Science Briefing: Andromeda Galaxy
Location
Virtual
Contact Information
About Event
In this edition of NASA’s Universe of Learning Science Briefings, we will learn about the formation and evolution of our nearest large neighbor galaxy, the Andromeda Galaxy. The clues to its formation and evolution come from the stellar structure of Andromeda, the unusual companion galaxies and the streams of stars that surround the disk of Andromeda, and the movement (“kinematics”) and chemical make-ups (“abundances”) of stars in Andromeda.
Dr. Ben Williams will introduce the Andromeda Galaxy, focusing on its structure and resolved stellar populations.
Dr. Michelle Collins will explore the stellar streams and unusual satellite galaxies around our large spiral galaxy neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy.
Dr. Ivanna Escala will discuss how measurements of the chemical composition and kinematics of individual stars in the Andromeda galaxy can reveal its history of formation and evolution.
Image Credit: ESA/NASA/JPL-Caltech/GBT/WSRT/IRAM/C. Clark (STScI)
The NASA’s Universe of Learning Science Briefings are professional learning telecons for the informal science education community, done in partnership with the NASA’s Museum & Informal Education Alliance, now found on NASA CONNECTS. These monthly thematic briefings highlight current NASA astrophysics explorations and discoveries from across the suite of NASA astrophysics missions. NASA scientists and engineers provide contemporary science results, and are able to respond to listener questions during the telecon. NASA-developed education and outreach resources, matched to the monthly theme, are included in every briefing.
In order to participate in the telecon and ask questions of the scientists, please join NASA’s Museum & Informal Education Alliance.
Facilitator & Presenters
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Dr. Ben Williams was awarded his bachelor’s degree in physics from the Middlebury College and his Astronomy Ph.D. degree from the University of Washington. He was then a postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, and a research associate at Penn State University before returning to the University of Washington where he is now a research professor of astronomy. His research focuses on the evolution of galaxies and stars through observations of resolved stars and X-ray sources in nearby galaxies. -
Dr. Michelle Collins completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Manchester before delving into the Andromeda satellite system during her Ph.D. degree studies at Cambridge University. She was the Galaxies and Cosmology Fellow at the Max-Planck Institute for Astronomy in Germany, and a Hubble Fellow at Yale in the USA. She is now an Associate Professor at the University of Surrey in the United Kingdom.
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Dr. Ivanna Escala is a postdoctoral fellow at Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). Before joining STScI, Dr. Escala was a Carnegie–Princeton Fellow at the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution for Science and Princeton University. She obtained her Ph.D. in Astrophysics from the California Institute of Technology in 2020, where she was a Fellow of the Ford Foundation and National Science Foundation and a France A. Cordova Tombrello Scholar. Her recent research focuses on star formation histories of the Magellanic Clouds and resolved stellar kinematics and chemical abundance measurements of dwarf galaxies in the Local Galaxy Group. -
Dr. Seppo Laine is a Staff Scientist at Caltech/IPAC. He was a member of the Science User Support and IRAC instrument support teams of the Spitzer Space Telescope from 2002 to 2021. He is currently involved in the formulation of the Roman Space Telescope’s Science Support Center at IPAC and in the IPAC Communications and Education team. His scientific interests include low surface brightness objects, and galaxy dynamics and interactions.
Event Resources
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Slide Presentation PPT
60 MB -
Resources Document
282 KB -
Chat Transcript
89 KB