» » »

Cosmic Rumbles and Fireworks from Merging Neutron Stars - CANCELED

Colleen Wilson-Hodge

Neutron stars are the remnants of supernova explosions. These stars have the mass of our Sun packed into a package the size of a city. When two of these tiny stars spiral in and crash into each other, the first evidence that humans can detect are gravitational waves and a short gamma-ray burst. Gravitational waves are ripples in space time, predicted by Einstein in his general theory of relativity. Gamma-ray bursts are the “birth-cry” of black holes. On August 17, 2017, gravitational waves were detected by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory (LIGO) and 1.7 seconds later, NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM) detected a short gamma-ray burst.

Dr. Wilson-Hodge will tell the story of the gamma-ray burst discovery with Fermi GBM, illustrating the exciting physics that we have learned from this single event, along with the many open questions that still remain. she will describe similar events, without gravitational wave counterparts, that we have found in past GBM data, along with efforts to find new coincident events.

Speaker: Colleen Wilson-Hodge, NASA/MSFC

Monday, 06/01/20

Contact:

Website: Click to Visit

Cost:

$15 General, $12 Members & Seniors

Save this Event:

iCalendar
Google Calendar
Yahoo! Calendar
Windows Live Calendar

California Academy of Sciences

55 Music Concourse Dr.
San Francisco, CA 94118
USA


Phone: (415) 379-8000
Website: Click to Visit