "This hour, TED speakers explore the often perilous journey of crucial deliveries."
First and Second Year Grad Students Back on Campus
On August 25, 2021, we welcomed the second-year grad students and new grad students back to campus after this long COVID closure. The photo above shows both groups of students: (from left to right) Xiangyu Jin, Hayden Foote, Jasmin Washington, Vivian Carvajal, Maria Gabriela Cota, Jeniveve Pearson, Christa DeCoursey, Jake Helton, Rebecca Minsley, Maria Pudoka, Joe Adamo, Nick Schragal, Yu-Hsiu Huang, Evan Mayer, Yang Sun.
(Not pictured - first-year students: Donghyeon (Jeff) Khim, Chia-Lin Ko second-year students: Haley Bowden, Soley Hyman, Aafaque Khan, Sophie Lebowitz, Matthew Murphy, Lily Whitler)
A more formal photo of the first-year students can be seen HERE, with the second-year students HERE.
51 Pegasi b Fellowship at University of Arizona
The 51 Peg b postdoctoral fellowship (Heising-Simons Foundation) is soliciting applications. The due date is Oct 1, 2021. Note that only certain institutions may host a 51 Peg b postdoctoral scholar: the UA is one of them. Astronomy/Steward welcome applications to the Heising-Simons Foundation that list us as a first-choice institution. For specific UA information on this fellowship, please contact Dr Jared Males (jrmales@email.arizona.edu) or Dr Buell Januzzi, the Department Chair (bjannuzi@as.arizona.edu). Read more about the fellowship HERE and HERE.
We note that Steward grad Ben Rackham of UA Astronomy received a 51 Peg b fellowship to work at MIT starting in Fall 2019. Ya-Lin Wu, a 2018 fellow, also from UA Astronomy, is now working at UT Austin. Thaddeus Komacek of UA Planetary Sciences and a 2018 fellow, is now at the University of Chicago.
Graduation 2020
On May 14, 2020, we used a "webinar" program to join from afar faculty, staff, parents, friends, relatives, and astronomy alumni. We all gathered to celebrate 29 graduating undergraduate astronomy majors and 12 astronomy minors.The list of names follows this text. Four screenshots, along with the text of former astronaut Dr. George "Pinky" Nelson's speech are given in the following five links: ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, TEXT. You can watch the 80 min audio/video HERE.
Congratulations and good luck to everyone, and special thanks to everyone who made this graduation possible.
If you're interested in going to school in astronomy at UArizona, the presentation also provides a Department-wide perspective of our undergraduate program, including opportunities for research, funding, and inter-Department programming available to our students.
Graduates:
Astronomy Majors-- Samantha Elizabeth Andrews; Marco Antonio Barragan; Cassandra Bodin; Yuxuan Chen; Sean Cunningham; Xingzhong Fan; Farah Fauzi; Colin Alexander Hauch; Yuan Jea Hew; Joseph Robert Hickey; Mackenzie Madisen James; Charlotte Kevis; Michael Klein; Reagen Anne Leimbach; Collin Davis Lewin; Jimmy Lilly; Sammie Mackie; José Angel Pérez Chávez; Chirag Rathi; Daniel Ryan Robinson; William Walker Rockwell; Trevor James Smith; Alejandra Jimena Stephenson; James Jordan Taylor; Justin Tazeah Osiris Ugaitafa; Madison Victoria Walder; Emily Catherine Walla; Ryan T. Webster; Steven Zhou-Wright
Astronomy Minors-- Adam Michael Bauer; Haley Love Collins; Jackson Williams DeStefano; Nicholas Richard Ferrone; Rebeca Christine Gardner; Zackary Kyle Hatfield ;Jacob Reis Heller; Minseong Kang; Evan William Mekenney; Shitij Seth; Sukriti Sinha; Prem Kumar Thirunagari
ASTR Major Wins Data Visualization Challenge
Undergraduate and graduate students from different disciplines were invited to submit visual displays of data to tell stories. This is the second year that the Libraries’ Office of Digital Innovation & Stewardship (ODIS) has sponsored the event. View the winning entries and access the digital collection.
Abstract of Tintin's project: The Law of Large Numbers and the Central Limit Theorem are two of the most fundamental and elegant theorems in Probability Theory. However, these concepts are impractical to demonstrate because they require an immense number of trials to observe the long-term behaviors of random variables. Therefore, this case study runs computer simulations on coin tossing as an intuitive example to explain these statistical concepts. The visualizations provide insights into the theorems without mathematically rigorous proofs, making them accessible for introductory statistics learners.
Third place: Ashwin Raj, Mathematics
Honorable mention: Torin Hodge, Biosystems Engineering
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For Public
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For Students
A good place to start if you want to become an undergrad major or grad student, or need to find our schedule of classes.
For Scientists
Find telescopes and instruments, telescope time applications, staff and mountain contacts, and faculty and staff scientific interests.
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