Gamma ray busts (GRBs), the death throes of the most massive stars, are the brightest explosions in the universe. These unique events give us a brief glimpse into early galaxies otherwise invisible to even the most sensitive telescopes, and allow us to attempt to figure out the star formation history of these galaxies through the dust and gas visible along the line of sight to the GRB. Dr. Updike will talk about her observations of GRBs with NASA's Swift satellite and observatories in Arizona and Chile.
“Cosmic harmony”, “the music of the spheres”, it’s a concept that has resonated with human civilizations on Earth since ancient times.
Now we know that this “cosmic harmony” bears some truth, also in a scientific way of looking at our universe. Many of the stars that we observe in our night sky ring with sound, like giant musical instruments. The study of this stellar music is called asteroseismology, and it allows us to probe the depths of our universe in much more detail than ever previously thought possible.
I will present my field of research and its applications, and illustrate it with some soundbites of actual stars.
