Hearts of Darkness: Black Holes in Space

Black holes are regions of space where gravity is so strong that nothing, not even light, can escape! No longer confined to the imaginations of science-fiction writers and theoretical physicists, black holes have recently been discovered in large numbers by observational astronomers. Learn about the remarkable properties of these bizarre objects from one of the finest explainers in the field of astronomy.

Speaker: Alex Filippenko is one of the world's most highly cited astronomers, and the recipient of numerous prizes for his research. He was a member of both teams that discovered the accelerating expansion of the Universe; this was named the "Top Science Breakthrough of 1998" by Science magazine, and the teams received the 2007 Gruber Cosmology Prize for their discovery. Prof. Filippenko has won the highest teaching awards at UC Berkeley, where the student body has voted him the "Best Professor" on campus six times, and he was selected as the 2006 Carnegie/CASE National Professor of the Year among doctoral institutions.

Room 106