Comets and their tales

Comets are very much in the news, with the recent visit by Comet Neowise. They have a much wider significance in astronomy than just providing spectacular sights in the sky, as their origin, development and composition tell us a great deal about the solar system as a whole.

Biography

Antonio Martin-Carrillo is an UCD Ad Astra fellow/Assistant Professor in the School of Physics. He graduated with a BSc and MSc in Physics with Astronomy from University Complutense Madrid. Following 2 years working at the European Space Agency as part of the XMM-Newton space observatory calibration team, he moved to UCD where he completed his PhD investigating gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and pulsars.

He is currently a member of the Space Science Group studying the transient Universe and in particular the prompt and afterglow emission of GRBs using high-energy space observatories and ground-based telescopes such as UCD’s Watcher robotic telescope.

His research also includes the development of software tools for advanced data analysis. As such he is an ambassador and collaborator on the Astropy project aimed at providing a wide range of software packages written in Python for use in astronomy. He is also a member of the INTEGRAL multi-messenger group searching for gamma-ray counterparts to gravitational waves, neutrino events and other transient sources; the ATHENA X-ray space observatory, an ESA large mission scheduled to launch in 2028, and the THESEUS space telescope, currently in its study phase with ESA.

Paul Evans is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: IAA Zoom Meeting
Time: Jan 5, 2022 07:15 PM London

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https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86772024897?pwd=YzhURHhRTjJheE5QZnlBREl4dDZmUT09

Meeting ID: 867 7202 4897
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This talk will also be Simulcast on our YouTube Channel

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“Asteroids: the key to unlocking the secrets of the Solar System ”

Synopsis

Asteroids are the small bodies of the Solar System which represent the leftovers of planet formation. They can be found throughout the Solar system, mainly in the rocky asteroid belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter and the more icy region beyond the orbit of Neptune.

By considering the physical properties of these bodies and how they came to be on their present orbits one can investigate the various processes of Solar System formation. Asteroids provide clues as to how the first solid bodies grew out of the disk of gas and dust from which the Sun was born, and how these small bodies then grew into the major planets. Furthermore their distribution throughout space tells us how the planets would have migrated from their birth locations in the early Solar System, scattering these asteroids as they went.

The asteroids are an invaluable key to unlocking the secrets of the Solar System, helping to explain how planets such as the Earth came to be. They are both the building blocks of our planet from which life developed and also a threat to life in terms of their continuing collisions with the Earth. As such they are fundamentally linked to understanding our place in the Universe and are an extremely fruitful subject of study.

Bio:

James (Jamie) Robinson

2011 – 2016: MPhys Durham University (year abroad at McMaster University 2013 – 2014)
2016 – 2020: PhD at Queen’s University Belfast on The Origin and Evolution of Transneptunian Binaries. 2017 LSST Data Science Fellow
2020 – 2021: Postdoc at QUB, ATLAS asteroid science
2021 – present: Postdoc at University of Edinburgh, LSST software tools

My research has covered a wide range of topics within the realm of small Solar System bodies. These objects represent the leftovers of planet formation and have a diverse range of physical and orbital properties. My research makes use of intensive computations and data science techniques to simulate and investigate the properties of small Solar System bodies. Studying such objects provides a valuable constraint on how the Solar System formed and gives us insight into how the Earth, and life, came to be.

For my PhD I conducted intensive numerical simulations to study how a binary pair of planetesimals can form through the collapse of a cloud of pebbles in the outer reaches of the early Solar System. I also considered how such binaries evolved under the effects of planetary migration which is believed to produce the Solar System of today.

I then took up a postdoctoral position at QUB which brought my research into the inner Solar System. I have utilised the large database of photometry from the ATLAS survey to study the surface properties of asteroids. The Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System is one of several wide field surveys that scan the sky discovering transient phenomena and I assist in efforts to analyse the data in real time searching for possible Earth impactors.

I have recently started a postdoc at the University of Edinburgh where I will focus on developing software tools for the next big wide field survey, the Legacy Survey of Space and Time. LSST will be a revolution in Solar System science, discovering and characterising an order of magnitude more objects than previously known.

Paul Evans is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: IAA Zoom Meeting
Time: Dec 8, 2021 07:15 PM London

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Meeting ID: 859 2771 3853
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This talk will also be Simulcast on our YouTube Channel

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“The Active Sun – Observations of our Closest Star”.

Details to follow…..

Paul Evans is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: IAA Zoom Meeting
Time: Nov 24, 2021 07:15 PM London

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Meeting ID: 813 9568 4573
Passcode: 986079

The room will open around 19:15 to allow for a prompt start

This talk will also be Simulcast on our YouTube Channel

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“Earth’s Constant Companion”

Synopsis.

This will be a general presentation on Earth’s constant celestial companion, the Moon. Its formation, physical attributes, movements, effects on the Earth and how to observe it. It will be a fun, entertaining and hopefully informative talk that will have something in it for all ages with no prior knowledge required

Biography

It is presented by IAS member Dr. Donnacha O’Driscoll who is a scientist by profession. He is the General Manager of the Science Foundation Ireland research centre ‘Insight’ in UCD.

Although professionally he has worked in the biotechnology and data analytical sectors, his passion is in astronomy and in particular Lunar astronomy.

He has been an active observer of the Moon for over 40 years and has presented many talks on the subject in that time. He established and runs the website www.themoon.ie which is an outreach project, acting as a source of information and teaching aids on all things Lunar to individuals young and old and to various groups and schools.

Paul Evans is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: IAA Lecture
Time: Nov 10, 2021 07:15 PM London

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Meeting ID: 863 4633 4772
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This talk will also be Simulcast on our YouTube Channel

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“Gravitational waves and the hunt for merging neutron stars”

Details coming soon

Paul Evans is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

Topic: IAA Zoom Meeting 27th Oct
Time: Oct 27, 2021 07:15 PM London

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Meeting ID: 815 0761 3599
Passcode: 745640