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KICP Talk
The first planetarium was developed over 90 years ago. Today thousands of planetaria exist all across the world. This talk will argue that the future of the planetarium is to make the transformation to a big data visualization facility. After reviewing the state of the art in planetarium visualization the talk will conclude with a invitation for University researchers to visualize their data sets at the Adler Planetarium.

Speaker Biography: Mark SubbaRao is the Director of the Space Visualization Laboratory at the Adler Planetarium. He received his bachelors degree in engineering physics at Lehigh University and his Ph.D from Johns Hopkins University in astrophysics. His Ph.D thesis concerned the characterization and evolution of the luminosity function of galaxies. After obtaining his degree he worked as a post doctoral researcher at the University of Chicago on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey a project to make a 3D map of the Universe. He has led the development of major exhibition galleries at the Adler such as "The Universe: A Walk Through Time and Space" and has also produced, written and directed a number of stereoscopic videos and full-dome planetarium shows. These include the planetarium shows "Welcome to the Universe" and "Cosmic Wonder." His visualizations have been widely shown in print and television. He was part of a team that created a first-prize-winning visualization in the 2011 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge. He was also on a team that was awarded the best visualization at XCEDE 2013. Dr. SubbaRao chairs the international Planetarium Society's Task Force on Science and Data Visualization, which seeks to realize the potential of the planetarium as a scientific visualization tool.

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KICP Workshop
Location: Michigan A (East Tower, Bronze Level) , Hyatt Regency Chicago

Description
This session will highlight a new program to bring astrophysics to older adults, where older Chicagoans are learning all about space from the researchers themselves. Come learn about how the physicists were prepared to work with older adults, how the programming was marketed and implemented, and the outcomes of this novel project.

Objectives
1. Increase understanding of opportunities to interact with University or Research settings and to bring their expertise to older adults in your community.
2. Identify components of the training that was provided to prepare astrophysics faculty to have a successful presentation to older adults.
3. Recognize the different marketing and outreach techniques used to bring older audiences to the project and programming.
4. Develop ideas for replication of high level programming in their own communities.
5. Learn about the experience of and lessons learned by a physics researcher working with older adults and the aging network, and bringing their expertise to a new audience.

Outcomes
1. Physicists learned how to better reach older audiences
2. Older adults were exposed to high level science programming
3. Collaboration between the University of Chicago, Chicago Department on Aging and other community-based organizations.
4. Development of a model to unite university faculty with older adult programming.

Presenters

• Joyce Gallagher, MA, Executive Director of Senior Services, City of Chicago - Department of Family and Support Services
• Daniel Grin, PhD, RN, KICP Associate fellow, NSF Astronomy and, University of Chicago
• Karen Kolb Flude, MS, RFG, Principal, Age with Ease

Astronomy Conversation
Have you always wanted to meet the people behind the science at the Adler? During Astronomy Conversations, you can exchange ideas with Adler space science and technology experts and learn more about ongoing Adler projects.

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KICP Lecture
UChicago's astronomers travel from Hyde Park to all continents of the world, as well as outer space, to explore the universe. In this lecture, Edward W. "Rocky" Kolb will describe the quest of UChicago astronomers to unlock the mysteries of the universe: dark matter, dark energy, and the possibility that we are not alone.

Edward W. Kolb (usually known as Rocky) is the dean of the Division of the Physical Sciences and the Arthur Holly Compton Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics and the College at the University of Chicago. He is the founding head of the Theoretical Astrophysics Group, the founding director of the Particle Astrophysics Center at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Physical Society, and the recipient of numerous teaching awards. Kolb's book The Early Universe, coauthored with Michael Turner, is the standard textbook on particle physics and cosmology.

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

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KICP Event
Join us for a conversation between COSMOSIS artist-duo Sarah and Joseph Belknap and exoplanet-expert Jacob Bean as they orbit topics relating to art, experimentation, and our existence within the environment of space. This intimate discussion will give the audience a chance to listen and ask questions about the Belkaps and Bean's processes, allowing for greater access and understanding of the fields of art and science.

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

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Lecture
Join us at HPAC for the COSMOSIS opening reception featuring a performance by Douglas Ewart, DJ sets by John Corbett, and sun-gazing with Sarah + Joseph Belknap.

Programming schedule:
2-3:30 John Corbett DJ set
3:30-4 Douglas Ewart performance
4-4:30 John Corbett DJ set
Sun-gazing with Sarah + Joseph Belknap throughout the event

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

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Talk
CMB cosmology is currently undergoing a data-rich epoch, with measurements on small scales from experiments like the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) and it polarisation instrument, ACTPol, adding to measurements on larger scales by Planck, WMAP and most recently BICEP. I will contextualise the measurements and present constraints on parameters from the observations at 148 GHz and 217 GHz respectively by ACT from three years of observations. I'll discuss my recent re-analysis of data from the 2013 data release by the Planck satellite, where we found that the 217GHz x 217GHz detector set spectrum used in the Planck analysis is responsible for some of the tension between the Planck parameters and other astronomical measurements. I'll show evidence suggesting residual systematics in the detector set spectra used in the Planck likelihood code, and discuss how the picture has changed with updated Planck data, and put things in context with the BICEP results. I'll highlight the recent ACTPol results, and outline how upcoming information from various cosmological probes will open up the window on the epoch of reionisation; our least explored epoch to date.

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

KICP Lecture
Every Saturday morning beginning April 4, through June 6, 2015; lectures start at 11:00 a.m. (No lecture on May 23rd, Memorial Day weekend).

Neutron stars are born in the final moments of the supernova death of massive stars and, in keeping with their exotic origin, they exhibit unmatched extremes in a variety of ways. Not only are they the smallest stars we know of, neutron stars are the most dense solid objects in the known Universe. Their surface gravity is 100 billion times that of the Earth and their magnetic fields' strengths, which can reach 10¹⁵ Gauss, are the strongest known to exist. Neutron stars are born rotating rapidly and their emission, like the beam from a lighthouse, is observed as a highly stable and regular periodic pulsation - hence the name 'pulsating star' or 'pulsar'. Although pulsars were discovered over 40 years ago and the number of known pulsars exceeds 2400, the physical processes which power the vast array of unique and often bizarre phenomena observed from pulsars are poorly understood. Explaining the observed behaviour of neutron stars has become one of the most challenging puzzles in high-energy astrophysics. Despite the longstanding mystery of their emission, the steady and predictable pulsations from pulsars make them remarkably powerful astrophysical tools. This duality has put pulsars at the centre of some of the most compelling astrophysical research of the last few decades.

Each week we will explore different aspects of this duality, by reviewing pulsar phenomena in different wave bands (radio, optical, x-ray, gamma-ray) and by discussing the role of pulsars in tests of Einstein's theory of relativity and in the search for gravitational waves. No scientific background is required -- just bring your curiosity.

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

Talk
Launched in 1977 to explore Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, the two Voyager spacecraft continued their journeys beyond the planets as they searched for the edge of the heliosphere, the giant bubble of wind surrounding the sun. Beyond the bubble lies interstellar space, the space between the stars filled with matter from the explosions of other stars and by the magnetic field of the Milky Way. After a 35-year journey taking it 11 billion miles from the sun, Voyager 1 became the first human-made object to enter interstellar space. Join Edward C. Stone, the 2015 Alumni Medalist, to learn about Voyager's journey of discovery.

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

KICP Yerkes Institute
Instructors: Louis Abramson, Ross Cawthon, Zoheyr Doctor, Dylan Hatt, Chen He, Sean Johnson, Randy Landsberg, Jason Poh.

Tonight we will begin a week of engineering and exploration. Throughout the week, we will tackle a number of engineering challenges associated with exploring a distant planet: Mars. After this week of working in teams, defining problems, brainstorming, building, testing, and improving your designs, you will make a presentation to your family and fellow students about what you did and learned. Below, we describe the institute schedule and format so you can better plan for the week ahead. The institute will kick-off with a star party hosted by the Milwaukee Astronomical Society (MAS) on Sunday night. During the day on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we will focus on three daytime laboratories, each of which explores a different engineering challenge associated with exploring the surface of Mars: Robotic Manipulation, Extraterrestrial Navigation and Launching/Landing (see lab summary descriptions on page iii). You will be divided into three groups named after past Mars missions: VIKING, PATHFINDER, and CURIOSITY. Each group will devote an entire day to each daytime lab, but the groups will cycle through the labs in a different order. By the end of the day on Wednesday, each group will have performed all three of the day labs.

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

KICP Life Long Learning Series
Organizer: Daniel Grin

Lecture
Every Saturday morning beginning October 3 through December 12, 2015. There will be no lecture on November 28th (Thanksgiving weekend) or December 5 ("Physics with a Bang!").

Supernova explosions mark the violent deaths of massive stars and the ignition of ultra-dense cores of stars called white dwarfs. The luminosity produced by these cosmic catastrophes is millions to hundreds of billions times greater than that of the sun, meaning that they can outshine their entire host galaxy. The massive stars that evolve into supernova explosions synthesize heavy nuclei that are some of the main ingredients of life. The immense intrinsic brightness of these events allows us to discover them at great distances and use some of them as "standard candles" to measure large cosmic scales enabling us to explore some of the most fundamental properties of the Universe. Supernovae are observed to be a very diverse group of astrophysical objects with many ranges in luminosities, durations and chemical composition. The onset of modern fully-automated wide field telescopes and the large number of amateur astronomers searching for them has allowed us to better understand their nature and explosion mechanism. Furthermore, realistic three-dimensional supernova simulations run on supercomputers have given us a unique insight on the physics associated with the explosion mechanism.

Each week we will explore the conditions that lead to supernova explosions by first understanding the evolution of massive stars, the variety of mechanisms proposed for the explosion itself, and the associated numerical supercomputer simulations largely performed by the astrophysicists here at the University of Chicago. No scientific background is required -- just bring your curiosity.

KICP Yerkes Institute
Instructors: Cosmin Deaconu, Zoheyr Doctor, Brittany Kamai, Randy Landsberg, Rito Basu Thakur.

At this Yerkes Winter Institute, we will explore the connections between musical instruments and the physics of sound. Students will build their own pan flutes, drums, and synthesizers to learn about the principles that drive instrument design and construction. With homemade instruments in hand, students will examine how physical parameters and playing techniques affect sound and quality (i.e., frequency and time domain waveforms produced by their instruments).