2008 Podcasts

(December 11, 2008) Dr. Scott Dahm of the W. M. Keck Observatory has been using the 10-meter telescopes on Mauna Kea and the Spitzer Space Telescope to study how young stars provide clues about the formation of the Solar System and other planetary systems. Determining where planets come from is a key question in astronomy. Dr. Dahm provides a first-hand look at the research that is beginning to answer this question.

(November 6, 2008) Observations with the Keck telescopes are giving new clues to understanding dark matter, an as-yet-undetected component of the cosmos. What is dark matter? Where is it? How do astronomers know it exists? These questions and many more will be answered by Dr. Josh Simon of the California Institute of Technology in his lecture “The Dark Side of Galaxies”.

(October 30, 2008) In this lecture, part of the Sharing Astronomy with Kupuna program hosted by W. M. Keck Observatory, Ed Stevens of Kahu Ku Mauna presents Cultural Beliefs and Practices on Mauna Kea. Dr. Robert Goodrich of the W. M. Keck Observatory also presents Keck’s Greatest Hits: Top Astronomical Discoveries.

(July 24, 2008) Dr. Paul Butler from the Carnegie Institution of Washington, Department of Terrestrial Magnetism presents “Extrasolar Planets: The Last Decade, and the Next.” Before 1995 planets outside our Solar System were the stuff of science fiction, Star Wars and Star Trek. Now with nearly 300 exo-planets known, many of them discovered at Keck, we are focused on new challenges: finding planetary systems similar to our own Solar System and small rocky planets like Earth

(May 22, 2008) Dr. Rafael Millan-Gabet from the California Institute of Technology presents “Planet Forming Disks - What We Can Learn by Combining the World’s Largest Telescopes.” His research examines physical conditions in the inner parts of disks around young stars, where planets like Earth are believed to form. Combining the largest existing telescopes so they act in concert, the Keck Interferometer, provides unprecedented detail, and allows us to infer crucial properties of exo-Earth nurseries.

(April 24, 2008) Dr. James Graham from the University of California at Berkeley presents “Planetary Debris Disks”. Planetary debris disks are circumstellar clouds of dust detected in young planetary systems. This dust is believed to be released by collisions between larger bodies such as comets, asteroids and even planets. Although this dust was discovered in the early 1980s, adaptive optics imaging from the Keck Observatory is now giving astronomers our first clear view of planetary debris disks in other planetary systems.