Science Briefing: Live from AAS! 2025
Location
Virtual
Contact Information
About Event
Please join us for this special edition of the NASA’s Universe of Learning Science Briefings! We will be live at the American Astronomical Society meeting in National Harbor, Maryland, where scientists will be releasing the latest findings on the universe. We’ll provide access to some of the breaking news coming out of NASA Astrophysics missions, and tie these results to NASA’s Big Questions:
- How Does the Universe Work?
- How Did We Get Here?
- Are We Alone?
In addition to the new science results, we will highlight several NASA resources. There will also be opportunities for you to ask questions directly of those presenting.
About the Series
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
-
Dr. Kelly Lepo is an Education and Outreach Scientist at the Space Telescope Science Institute, where she supports outreach efforts for the James Webb Space Telescope. She received a PhD in Astronomy and Astrophysics from the University of Toronto. During her time in Canada, she made numerous local and national media appearances to talk about everything from the 2012 Mayan Apocalypse to the Super Blue Blood Moon. She previously served as the Coordinator of the McGill Space Institute, taught physics at Gonzaga University, and helped build the Large Hadron Collider at CERN -
Jim Manning is a science education consultant with long experience as a planetarium director, including in a museum setting. Most recently, he has served as head of the Office of Public Outreach at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, and as Executive Director of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific in San Francisco. He’s a past president of the International Planetarium Society, and has been Principal Investigator or Co-PI for a number of NASA-funded and NSF-funded programs in informal science education. He currently consults for the NASA’s Universe of Learning program.
-
Logan Fries grew up in Kansas City, Missouri. He earned his bachelor’s degree in physics from the University of Missouri - Kansas City in 2018. Logan is currently pursuing his doctorate in physics at the University of Connecticut supervised by Dr. Jonathan Trump (no relation), and will graduate in the spring of 2025. Logan’s research focuses on understanding the inner environments of supermassive black holes. -
Emma Lieb is a third-year PhD candidate and a NASA FINESST recipient at the University of Denver. She works with Dr. Jennifer Hoffman to study the dust formation processes and colliding wind structures in carbon-rich Wolf-Rayet binary star systems. -
Dr. Josh Peek is an astronomer specializing in the dynamics, kinematics, and structure of the interstellar medium and diffuse matter in the Milky Way and beyond. His work combines large surveys with AI/ML methods to study the interplay between gas and dust in the Galaxy and the broader context of Galactic dynamics and accretion processes. Using open data and open science approaches, they aim to extract meaningful physical insights from large datasets to advance our understanding of the interstellar medium and its role in galaxy evolution. He is currently head of data science at STScI.
Event Resources
-
Slide Presentation PPT
135 MB -
Slide Presentation PDF
14 MB