Benjamin Dean Lecture: The Dark Side of the Milky Way

The Milky Way is both a beautiful sight in the night sky and the nearest galaxy that astronomers can study. It is also home to many of the most spectacular images coming from the Hubble Space Telescope. But in its heart of darkness lurks a black hole with a mass millions of times greater than that of the Sun. In its outermost parts, the Milky Way is cloaked by dark matter: mysterious material of unknown, probably exotic composition that produces strange, observable effects at the Galaxy's periphery. Dr. Blitz will describe the Galaxy we know and see, as well as the black core and dark mantle of the Milky Way we cannot.

Speaker: Dr. Leo Blitz, Professor of Astronomy, University of California Berkeley